I went off script, we didn't talk about this one, but I poured myself one. This counts as a brunch cocktail, right? It's a Greyhound. Sure. Oh, nice. Is it peach in color or is that the glass? It's grapefruit juice. Oh. And vodka. Oh. I prefer a salty dog. Salty dog. I knew you were gonna say that, Roger. What makes it salty? Salt. Salt. Oh, well, I'm salty enough. That's for damn sure. That was like three terrible dad jokes in a row. Hey folks, Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. This week, we're talking about brunch cocktails, and I don't think a lot of people are hosting brunch during quarantine, so we're not calling it a quarantine-y episode, but we're gonna have a lot of fun anyway. Stuff you might drink sometime before noon, and that's okay. I'm Greg, I do communications at Binny's. Today joined by Chris. Hey, I'm Chris, I do wine. And Alicia. Good to be here. Thanks for having me on. I'm also in wine and excited to talk about brunch. And everybody's favorite, Roger, is in the room. Hey, folks. Roger, beer, cocktail enthusiast. May I say that just to start things off that although people may not be hosting brunches, I think the rate of day drinking may be much greater than the average right now. It's possible. It's documented. It's definitely. But we're sure. So we're doing society a great service. And if you perhaps overindulge the night before, there's a whole group of drinks called Corpse Revivers or Eye-Opener cocktails. So these fall into that category. Hairs of the various dogs. Yep. You gotta sometimes just pull yourself up, get back on that, get back on the train. So you want to just get the basic bitch brunch cocktails out of the way, first thing? Yep. Instead of making a Bloody Mary or a Mimosa, we're going to give you lots of excellent alternatives. Not that there's anything wrong with those. What is the strangest thing that you guys were ever served in your Bloody Mary? Oh, yeah. Because they've kind of just become a how to out-ridiculous each other cocktail. A slider. Yeah. A whole slider. Yeah. Like on a toothpick or like on a plate? How do you do that? On a stick. On a stick. Yeah. Like a bamboo skewer. Yeah. There are places that make whole meals out of a Bloody Mary. They're absurd. I've seen slices of pizza. I think my favorite Bloody Mary accoutrement ever was a little shot glass with another Bloody Mary. My favorite accoutrement for a Bloody Mary is the fine Wisconsin tradition of always serving a beer back with your Bloody Mary. All right. This is great. Beer back. What do you do with it? Drink it. You just drink it. Before or after or during? Well, it's a back. You can take sips of the Bloody Mary and hit your beer, or you can just drink it afterward. Yeah. I don't even cool your throat if it's too spicy. Indeed. I don't even care if this is wrong. I like pouring it in. It's great. Sometimes I'll order a Bloody Mary and then a Negromodello at the same time, and drink the Negromodello about at the same rate as the Bloody Mary by continually topping it off. That's akin to a Michelada, right? Yeah, except there's tequila or vodka in it too. Right. The Bloody Maria, of course. Yeah. One other variation that I actually like quite a bit, that it probably doesn't have a lot of traction in the US, but I learned this a long time ago. I was cooking dinner for a guy in his house, and he was a British guy, and he was making Bloody Sherrys, which replaces the vodka with Fino Sherry. Quite fabulous, much lower in alcohol. I like to introduce nuttier quality to the drink, so Amontillado or Oloroso works really nice, but the classic is Fino. So try that. Wait a minute. You're talking about the different subsets of the Bloody Sherry. Yeah, I am. I'm digging in. Chris, so good to have you. Yeah. Okay. When I first started getting into Bloody Mary's, I was like everything, right? A bunch of Tabasco and a bunch of Worcestershire sauce and a bunch of horseradish and really like amp it up. Then something happened. I think it was a day that I was at Arlington Park, not that that's like a pastime of mine, taking in the antiquated art of horse racing. You love the ponies. Oh, my goodness. You grew up near a dog track. I don't even understand how, anyway, it doesn't matter. You're a modern day Bukowski. How is this still a thing? It's 2020. Anyway, I ordered the Bloody Mary and it was very simple. It was just plain tomato juice and vodka and a little Worcestershire sauce and a little celery salt and it was it. I was like, you know what? It's nice and fresh and light and like overwrought the way that I tend to make them. And it kind of changed my mind on the Bloody Mary game. Well, certainly that's harkening back to the origins. This is a cocktail I believe was invented in Paris. And it wasn't that elaborate at the time. And certainly there weren't all the crazy things piled on sticks. But yeah, tomato juice, vodka and maybe a little seasoning. Are you telling me that cocktail coop didn't have a full Snow Crab Claw? No Bloody Mary in mind. Just wait till in France, like in Paris or wherever they're inventing the Bloody Mary, they're like, just wait until they invent the Buffalo Wing. Well, you want to hear something funny. This needs a trickin drumlet on the top. Speaking of Seafood and Bloody Mary, the guy who invented it, if I'm not mistaken, moved to New York after a while and started working at a bar there, and changed the name to the Red Snapper. How's that for some esoteric weirdness? All right. Was there any fish element to it? No, not at all. Although, yeah, the Bloody Caesar we forgot to mention. Thank you, Ron. This is a fun fact. Did we forget it? Do you guys know that that is the national drink of Canada? Oh, Canada. What is? Canada. Bloody Caesar. Which is a Bloody Mary made with Clamado. I thought it was Molson Canadian. Right. What are those hosers doing drinking clam juice? With a maple syrup back. Yes. One thing with Bloody Mary is, I'm definitely wanted to have it punch you in the face. I like it super spicy and just packed with flavor and just double every measurement of any ingredient that anyone ever suggests to you. But I also really like it with Mezcal and much prefer it to vodka. I was going to bring that up. Yeah. Tomato juice on its own is gross. I mean, I like tomato sauces, but as a juice, it just doesn't do it for me. Agreed. Cover up that tomato juice with every other savory and acidic flavor and smoky flavor there is. It's like the best juice. It's like the best juice there is. You were just eating a cheese stick, Greg. Can I point that out? Anyway. Greg, akin to that, to piggyback off that, Greg, do you remember a world of whiskeys when the Ardbeg whisky people were making Bloody Marys? Yeah. There you go. Another smoky spirit. Well, you said that, but what I really remember is those oysters that they had. You remember those oysters? Oh my God, those oysters. They had Ardbeg in them. They were smoky oysters. Well, you can do a nice little shot glass with an oyster in it and something akin to a Bloody Mary and knock it back. Then you only have to, yeah, what makes tomato juice more palatable for Alicia? Oysters. You got to swallow an oyster at the same time. I'm done with that. Bloody Marys, let's be honest, Bloody Marys, I can't get past this. It's a glass of heartburn for me, so never been my jam. Bit of that. Good point. Have we covered Bloody Mary? Are we moving on? Yeah. All right. Mimosa's, Bellini's? Yeah. Yeah, they exist. So take a mediocre sparkling wine and dump a bunch of orange juice in it. Boom, there's your crappy mimosa. At that point, you're barely drinking, right? I feel that, well, firstly, talk about a stomach ache, the level of acid that's in a mimosa just with all that orange juice, and that's never the best. But I agree with Roger that it's kind of, if you don't want to spend enough on a sparkling wine to have it be something pretty tasty, then I guess you'll just have to dump orange juice in it to make it palatable. Yeah. Conversely, if you want a good mimosa, you don't need to spend a lot of money. You can find an $8 Cava that's going to deliver quality, and you won't feel bad about putting in a mimosa. I don't have the money to spend $40 on somebody's non-vintage champagne, and then doctor it up with orange juice. Roger's flashing his bottle of Ciguraviris Reserva for Spain Cava. Boom, exactly. Yeah. Is that the one you'd go with? Santa Monica, Ciguraviris, Cristalino, all good options in Cava. We might as well mention that the classic proportions for a mimos are 50-50. However, you can play around with that if you want. A little bit of orange juice goes a long way. Yeah. So if you think that's true, the British have something called the Buck's Fizz, which is two to one sparkling to orange juice. Good thing they gave it a different name. Yeah. Well. I generally prefer 90-10. If you want to amp it up, you can put some orange liqueur in there too. Drop a shot of Grand Marnier or something in it. One of my suggestions for a great brunch cocktail eye-opener is to take one of those nice affordable cavas, like a good old Workhorse Segura Viudas. Some people are familiar with a drink called the Cur Royale, which originally used a black currant liqueur, a cassis. I think more often than not, if you were to order one, you would get Chamborg liqueur added to it, which is a black raspberry liqueur. Rothman and Winter, who I have brought up on the podcast before, Excellent portfolio of fine liqueurs. Roger, you were flashing their creme de violette last time. I can't say enough good things about their portfolio stuff, just so much good, interesting stuff. And this is a apricot brandy that is just fantastic. And this can be as simple as literally, you're mainly just drinking your sparkling wine and you're adding about a half an ounce. Again, you can dial it into your liking, but this with that apricot liqueur is just a beautiful drink. So give that a try. No juice required. Or again, instead of taking juice out of the carton, if you just have your little elbow juicer, juice like a half an orange in there and then add the apricot liqueur as well. Nice. Yes. I think we should also mention that the quality of the orange juice or whatever juice you're putting in is important. When it comes to a cocktail, fresh squeezed is the only way to go. No matter if it's lemon, lime or orange. So everybody has orange juice. A lot of people have oranges to make fresh squeezed orange juice. But who has peach puree? Yeah, that's a little tougher, right? Literally nobody has peach puree. Technically, too, it has to be, I'll let Chris nerd out on this, but it's not only are the peaches fresh, they're macerated and then steeped in liqueur, correct? That is true. Not only are they just peaches, they have to be white peaches as well for the original. Wait a minute. So what you're saying is, if you've been making a Bellini, you've been f***ing it up. You've been doing it wrong. Yeah, this is from the Harry's Bar in Venice, right near Prosecco production region. Peaches are commonly macerated in wine there, so you just puree them up and add a little bit of puree to your Prosecco and boom, there you have it. Is Prosecco the way to go with the Bellini? It's the traditional, yeah. I think the- You can use Cava too. You certainly can. I think the fruity na- like the method of production for Prosecco and Cava are quite different, and the nature of the grape variety, glera or Prosecco, whatever you want to call it, it's much much fruitier even when they're made dry, and it works with the peach quite How about another champagne cocktail? Alicia, you have some that you want to mix up here? Yes. If you are still in the mood for sparkling wine in the morning, or early afternoon, or whenever you're having your brunch. Brunch in the evening. Don't overlook some classic cocktails, and I have two today, but we'll start with the French 75, which I'm going to make now, which you might not really think about having with brunch, but who cares? It's delicious and it's sparkling. So you should give it a try. I'm going to make it right now. I have in a shaker, obviously, some ice, and I'm putting in one and a half ounces of gin. I am trying. I just bought this. Maplewood's new gin here in Chicago, Maplewood Spruce Gin. Any thoughts, gentlemen? Never had it. I have yet to try it as well. Yeah, it's pretty brand new. Totally an experience. Let us know what you think. Have you had it before? This is the first time I purchased it, but I had opened it before this, and it reminds me, it has the same kind of piney spruciness as a St. George's gin, but not as much. Not as much pine tree air freshener dangling from ear to ear. Exactly. All right. Quit disparaging Juniper. The very definition of gin is Juniper Berry. Well, Juniper is fine, but that St. George one is trying to... It's the terroir one. They make a few different gins. I like it. It uses spruce. So, I mean, it is a spruce to the face. Well, right. It's not that bad. You're being beaten with pine boughs. I disagree a little bit, Roger. Picture a Turkish bath, but it's the... Settle the whole... All right. Come on. But with the pine boughs. Roger. Bring it in. I have used that one on a bunch of recent quarantining episodes, and it's not as overwhelming as you think. It's a little oily and it's a little round and sweet. In fact, I want a little more lift, a little more punchy pine. What can I say? Some of us have sensitive palates that aren't dead. I guzzle hot sauce. It's true. It is an interesting concept, though. I mean, gin, you know, has all kinds of aromatics in it. And historically, it wasn't really, I wouldn't say, about regionality. A lot of them come from far afield. But to bring that to it is kind of interesting. Yeah, for sure. Oh, is that the newly introduced Baron Fuente? Yeah. Now I'm going to. Nice job. Excellent champagne pick, Baron Fuente. So talked about Maplewood Gin, which I think is awesome. Give it a shot. But I'm using Baron Fuente champagne here. And one, if you are listening currently, which were in the month of June, this is on a killer sale right now at Binny's. This is at $24.99, which is incredible. Is that real authentic champagne for $24.99? 100 percent. Wow, it is remarkable. You shook the gin with what else? A little simple syrup and lemon juice. Do not shake it with the champagne. So shook that over ice, poured it. I would say this is an important point. With champagne cocktails, you don't want to lose the effervescence. So if you have a base you're shaking, shake it separately and then top with fizz, of course. That looks like a refreshing cocktail. It smells it as well. A little lemon twist as a garnish. It's lovely. That was so suspenseful. It's so refreshing, but yet that a little bit of simple syrup in contrast with the bright acid from the lemon juice, of course, as well as the champagne. Lots of tension on your palate. Again, just that slight bit of sweetness, which we always crave just a little bit of that in the mornings. I think it's a wonderful brunch cocktail and a nice alternative to their own orange juice and your sparkling wine. I couldn't agree more that it is completely appropriate for brunch. I actually enjoyed one in New Orleans almost about a year ago now at the Arnaud's French 75 Bar, which if you've never been there, that is one of the best bars in New Orleans. Small, elegant, they make impeccably made cocktails. One thing I would mention is that this cocktail famously has two variations. You made the more modern version with gin, but the Cognac variation is also excellent. Oh, Cognac. Indeed. That is actually the one I prefer. The gin version is much more refreshing, and that is not to say that Cognac doesn't refresh in this context, but it adds a richer, more nutty, caramely, brown spirit note, of course. Yeah, for sure. The other thought I had when I was thinking about the French 75, was the French 95, which replaces the gin and with bourbon. I've never had that one. Neither have I. Why is it bourbon 20? Well, it's a 75 to a 95. Is it the millimeters on the cannons? Why is bourbon at 20? Yeah, it's American, so we were like, bigger guns. Yeah, the French 75 is named after the gauge or what, the diameter of the shell in the cannon. If you add bourbon, why the extra 20 mil? Just because. Very good question. You put a little more bourbon than you would gin, but that's all I know. Yeah. I like a French Buck 20, you know, Buck 25. All right, cool. Who's next with their brunch cocktail? Well, I could certainly go. I'm going to whip up a real classic corpse survivor. As Roger noted earlier, corpse survivors are the drinks that literally will revive. Raise the dead. Raise the dead or wake a zombie after a long night of drinking. There are many, many variations on a corpse survivor. The modern iterations, they're two pretty famous versions. I'm going to make the number two. I like it better. Although again, just like with the French 75 that we were talking about, it's a matter of the base spirit. The number two is a much more refreshing and complex and aromatic drink. I think what makes this really special is the aromatics. The way you start off in making this, add a little absinthe to your glass. It is traditional just to use an absinthe rinse. I often actually find that the rinse is not quite enough for me either. A lot of times I shake a little absinthe into the drink or float a little on top at the end. What you really want is that incredible anise licorice aroma just to waft out of the glass. The rest of the drink consists of equal parts of four ingredients. Gin, I use London Dry style. I do like a Juniper Forward Gin in this context. Quantro. What gin are you using? I am using a Workhorse Tank Array, but I would recommend Bombay Sapphire, Beefeater, whatever your London Dry of choice is. Bombay Sapphire, if you feel like getting drunk when you're hung over, and Beefeaters is the best budget choice you can get in London Dry. Yeah, Beefeaters classic. It has that absolutely Juniper Forward note. Gin, Absinthe Rinse, Lemon Juice, Quantro, and a Americano, which is an aromatized wine. Historically, this was made with Lillet. Yeah, do the substitute. Yeah. Kick that Lillet to the curb. Lillet is not made the way it used to be made, and Coke Americano is a closer approximation to the classic ingredient. Also, just like with the jackfruit, Jim has to hit that beer, beer, beer, beer, beer button because we're talking about Coke Americano yet again. And once again, I have Brophy's bottle right here in my hand. Roger has a fresh bottle. That's great. I'm going to talk about it more. I'm drinking it with champagne right now. I like to think of it as a stepping stone between vermouth and like Amaro. Yeah. Yeah, it's a less spiced up version of like a vermouth, you know, a bitter like a Campari or not like a cocktail bitter, but like an Italian bitter. Again, if only we had Brophy to interject now and talk for 40 minutes about bitters. If he listens to these episodes, which I don't think he does, but if he does, he's probably like so angry that he can't interject his opinion right now. So I would say like vermouth, it's good as an aperitivo like a Amaro that's more often a digestif. It does have significant bitterness to it. But I would lean more toward opening your evening with Americano on the rocks or with soda than ending it. So did you say this is number two or number five? Corpse Reviver number two or Corpse Reviver number five? Number two, equal parts. Number two. London Dry Gin. So this is a brunch cocktail for the hungover. Exactly. Or for those who want to get a jumpstart on the day. It came out quite nicely. I didn't have to add any more absinthe. It has that beautiful, subtle aroma and you know that absinthe is not subtle. But in this context, you want it to be, and it's beautiful. I drink this anytime of the day. So we'll see you later, Chris. Also one of those things that's recommended to have several in succession just to make sure you're on the right track. Sure. Yeah. That's another one. Harry's Bar, right? You said? No, this was from the Savoy, I think. Strangely, Harry's in Paris is where the Bloody Mary came from, and Harry's in Venice is where the Bellini came from. Oh, yeah. It was Craddock's bartending book, and it said drink four of these in succession. He's the one who at least codified these recipes, Harry Craddock at the Savoy, I believe. Yeah, that's why I was wrong, Harry. Right. It is indeed Harry's bar in some way. All right. So I'm going next, and this is one that we've talked about a bunch of times. We've teased, but we've never actually done on the podcast. What you'll notice I have here is a tall glass full of ice, and I happened to already lay down the garnishes, which are peach slices and pineapple slices. You could use cucumber. I feel like the one thing I'm missing here is a big leafy something sticking off the top, but I don't have that. Basel, as those limeys say on the other end of the pod. Oh, a little bit of basil in here would be great, but I just planted it. We had to wait a couple of months before it starts putting off leaves. The other glaring absence there is strawberries, which this is a classic early summer drink. That's right. Strawberries. It's from the South, though. As I was telling Greg, if you're in this, it's one of those classic North and South things in England. The Southerners don't put anything in there except a tiny little bit of cucumber. Leave Greg alone. Since nobody knows what the hell we're talking about, because I haven't set my cocktail yet, I'm making a Pimms Cup. I scored a bottle of Pimms, number one, right here. Following the instructions off the back of the glass, except for the garnishes because the Pimms people believe in, a slice of lemon or a slice of lemon. Tall glass, they say an ounce and a half, but come on guys. By the way, this on its own, it's definitely like a premix that you put a little bit of soda in. But on its own, it basically smells like a cola. It's a closely guarded secret recipe to make Pimms the liqueur. Well, one known part of the recipe is, at least the number one is gin based. There are many iterations over the years and with different spirit bases. They say an ounce and a half, I gave it a little bit healthier of a dollop than that. Then you can fill with the soda of your choice. Ginger ale works well. I happen to be using Diet Sprite, but it doesn't matter. No. Ginger ale is an excellent choice. You would often see in Britain sparkling lemonade in place of that. Oh, that'd be great. I wish I had one of those Q Tonic or Fever Tree. Fever Tree, Indian. Yeah, Fever Tree Bitter Lemon would be awesome. Didn't pick it up on the way in, but that's what we got. Pineapples and peaches as a garnish on my really tall Pimm's Cup here. It's not real boozy, but it's an absolutely delightful, refreshing, more complicated than a soda in the morning. If you want it a little stronger, a lot of recipes will include a little bit of gin to pump up that alcohol content. Sounds great. Something with a little bit of herbal cut to work with any sweetness that's in your soda and the fruit. What I love about this is that this is essentially the first RTD cocktail. This was the Bartles and James, the Schmiernafise. Roger, I feel like you're coming at me right now. This is the White Claw of the time. Hey. Which unlike all those, this had a little bit of class, whereas there's a little more going on in this. It's a gin sling that's pre-prepared for you to just add the sparkling weak component to it. That's right. Don't forget that they were probably drinking this with a hat on while watching Wimbledon. It's just way classier than White Claw. What a reference. The most Pimm's Cups consumed are at Wimbledon. Indeed. Strawberry and cream. You know you're allowed to bring in bottles as a spectator to Wimbledon. So when you're sitting there, obviously not when the match is going on, but between points or sets, you'll hear people just shooting off. No slurping between shots. Listeners can't see, but I'm actually wearing an ascot and a monocle right now. One thing to point out, we've done Barrel to Bottle episodes before about non-alcoholic stuff, low alcohol. That obviously is something that some people are looking for, or maybe during the week you want to maybe experiment with some stuff that's a little lower alcohol. This is one of the most famous low alcohol cocktails. So it's like drinking a wine spritzer or a vermouth spritzer. The base spirit here is going to be low in alcohol. It's bottled at 25% and if you're mixing it down, you're going to end up with something pretty low in the glass. Yeah. It's a delightful daytime drink. Certainly brunch works, but an afternoon picnic on a lovely June day with some cucumber sandwiches. Woof. Jesus. All right. Lovely. It's nice when it's really hot out. It's good because if you tend to drink cocktails pretty fast when it's hot out, it can be nice to be able to drink several of these in succession, and unlike that in the afternoon or you'd be hammered. The other great thing about Pimms is that it's an easy batch cocktail. If you are having people over onto your roof or patio or whatever, it's just you, go ahead and make a big picture of it and you're set. Absolutely. Think of it as akin to a British version of Sangria or a punch of some sort. You know, it's a classic fruit cup. It can be made in large batches. Yeah. When you're done, you get to eat the salad. Roger, what do you have? All right. So the, undoubtedly the absolute hottest drink of last year was the Aperol Spritz. This thing went from being something that a lot of vacationers and Italy fell in love with to just one of our absolute most requested. Let's be honest, it's a somewhat oddball Italian bitter kind of that category that's adjacent to Amaro's. You know, at least at our Willowbrook store, Chris can attest to this. There's a whole stack of Aperol in the sparkling wine department. I think the world realized that the Aperol Spritz had kicked in as a hipster dynamo on May 9th, 2019, when the New York Times published a editorial, the Aperol Spritz is not a good drink. That's true, Roger. I actually put that stack there and it's never moved since. We sell as much Aperol out of the sparkling wine department as we do off the shelf in the Liqueur Isle. Like anything else that's tied to people vacationing, there's some nostalgia there, but I think what's appealing to people, you know, that balance of acidity and or bitterness and sweetness is always something that appeals to people whether they realize it or not in beverages and food. So I think the the Aperol spritz really kind of hammers that home. Again, it's popular because it's a cocktail, but it's a little lower alcohol, so you can enjoy these without getting, you know, too inebriated. The thing I'd like to mention is that like all cocktails, you should be playing around with this and modifying it to your own liking. And I know some people have complained that they're not ready with champagne cocktails to commit to opening a full bottle of sparkling wine. So one of the easiest things that I'd suggest you try is that if you enjoy Aperol spritzes, which involve, you know, Prosecco, Aperol, and some sparkling water, you should try mixing them with a good hard cider. So there's so many options out there. He's going to pull out that tiny can of Vandermilb Brut again. Yeah, there you go. Brilliant move, Roger. Real quick, I meant to ask this on the sparkling cocktail earlier. Two, when mixing up sparkling cocktails and you don't want to blow it on the 24.99 for their Baron Fuente, what's your French wine people, what's your French sparkler that you go with? Lucien Albrecht Rosé is pretty awesome. I like that Francois Montand. Great quality there at half the price of champagne. The other thing with Alsace, perhaps why I picked that, say, over a Crémant de Bourgogne is just that they're planting Chardonnay in Alsace to make sparkling wine. It's not a noble grape variety there. They're not making still wine with it. They can't under AOC law. Though the sites might not be as great as the ones reserved for the noble grapes, they're intentionally growing it there to make their sparkling. Whereas in Burgundy, all the best sites for Chardonnay are going into White Burgundy. Yeah. So I think in Alsace, as well as in the Loire Valley, I think you can find some really great Crémants at a fraction of the price. Yeah. Some really good Chenin Blanc-based sparklers are there. No love for Lemieux. Yeah, Lemieux, so Blanc-et did Lemieux. Also, a really amazing value of sparkler out of France. So there's your wine nerd Easter egg secret value sparklers, while Roger is mixing up his sprites. All right. Who still has cocktails to go? Back to our brunch cocktail conversation here. So I'm going to make Death in the Afternoon, which I have not had before, and so I'm really interested in trying this. I'm going to use Copper and King's Absinthe, and the same Baron Fuente that we mentioned earlier. So while I make this, which is just an ounce and a half of Absinthe, and then about four and a half ounces of champagne, I'll let the gentleman here tell you about the history of this cocktail. So this is invented by one of my favorite authors, Ernest Hemingway. And Ernest Hemingway was a diabetic and he tried to avoid excess sugar and stuff. So one of his favorite drinks was a rum cocktail that was essentially all booze and lime, a little bit of Luxardo, but it omitted the classic Caribbean, let's add some sugar to that. So, in a way, you can view this cocktail as taking the classic absinthe preparation, which involves absinthe, sugar and water, and simplifying that as, let's just mix absinthe with champagne. Champagne's got water in it and it's sweet, it's got a little bit of sweetness at least. I don't like a lot of sweetness, I don't want a lot of sweetness. So it's about as simple as it gets, but it really works. I think it's an excellent way to enjoy absinthe because nothing there is really covering it up at all, but it's giving it some lift. Absinthe, of course, is famously very strong. We're talking over 100 proof. A little bit and flavorful, a little bit goes a long way. I'd say. So this is, go ahead, what do you think? This feels like you've been living in darkness for a while, and someone just opened up the blinds. Yeah. It's the Wizard of Oz when it goes from black and white to color. As we know from Plato's Allegory of the Cave, you have to be careful about realizing what the true light is. If you do not like that, obviously, that anise and licorice aroma and flavor, this is definitely not for you. I do enjoy it. An ounce and a half of absinthe is a lot. Yeah. I will say I've made a smaller portion of the drink here because I do have a day to continue on with and so I cut it down by a third and so I just have a little bit here. But the champagne to me does not at all mute the absinthe. It really just lifts it and it elevates it and it almost just helps spread it across your palate. It's very nice. I definitely could only have one which perhaps would disappoint Ernest. Yeah, he suggested four, all in a row, rapid succession. I got to say that four death in the afternoons is followed the next day by a corpse reviver. Right. Oh yeah, for sure. Probably arguably a corpse survivor at night. Because you will be dead in the afternoon and you will need to be awakened if you choose to do anything in the evening. So let me just say Ernest Hemingway is one of the most famous drinkers in modern history, and he's also a very macho guy, shall we say, his writing and his lifestyle were filled with machismo. So he's not going to go with a subtle amount of absinthe here, it had to have a kick to it. So if you want to lighten up a little bit, I think that'd be okay. Yeah, I think if you are preparing to do something in the day that you're kind of nervous about or something like just pound like a third of this, a third of these broken eggs. Like every day of work? I'm a little nervous about where I'm at today. It really gets you going. My eyes feel wider. This is the desk whiskey of champagne cocktails. I mean, this is akin to almost like moonshining. It's straight booze and I mean some absinthe are 130 proof. I mean, it's strong. So to suggest drinking an ounce and a half of that with champagne, like giddy up, like hold on. Thank you all for not sharing those thoughts with me when I signed up to make this drink. You seem so eager, so excited. I don't know if I mentioned it, but I was using Lucid in my drink earlier, Lucid Absinthe. Lucid is your absinthe? Yeah. I'm looking at it right now. I think it says 124 proof. Yeah, the Copper and Kings, which is very nice, but yeah, it's 130. Yeah. Yeah. 130 is closer to the legit. Not for the faint of heart. You guys have other cocktails? Other brunch cocktails? Were you going to talk about touch on beer at all, Roger? Oh, yeah. That's a whole another lovely thing to open up here. So you have four minutes. Yeah. Greg and I have often talked about how it's funny with coffee beers, how people don't appreciate there's real coffee in there, which means there's real caffeine in there. I now am paranoid of opening a coffee beer after like eight o'clock. You're so old. I know. I know. I still drink Four Loko, so I don't know what you're complaining about. Coffee Four Loko, in fact. I went to a coffee beer tasting once. We started, I don't know, probably around like eight o'clock at night or so. I couldn't fall asleep until four in the morning. I was so wired. We had opened an asinine amount of beers, but. Drunken wired. Perfect. The kind of the trend that craft beer has been on right now, there are so many heavily adjuncted beer styles that are dessert like. So there's so many beers now that arguably would fit super well into drinking at brunch earlier in the day. There's things that are literally modeled after coffee cake, crumbles, breakfast cereals. Hey Roger, I saw the Kringle on your Beer Blast today. Yeah, exactly. So in the Beer Buzz, I talked about a beer from Central Waters that's modeled after a bourbon. It's a bourbon barrel-age pecan Kringle, which if you've never had Kringle, that's a lovely Danish dessert, which is the official dessert of Wisconsin. So you get them from Kenosha. They're the pride of Racine, Wisconsin. It's the highest concentration of Kringle bakeries on the planet. Although right by the Willowbrook store, there's a Danish bakery Kirsten's that actually won an award for their Kringle. Here comes the suburban Chicago guy talk. If you want to get a Kringle. If you want a good Kringle, if you want to skip that Racine stuff. Yeah, I think they toned down that really super sweet frosting too at Kirsten's. A lot of the Wisconsin iterations are very, very sweet. They're crazy sweet. But anyway, they're sweet people. They like sweet stuff. But anyway, the beer scene right now is designed for beers that would be great in the morning. Everything is all about juicy flavors, very fruit heavy IPAs. Just like we've featured in these cocktails, I mean, they almost blend seamlessly. Think about that next time when you, some of these drinks that you really enjoy, consider serving that for your guests if you're having friends over for a brunch. Something that's real juicy, some of these IPAs, whether or not they actually have juice in them or not, they work really well. Any of the coffee beers work nicely as well. I was drinking, speaking of central waters, some Cassian Sunset. Yes. As a brunch type of drink a few weeks ago. Think about that. If you enjoy coffee beers, they're a good option for earlier in the day. Can I throw in- Have you ever had beer but in the morning? Can I throw in one of my classic old man references right now? There is a tradition in Bavaria to drink Hefewezen at somewhere late in the morning, 11 o'clock or so with little Weisswurst. Great morning beer. It is again fruity, aromatic, moderate alcohol, easy drinking. So Weisswurst. Yes. Whip beers in Belgium. Yeah, exactly. Are a classic as well. Any nice like your Who Gardens or Allagash White. So many good Vit beers out there. Those are perfect for drinking beer. I'm going to also beat the dead horse that is Sherry from the last episode, or was that this episode? I can't remember. Or the next episode. Right. It's going to Sherry Crusade. It's so under appreciated. Yeah, indeed. I don't know if anyone, see, again, I'm aging myself, but did anyone ever read Decanter Magazine back in the day? Michael Broadbent, very, very famous guy in the wine world, used to write this very, very whimsical and British article in every edition. He was constantly talking about what he had opened with his wife for elevensies. I was going to say, I know where this is going and I like it. It's so posh British. It's hilarious. I love it, but Sherry is perfect for that. He would always be opening something easy-going, fruity, a lot of German Riesling and things like that. Perfect for elevensies. Just after Hobbit's second breakfast, you have elevensies. That's a British tradition I can fully get behind. We should bring back elevensies. It never went anywhere in my house. I think though the theme here seems to be that you should drink what you love at the time of day that you feel like drinking it. Mostly the morning. Social standards be damned. Maybe if you're working, maybe not. But other than that, drink during the day. In all seriousness, though, I hope that you listening think beyond just mimosas and Bloody Mary's for brunch cocktails because everything that we've talked about here would be really fun to have. But ultimately, find something that fits your mood that morning, that on a weekend, and have some fun with it because you can only have so much tomato juice in your life. Amen. Tomato juice is great, you guys. Signed, sealed and delivered. That's terrific. That's how you cap it off. Come on. Send us off. Well, that's another episode of Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. Thanks for listening. We'll be back in your feed with something fun next week. Until next time, I am Greg. I'm Alicia. I'm Chris. And I'm Roger. Keep tasting. Drink during your work. Who are we to judge? It's coffee.