You're listening to another episode of Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. Today, we're gonna talk about summer cocktails. Yeah. Summer's finally here, it's been a hot one so far. And I just kind of went through and picked up some of my favorite summer drinks, and I'm gonna mix some of them up, and joining me. Hey, I'm Pat. I merchandise the CBD gummies and dog treats at Binny's Beverage Depot. I am both Rob Thomas and Carlos Santana. It's been a hot one. Anyway, I'm Chris. I do wine. I'm Greg. I do communications at Binny's. Roger Beer, cocktail enthusiast. You already introduced yourself, you jag. Listen, more importantly, you brought some cocktails. You're having us rather make some cocktails, and I don't think I've heard of a couple of these today, at least the one I'm supposed to make two different kinds of. So what's going on? Summer cocktails, what's your definition? Just fruity or spritzy or both? Both. There was a bent here too to make nice, easy cocktails. I'm famous for a lot of these multi-ingredient, labor-intensive Chris as well with his preparations. Well, we know Chris is going to have some egg whites in his. egg whites and summer cocktails. Dude, I am going so simple today, it's ridiculous. I'll believe it when I see it. So the summer cocktail thing, if you Google summer cocktails, it's one of those, a lot of the same old faces come up. It's margaritas, gin and tonics, pina coladas. Spicy margaritas. Well, yeah, a little jalapeno in there if you're feeling wild. Kind of wanted to do some things that are equally refreshing, easy to make. Like you said, I always think of fruit, well, just basically always, but in the summer especially, you can go out to the farmer's market or go in your backyard, get fresh herbs. So a lot of summer cocktails, I think people are trying to incorporate stuff that's nice, fresh and on hand. Cool. So I mean, when I think summer cocktails, obviously the main tequila ones, a lot of gin drinks in the summer. Yeah. Tropical rum drinks, I suppose. But it doesn't have to be with that. Like you can make great summer cocktails, a lot of bourbon too. Possibilities are endless, I guess, when you have a definition as nebulous as this. Yeah, right. Right. Yeah. I mean, as long as it's refreshing. Yeah. Yeah. I would say in general, you're looking for things that are thirst quenching because it takes well to ice. Yeah, we tend to spend time outside, right? In the summer, we want to be outside. We've been cooped up inside all winter. So, you know, there's odds are you might be sitting in the sun. You might be, you know, might be hot out. So you don't want anything that's super strong. So we shouldn't use that new cocktail mixer that we presented with, made with rendered beef fat in it. Oh, right. Or this first drink that Roger prepared for us, which is a room temperature mudslide. The first drink that we're all gonna enjoy here is a very simple cocktail, a classic old 20s cocktail. It originated as the Greyhound, and I've salted the rim here. So, you're drinking a salty dog. A salty dog is the only difference to salted rim? Yes. Okay, so what's a Greyhound? Grapefruit and what? Gin. So, originally, it was gin. Like most interesting cocktails over the years, people started substituting gin out and putting vodka in. So, if you wanted to just, if you wanted to taste like grapefruit juice and nothing else, you can put vodka in there. But instead, I used gin as is traditional. For the grapefruit juice, we didn't use fresh because we have a newer product that is great. And if you don't have time to make it to the store and get a fresh grapefruit, I used fever tree sparkling grapefruit, which- Which I haven't shut up about in like four months, five months. Maybe longer. So, this should be right up your alley, Pat. This is like a gin-based Paloma. Yeah, no, it's awesome. And it totally is a gin Paloma. And now, the gin we use is actually a new gin to the shelves at Binny's. And it's a limited release from Citadel. Citadel is a French gin from Alexander Gabriel, the same place that is making Pierre Ferrand Cognac. And this is Citadel Jardin d'Etat. Can be shortened to Citadel Jardinera. And it is a little on the softer side for gin. It's 41.5% alcohol. The inspiration behind this gin was Alexander Gabriel's wife's garden and the different herbs and fruits and veggies and stuff like that that she was growing in her garden. So it's supposed to be- Des Chardins. So unfortunately, the bottle that we're using is directly from France as our sample bottle. And I'm not sure what all the ingredients are. Because he doesn't know ingredients in French. Citron and Tiers, Zeste de Yuzu. This is a 70 CL bottle. Zeste to Yuzu? What the hell could that be? I'm sure they've got yuzu growing in their French garden. Yeah, right. Szechuan peppercorns are in this. Yeah, they got those there too. Cardamom. That's cool. You'll have to tell me if it gives you that Szechuan peppercorn electric tingle on your tongue. Cassia, Angelica, Iris, Fennel, Cumin, Anise, Violet. Okay. Well, I've made enough of an ass of myself trying to figure out this French label here. I, of course, am making my own at home. I did the little horse neck trick with my grapefruit peel. Of course. If you can see that. That's my only fancy embellishment today. And I'm, of course, using fresh squeezed grapefruit juice. I bet that's good, Jim. And Plymouth gin. Chris, did you salt your glass? Did you salt your room? I did. I like a Greyhound, but the salt adds another dimension that I think is really welcome with grapefruit juice. I agree. And in the summer, it's nice to have some electrolytes, you know? This is really delicious. Greg and I have finished ours already. Yeah, I never would have salted the rim like this. But Roger, you did it like expertly where it's not overwhelming. It's not like a cheese martini glass full of margarita. I was going to say, when I salt a rim, I want to make sure that you can't see the glass. And Roger may have done it better. This is subtle and it really makes me want to take another sip. I never would have thought to add salt to this. Also, you guys are going to make fun of me. But when I mix a Greyhound, which I do occasionally, I tend to make them small. I put them on the rocks because I put everything on the rocks. But I also blend it like 50-50, like it's closer to a grapefruit spiked martini than it is like a tall drink like this is. Oh, you make a stronger drink? I know. We don't know that about. Surprise, Greg makes a stronger drink. But this is soft and refreshing and easy. This is an awesome drink. I think that's very fair in this situation. I think it can go one to one up to about three to one. Especially with grapefruit juice, like heavy grapefruit juice. Yeah. You really can. I mean, grapefruit juice has a strong peppery punch to it and it's not shy. Yeah. So you can have a high proportion of booze to juice. We could maybe dial up the gin on this version. You know, just saying. I would agree. Yeah. I made this to be definitely like a tall, something that you would, you know, you guys got through it pretty quick. So this is built for speed, not for comfort. I feel some judgment coming from the other end of the table, Greg. Yeah. This is the summer cocktail version. So, you know, it's got to be tall and refreshing and not too boozy. What were your proportions, Roger? I did like one and a half ounces of gin and then maybe three of grapefruit. That's about what he did too. I did about an ounce of gin and then probably three ounces of this sparkling grapefruit. So again, it's like it's not pure juice. So this would be the equivalent of how I like to make them anyway, which is I like to put some sparkling water in them to make it a taller drink. So this is this is like a total foolproof. It's a cheat. Besides being like, you know, you don't have to go buy a grapefruit. It's a hack. Kids call it a hack these days, OK? He's hacked the Greyhound. He's hacked the salty dog. Oh, yeah. My grapefruit juice version is pretty delicious. I believe it. So if you can do it, make it with fresh. But that fever tree is good. So if it's called the salty dog, you have to expect that there's rum in there. Especially coming from Roger. Yeah, he said he was making a salty dog. And I've never heard of this before. So I assumed we were getting a rum drink. So we had to let us down. This is a classic refresher. And again, this one is this one was kind of almost dangerously drinkable. If you're using fresh grapefruit juice, it's going to be more sour. Than this, so you can you can play around with a drink this simple. If you want to put a little simple syrup in it, if you're using fresh grapefruit juice, go for it. Turn it into kind of like a grapefruit soda, you know, like you would use in a paloma type deal. And yeah, it's totally easily changeable. You could just sub in tequila and boom, you basically have a paloma. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you've got a couple of ingredients here. I will say that that using fresh grapefruit juice without any soda, the salt to me is absolutely key. It just cuts the acidity really nicely. It's really good. Nice. Somebody mixed up a salty Greyhound for somebody else, and they were like, how do you like it? And he was like, it's salty, Doug. Oh, no. Terrible. Roger is making quite the mess over here. As soon as we're done recording, Greg and I are just gonna walk up and leave. Yeah. And leave with all of Roger. I'm thankful for Roger putting all this effort into these amazing looking drinks. Yeah, because if I suck this one down as fast as I suck the first one down, I'm gonna be in a good mood when I get home. All right, so the next drink, people started talking about a few years ago, they would often talk about like a cocktail bar they went to, and they're like, oh, have you ever had like a bourbon smash? Yeah, it's on all the hip bar menus. Yeah, I'm like, no? I'm like, what the hell are you talking about? So it totally was something that grew and became popularized via the internet, a lot of Pinterest recipes, Instagram. It's kind of one of those cocktails that's hard to pin down, like there isn't really an origin story or anything. But I love the concept of it is like it taking advantage of fresh ingredients that are available in the summer, especially herbs and fruit. So the one that you saw in a lot of posts was Blackberry and Sage, which is interesting. Sage is dark. Sage is potent. And I'm kind of like sensitive to it, and I like it, but I don't really like drinking Sage. Sage sensitive. Yeah. I mean, it just makes me think of like Thanksgiving too much, maybe. I don't know. But yeah, because everybody hates Thanksgiving. Well, you don't want to. You don't want to. I love Thanksgiving, but you don't want to. This is some real Sage advice, Roger. Nice. You don't want to drink, you know, Thanksgiving dinner. You want to eat it. But anyway, Sage aside, the other really common herb is mint. So my mint is going crazy right now. So I just grabbed literally a handful of fresh mint this morning. And then there's tons of great berries in the grocery store and in the farmer's markets right now. So in addition to blackberries, I brought raspberries and strawberries as well and blueberries. So the least exotic Roger fruit selection imaginable. This is a shockingly pedestrian fruit mix for you, Roger. But it looks it's really mouthwatering. Yeah. So, Roger, if you were to use gin to make this, this would be known as a bramble, right? Right. Exactly. And we're going to try it two ways. So this way, and then we'll let you guys make some cocktails. I have enough ingredients so we can try it a second time. And I'm going to throw instead of- Yeah, thanks for bringing all the booze, Pat. Instead of bourbon, we're going to use tequila in the next one, which I think will be kind of interesting. Tequila smash? Yeah. So the other thing is there's citrus- It's going to taste just like a margarita at Cesar's, like 90 percent fruit puree and a little tiny whiff of alcohol. Right, right. This is so customizable. So in this one, I use lemon juice, but a lot of times people use lime. I think personally that lemon goes better with bourbon than lime. But if you were using gin and or tequila, obviously- I think that's fair. Lime is more common. But they're super easy, right? So I think part of the reason people like these and bars too, a lot of times they're served in mason jars, which is kind of folksy and cool. I have a mason jar here with one of these little mason jar strainer. Attachments that you can get. Never seen that, but that is adorable. Roger's Country Cocktails. Dude, Roger totally has a pillow on his couch that says gather. Right? It's Chevy chic. He bought the table with the edges already smoothed down. The white paint is already broken through. This is a gift from my sister. I do love it though. Basically, I took a muddler. After you put some sugar cubes in there, so of course, I used raw unprocessed sugar, so it's Demerara sugar cubes. Yeah. So the citrus, the fruit, muddle it all up. Put the mint in there as well. So we've got this kind of really cool looking puree of stuff. You can either just shake this and then hand it to someone as is. Because we used all these berries with seeds in them, I'm going to strain this for you guys. Yeah, you want to strain it for sure. Because you don't want to be like drinking all the seeds. You don't want to hear me complaining about f**king seeds in this cocktail you made me. Or two days later when it's stuck in his large intestine. Yes. That's a satisfying shake noise with the big classic cubes. I do have to admit. They're looking great too. Look at all your fruit purees clogging up your shaker. It is. That's how you know it's good. It looks like a fluorescent red syrup coming out. It looks amazing. Oh, careful, don't get the seed. Pads kinda complained that the seeds get caught under his bridge work. Looks really good, though. This is so funny. Chris, I forgot that you're not literally in the room with us. Yeah, he made Chris a drink. He literally took four glasses out. I was better than last week when Alicia forgot I was literally anywhere. The outro, the hidden outro is Alicia forgetting to introduce him and to say goodbye. Jerp. Well. All right. So then you can top these off with anything to give it a little sparkly fizz. So we're going high end here again. Treat yourself. High end for five bucks. Yeah. Roger's on the fever tree train. Yeah, nice. Fever tree is- He's regretting not picking it in the home bar draft. Every time. Yeah. It's where it's at for sure. I've been drinking the ginger beer lately. It's killer too. FYI, new office guy, Greg, says home bar draft was a quote, genius idea. He did say that. Just letting you know. He did. So you're using the fever tree ginger ale. I bet this would also be okay with like the bitter lemon, which is super. Yeah, for sure. Oh, it smells so awesome. The mint and the fruit. Oh yeah. Wow. Wow. That is awesome. Way to screw it up with all these seeds, Adamson. Oh, this is so good. Oh, not at all. This is so good. Yeah. So you get, you know, again, I think we've say it no matter the category, when you can nail sweetness and acidity, that's one of the best. How much mint did you use? This is obviously minty, but it's not too minty. And I think that's really hard to do with fresh mint leaves. I used quite a bit. So, I mean, I was making it thinking that, you know, I'd be dividing it by four. So, I mean, it was like it's a fistful of mint. Wow. It's probably like one big stock. That is a nice thing when you grow mint. It's like, this was probably almost half of a container you would buy in the grocery store, like the ones that you have in the little hanging. Be careful growing mint. It takes over everything. That's true. It gets gamey pretty quick too. It's a good ground cover to have. Keeps like, pests away. Yep. So, if you have like a part of your yard, like shady and wet that doesn't, you know, struggle with muddy area, like plant some mint. I'm feeling personally really deprived right now because that sounds good. Yeah, Chris, so good. This is very good. Roger, let's go over this recipe. What's the spirit? We use J. Henry & Sons Wisconsin straight bourbon whiskey. It's a five year old bourbon. It's actually a four grain, made in Wisconsin, made with some heirloom red corn and some heirloom rye. Really, really, really great stuff. When I have poured, I have poured this at a blind tasting before, and it wiped the floor with everything else with it when scored by the audience, including Old Rip Van Winkle 10 year 107. Amazing. Yeah, it's a great bourbon. You don't think of Wisconsin and whiskey in the same sentence normally, but that is solid product. Yeah, really great product. So on top of this bourbon, we watched Roger muddle the fruit and then muddle in the mint. But we also watched him, were you remixing a pre-made simple syrup or were you muddling in a simple syrup? No, what I didn't do is that you can muddle lemon wedges, so then you get some of the oil. Just, I don't know how to have it. I just squeezed the lemon juice. Oh, so it was sugar in lemon juice. Yeah, it was a sugar cube in lemon juice. While you were adjusting Chris's audio, he was muddling that all off. So that is, I think that's really important here. You've got the sweetness from the fruit. You've got a little bit of sweetness from the sugar that you added, but the tart burst from the lemon and the lift from the mint. Oh my goodness. Yeah, what an awesome cocktail. This is a symphony and it's like a cliche, but it's so complicated, but it's also just really good and it's like a whole thing. And you used Fever Tree Ginger Ale, not Ginger Beer, which listen to our Fever Tree episode to hear about the difference. Yeah, I think that too, it just comes down to what you're looking for. The ginger beer is definitely going to be more pronounced ginger flavor, so I just wanted it to be there a little bit, but not too much and really just a splash. I mean, barely any. This is outstanding. Chris, I wish you were here so we could rub it in, guys. Yeah, sorry. I wish you were here so you could f*** this up with some egg whites. I would say though, Roger, that it is really great to muddle citrus fruit. If you've ever had a- You got to be careful, those oils get so bitter so fast though. You really got to be careful. I can, but if a caipirinha where it's just tons of limes muddled with sugar and then some cachaça on it, it's such an incredible drink and a lot of it is due to the oil, I think. No, yeah, for sure. Literally did it out of habit. It's funny. I'm just so used to I see citrus and I'm like, got to squeeze it, got to prompt. Wow, that was good. Super good. So, I'm sticking to this really simple game plan today, which is just basically two or three ingredient cocktails. Shocking. Three ingredients plus egg whites and a swizzle stick. And nutmeg. None of that, none of that. And the next one I'm gonna do is the Cape Cod or the Cape Codder, which is just, it's along the same lines as the Greyhound. It's juice and booze, and that's pretty much it. So I'm gonna do an ounce and a half again of vodka, which is rare for me. But I happen to have a bottle of North Shore sitting around. Oh, don't you have your Stoli Elite from the draft? I don't. Actually, the only reason I have this was a friend was visiting from out of town. He's a vodka drinker, and I thought I'd buy him something local. And the half bottle he left when he left town is still here. And that was maybe three years ago. Plus side is it's a really nice vodka, though. Yeah, it is. There's no doubt. And then top it off with cranberry juice. I'm using Ocean Spray cranberry juice cocktail because this recipe was actually developed by Ocean Spray, if you can believe that. Really? Yeah. So in the mid-20th century, they were trying to promote cranberry use. So they put out a lot of recipe books and stuff, and they did a few cocktails. A big cranberry lobby. Can't have turkey without it. Of course, Cape Cod is where a lot of cranberries are grown. And here it is. So it's beautiful. I've got a little wedge of lemon in it. I mean, lime. That is a beautiful cocktail. Yeah. I mean, it's so simple, and I'll taste it. Yeah. I mean, it's very straightforward. It has that kind of slightly tannic nature from the cranberries, this little fresh lime, and vodka is totally neutral for the most part. So it's delicious and refreshing. So it's a Cosmopolitan. So it's a Cosmo? It's tantamount to a Cosmopolitan. It's missing some ingredients. Triple sec, I guess. And proportions are whacked. You need triple sec for a Cosmo. Is it a triple sec? Yeah. Is it triple sec? Yeah. So what are the proportions in there again? The same as I did for my Greyhound. Basically, 2 to 1, juice to booze. And you're calling it what instead of a Cosmo? Oh, this is a Cape Cod or a Cape Codder. A Cape Cod. Yeah. Cape Codder, huh? Yeah. It's a Cosmo. It's a very- It is Cape Codder. It's a tall drink, so it's not a Cosmo. No, you're right. Exactly. Cosmo is more akin to a martini. This is much more juice. Cosmo would be served in a martini glass. It has triple sec. Right. It's shaken and strained. Yeah. Now, did you just build that in the glass? Yeah, just built it in the glass, which was what makes some of these drinks so great and simple. I mean, in the summertime, you can slave away making a smash, which is great. But I mean, sometimes you want immediate gratification and you can make this in literally five seconds. Thanks for slaving, Roger. Yeah, appreciate that. For parties too, I mean, it's great to have these things in your repertoire for like, you know, if you told people you're making them a vodka cranberry, there's not a lot of pizzazz to that, right? So you walk out with this, you go, oh, it's a Cape Codda. And then we're like, oh, what's that? And then you got a vodka cranberry with some lime. It sounds very upper crust New England, doesn't it? They're super refreshing. Or the opposite, like that grungy guy who gets off his dinghy. I don't know what books are called. I don't think the Gorton's Fisherman is drinking Cape Coddas. All right, so what I suggested for Brof, since I know he likes nice, simple cocktails, everybody's been talking about mules lately or darkened stormies, hashtag goslings drum. Man, I love darkened stormies. Alternatively, kind of before the Moscow mule and the darkened stormy thing became such a phenomenon, there was a, in fact, Chris already alluded to it, a cocktail called the horse's neck, which was famous for the garnish, which is big, long, I had one of those at O'Shavel once. It was excellent. I've been calling it a horse collar this whole time, like an a**hole. Really? Did you have a burger when you were there? Of course I had a burger when I was there. Come on. Yeah, I know. It's a stupid question, right? So this is essentially an extremely easy drink. So you're just looking at, again, fresh citrus is the star of the show here, and you want to use quite a bit. So you're looking at about a half an ounce of lemon juice. You could do probably as much as an ounce and a half of gin. This will do an ounce. I think you went a little heavy. I think you're closer to three quarters on the lemon juice there. Roger's just using a shot glass to measure here. And it's a sh**ty shot glass too, so. Your ratio would usually be like an ounce and a half of gin to a half an ounce of lemon juice, and then all you have to do is top it up with ginger ale or ginger beer. What are we calling this? This is because this is not a horse neck. Yeah, this is a gin buck. A gin buck, a gin buck. So, Chris, do you have thoughts on, I know people argue like most old cocktails about some of the reasons why. I've heard that, you know, it was called a buck because it had more booze in it, so it had more kick. Yeah, the kick of a buck, yeah. Or a mule. Versus the kick of a mule. Right, so, again, this is one of those things where don't skimp on the ingredients. Again, we're using fever tree here because we love it. Use a good ginger beer or ginger ale, something with some character. Fresh citrus, good gin, and good ginger. Yeah, I don't think you can overstate that in this case. All of these drinks, for the most part, are really simple, so it's like cooking Italian food. Three, four great ingredients. They've got to be top notch, and you have a perfect result. Yeah, when you only have three ingredients, you need to use good ingredients. Yeah, don't mess around. Don't mess around with cheap stuff. It's not worth it. And you use lemon juice here, not lime juice. Right. So whereas like a mule would be ginger and the spirit and lime juice normally, the buck here is lemon, the spirit and ginger. Right. So what you end up with is kind of like a sparkling lemonade, which is very similar to like a Pimm's Cup. Yeah. So if you wanted to add some Pimm's to this, go for that. Or you could add some Augustura bitters. You could add some vermouth. You could add an Amaro. Like it's almost endless. I would go with the bitters there. How do you feel about adding Pimento Dram? It's already on the sweeter side. That might make it a little too sweet, but I would love the sweet spice character. We know you would. Oh, yeah. A bitter red or like even Aperol would be great on here. I would just point out how versatile this basic cocktail is. I mean, you sub in bourbon, brandy, whatever you want, and make a buck out of those using the same recipe, and they're all delicious and refreshing. This is awesome. The other thing too. The horse neck started out as non-alcoholic, right Roger? It was just the fancy, long, heel garnishing. Roger's got an entire mint plant in a bag. Ginger ale. That's a lot of mint you brought, Roger. So I mean too, this is made for garnishing. Get some mint in there. Smack it a little so the oils come out. Yeah, I was going to say, you should mention that you were... A little slap and tickle? Slap it around. Yeah, I didn't garnish it either, obviously. Get your bartender's knife out, make a nice long, twirly spiral of lemon. You could do any other citrus. I mean, this is one of those things where this is your chance to make this simple cocktail your own. So put whatever you like in there. Put blood orange juice instead of lemon. Garnish it with some berries. Orange peel around a cherry. That'd look great. Yeah. The reason that I wouldn't want to put Amaro in here is because it's such a beautiful looking cocktail. Yeah. And then you're really going to puke it up. Browning it up would look, but it looks delightful. It's summer in a glass. Another, yeah. Just great for when it's hot out and you want something that's just going to refresh. Buck mules. So 10 years ago. Get on the buck bandwagon. Come on. They're timeless. Damn, you're good. I would make this extra tall and call it a Buck 50. We're nailing it. So, Chris, you have another variant on your drink, right? Yeah, actually I do. And strangely, it's almost like a combo of the two prior ones, which is why I chose it. This is known as the Sea Breeze. And it's literally vodka, cranberry juice, and grapefruit juice. So we're just making a compound of juices and there are lots of drinks in this family using different juices. You sub in pineapple juice for grapefruit and you have another drink, which I can't remember what's called, but what's that called? Pineapple and grapefruit? Pineapple, cranberry, and vodka. Pineapple, cranberry, and vodka. Bay Breeze. Oh, yeah, Bay Breeze. There you go, Roger. Thank you. Pat and I are looking at each other. How the hell do these guys? A Bay Breeze? Okay, Sea Breeze sounds like the name of a horse. I thought maybe it would be the option. Yeah, that's what I thought. So this is also related to- You're making a Sea Breeze, not a Bay Breeze. Not a Bay Breeze. Don't even confuse it, okay? This is straight up Sea Breeze. And Pat, you recall making your Sex on the Beach a while back. That's kind of- I tried to shove it out of my memory, but thanks for bringing it back up. Kind of a riff on this drink. There are a lot of variations. So I'm doing an ounce and a half of vodka again, about three ounces of cranberry juice, and about an ounce and a half of grapefruit juice. And that's all there is to it. And you put a little lime in it again. And there you go. That's interesting. That's two kind of bitter juices. And they have sweetness too. But I bet that I can't even imagine how those two taste together. Well, I'm going to taste it. I'll tell you. Rock and roll. It's simply a delight. I mean, really, everything goes together surprisingly well. It's pretty, it's simple, and it certainly will quench your thirst on a hot day. What did you garnish it with? Just a lime wedge. See? Nice. You can do a wheel too. You would think that the color might get a little weird between those two drinks, the two juices, because the Cape Cod is so bright red, but this turns like a really nice hazy hue of deep pink. I like it. Yeah, hazy pink. It's a really nice looking drink, actually. It's a good looking drink. It's, again, can't emphasize enough. Like, it's such a cool sounding drink. You're having like a pool party and you just bring out like a tray and go, hey, man, I got sea breezes or bay breezes. Like, boom. Garnish it with some pineapple. Nobody's going to turn one of these down. So we just found out last week that Roger has a pool and he's- You have a pool? And he's never told, right? And apparently, he brings out like bougie trays of sea breezes to his pool guests of which we are not on the list. How have we not done this? Do you- Right? What the hell? Sorry, I'm inviting myself to someone else's pool party. Doesn't matter if it's above ground. It holds water, right? Yeah. Roger has a pool and he never told us. Got a pool, got a pond. Pond would be good for you. Oh, yeah. What was COVID times? What can I say? I imagine Roger in a waiter's outfit with his pants rolled up. No, no. What's the Cuban shirt with the four pockets you said? Oh, yeah. Guayabera. That's what he's wearing when he walks the drinks, the sea breezes and bay breezes to the pool. That we are not guests of. Well, anyway, that sounds fun, Roger. Anyway, yeah, you could be wearing that. But your pants have to be rolled up and you have a tray of these on. Yeah. I mean, I assume the pants are linen. Yeah. Of course. Maybe a straw hat too, a Panama hat. And he's got those big leather mandals on. Those men's sandals that are all leather and they cover three-quarters of the foot. The huaracha sandals. At least we know where we stand now. I mean, not in a yard and a half of water. I'm just gonna come clean here and say, I've been wasting my cocktail drinking life. I feel embarrassed for some of the stuff that I've been drinking in the basement when I realize how easy these drinks are to make and how delicious they are. Is this actually gonna change any behavior on your end? I think it could, these are nice and easy. What about nice and easy? Gonna go upstairs? And they're acidic enough and strong enough that he'll actually make them. I'm kind of surprised that you guys haven't heard of a lot of these because I've done just very basic bartending professionally. Nothing fancy, but if you're bartending at a wedding or something, I mean, you got to know all these things, Cape Cod and Greyhound. Every wedding that I've ever been to where I ordered a drink with a bartender didn't know, he was like, the hell are you talking about? I've said it before, I'll say it again, I like to order in the old man drinks at weddings, because the old man who's inevitably bartending is impressed. Yeah. Roger, I love how you manhandle this mint. All right, gentlemen, so here's the variant on the gin buck. This is a bourbon buck. I love that going into this podcast, I was supposed to make these two bucks, and Roger's just like, you know what? I know how to get a better outcome here, but except that I just make them myself. Yup. Thanks for not letting Pat f**k it up. This is why you don't get invited to the pool, Pat. Oh, s**t. This is why I don't get invited to the pool. Because you can't make a drink. Wow, this is lemony. Yeah. So this is like a great whiskey sour. Note the lack of egg whites, Chris. I see. I could see if you want, this could almost be like a tall mint julep if you wanted to put a little sugar and mint syrup in here. But yeah, totally the idea of you having a good whiskey sour. So the bourbon buck, similar to the gin buck, is fresh lemon juice, bourbon, mint, ginger ale. Now, you've garnished this one with a lemon twist, and I noticed that you did express the oils into the glass as well, which I think adds a little bit of dimension that our gin buck was lacking. This is nice. If you served me that gin buck poolside, I may not have come back to your house, but if you served me this poolside, I would have been a regular guest at your galas or is that galas? What a cretin. No expressed oils. I'm never coming back to this pool. This also is about a half inch away from your gold rush that you like so much. It's got some sweetness to it that's making me think honey, but really it's just that ginger ale. That's right. Yeah. He said summer cocktails, I was like, oh, sweet gold rush. I was like, wait a second. We talked about those nonstop. You remember Pat's gold rush phase? That was weird. I'm about to get back in. That's what these lemons were for. And then I bring the last four lemons in the house for this. Wait, you brought the lemons? Yeah. That's teamwork, guys. Good work. And I brought the booze. Yeah, I know the booze. Yeah, you literally always have booze in your car, so. It's true. For work, folks. Yeah, not for you. Roger, this is awesome. This is awesome. So it's a bourbon buck. Just for me, it's bourbon and ginger ale. There's a mint garnish and then lemon juice. Yep. That's it. And so it's like an ounce of bourbon ounce. How much lemon did you put in? Three quarters of an ounce? Half an ounce of lemon. Half an ounce of lemon, ounce and a half of bourbon is what it's supposed to be. And then top it up with the ginger ale to taste. And then slap some mint on there. You really should have put some egg in there, turned it into a fizz. You really missed the boat, Roger. All right, let's talk about the mint too. Just because it- The mint is so crucial for this. If this didn't have the mint, it wouldn't be as good. It's a garnish. It wouldn't be anything. It's a simple, dumb little garnish, but it brings this extra element to your eyes and also to your nose and also to your palate. Oh, the fruit king's got his muddler out again. Let's see where this is going. Roger, you're crushing it. Thank you. Damn it, what is this today? Sorry, I'm a dad. No, no, but it's like, it's like, oh s***, my kids are in school already, I better start making dad jokes and make up for a lost time. But outside of the pun, he's still making some amazing drinks. Man, bourbon buck. So simple, right? Yeah. I've been drinking those like crazy lately, basically that exact drink. Maybe if we offer to bring the ingredients over, we'll get a pool invite. Maybe. Yeah. Show with a basket of bottles of Jay Henry. What is it called? Yeah. Jay Henry & Sons. Look, it says to Pat, Joe Henry. Oh, you're tasting out the sample bottle, the signed bottle. Yeah. That's fine. Bottles of whiskey are for drinking. I don't care if you sign them. Hey, but seriously, big shout out to Jay Henry & Sons because this bourbon is awesome. And our guy, Joe Henry, gave this to me. I was, I stopped by the farm. The Henry Farm is right off I-90, just past Madison. It's in Dane County, Wisconsin. It's in Dane, I guess, township of Dane, Wisconsin. On the way to the Dells. Yeah, literally like the last exit outside of Madison. I was on my way up to Minnesota with some buddies to stay at my uncle's cabin. And they were awesome and they were cool. I stopped by with like three people. We got a tour of the farm. They got a whole bunch of barrels aged in the warehouse there. They've got some stuff aged in an Armagnac barrels right now. Wow. Yeah, they're doing some cool s**t, man. And their whiskey is awesome. This Roger drink looks a little sloppier and soupier. Yeah, right, we haven't officially started yet. Oh, you know what, he hasn't poured fizzy stuff over it. We're not gonna make fun of Roger for pouring berry sauce because he's making amazing drinks. He's making amazing drinks for us right now. Next time. Roger, I'll give you some hams. This thing can't handle the... Yeah, you need a cheesecloth or something. Even though it's no PBR, apparently. Oh, I'm putting in a it's no PBR in every damn episode. I knew it. We kind of had a bet going which one you were gonna do. Oh, no. I mean both, but there's gonna be an emphasis on it's... Well, this is really good, but it's no PBR. It did win a blue ribbon for a reason, I guess. It's true. Look at this fruit puree full of black specks that Roger gave me. All right, Roger, this looks real familiar, similar to a cocktail we had earlier. What's the difference? Just the base liquor. So I just took the bourbon smash and made it into a tequila smash, which you could further riff it and make it more familiar to a margarita by putting lime instead of lemon. You could put agave syrup here instead of the demerara. You could sub in little orange liqueur or put oranges in there. Roger's making them faster than I can drink them today. Damn. Yeah. Just another drink I have to sit here envying. Yes. Thank you. Okay. I got the pulpy end of the mixer here. No, we all did. That doesn't matter. So the tequila really shines through on this. The other thing you can do with this too, if you want it to be Paloma, is use one of these sparkling grapefruits instead of the ginger ale. So mine has ginger ale. Yeah. So this is your muddled fruit. So you have lemon juice with a sugar cube, and then you muddled fruit in that, and you use strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries, and you muddled mint in it, and then you pour it into the glass, you put about an ounce and a half tequila in each glass, and then you topped it off with ginger ale. Yep. That's correct. And now Greg got some added sparkling pink grapefruit in his. Yeah, I drank it about halfway down, and then Roger poured some grapefruit on top. And for the Paloma fan who also likes berries, I'm in heaven right now. Roger, these drinks, one after another. They're pretty good. Machine gun cocktail guy over here. You know what I'm realizing right now is that I have blueberries, strawberries, and all the ingredients that you're using. Why am I not playing along at home? What the hell is wrong with me? This is an awesome drink. You should be making this. God. What did I do? Try it with some of this. It's even better. It's really good with the grapefruit. Oh man. And the grapefruit doesn't dominate like it does in many other cocktails. This fever tree grapefruit is a must try. It really, it's their best product, I think. I love all their products. I love the ginger beer. I love the ginger ale. The spiced orange ginger ale with Reposado Tequila, I tell everyone who will listen, it was a mind blowing drink. That was a life changer, yep. Total life changer. Yeah. Legit life changer. But this sparkling pink grapefruit is probably the best thing they make. Dude, let's not undersell their tonics. The various tonics are so good. The various tonics are amazing. They'll make your gin and tonics based on your gin and there's like a rainbow of different options. It's so stupid that fever tree is only five bucks a four pack. It's just dumb. Don't tell them. I know. Don't tell them. I know. I know. This is, yeah, this is, this is, you know, cocktail lounge quality that you can make at home with just, you know, such simple recipes. I think they would have strained the seeds out for me. Probably. You know what, out of fancy- A lot of people like that. I'm going to enjoy some of the pulpier ones. At a fancy Chicago place? Heavier ones fall in the bottom. Maybe I don't want to swim in your pool. At a fancier Chicago place, even as fancy as Big Star, they would charge you $8 to $12 for one of these. Buddy, it's 2021. They charge you $12 to $16 for one of these. Some of the places in New York that are this tier, they'll charge you $20 for this drink. Yeah. Seriously. For sure. And you can make it in your own house for $1.25. In a mason jar. In 45 seconds. Plus the muddling. He put in a lot of effort on the muddling. So after drinking half of it down, now we're using small little glasses, drink half of it down, and I topped it off with the Fever Tree Pink Grapefruit. It's totally different. I got half and half ginger ale and pink grapefruit. Unbelievable. The Pink Grapefruit and it did make such a good cocktail. I think the grapefruit makes all the difference when you're using tequila instead of bourbon or gin. Honestly, I bet the grapefruit would be really good with the gin too though. Yeah, for sure. It is. I can tell you that. Yeah, he tried some. It is. Well, I feel like an asshole for mixing Kahlua and Dr. Pepper. Gross. That was a joke. That was a joke. Roger has opinions on real sarsaparilla in there somewhere. I had some Su City sarsaparilla for the first time in ages the other week. Is that? Wait, really? A lot sweeter than I remember it. Holy cow. I need to cut it with a little soda water, but that's just how you know you're old. Like I cut my coffee now with just like a little water, so it's drinkable at a better temperature and it doesn't just like hurt my stomach immediately. Well, gents, you're ready to go out there and bring these to your friends and family for summer parties? I mean, I'm having a party Saturday that apparently nobody's coming to, so I'll drink them myself. It's like four, first of all, that party was two weeks ago. And second of all, we found out about it like four days before your party began. I know, I know, I know, I know. Remember that time we were hanging out and Roger had his, what was it, Guns N Roses jean vest on? Oh yeah, yeah. It's an oldie but a goodie. Crafted in my youth. So gentlemen, easy, upscale, but super easy, cocktails. Upscale is code for bougie. You could trick people into thinking you like slaved over some of these cocktails. Roger, I saw you, you slaved over some of these cocktails. I did. We had 15-minute music breaks while we riffed about like cartoons that we watched while you were muddling. I saw it on Marshall Bravestar? Yeah. The muddling one takes a little time, but it's worth it. You guys loved it. The other ones, I feel they're mixer, build in the glass cocktails. Not bad. And both of Chris's were totally just built in the glass. Yeah. That's right. I'll say it again. I honestly, I mean this from the bottom of my heart, feel like a total d*** for drinking some of the drinks that I've made when I could make these with very little effort. Now you know how we feel about you. I'm a bleep. Thanks, Pat. Well, these were good, but they're no PBR. We'll see you next week. Oh, all right. This has been Barrel to Bottle. We'll be back in your feed next week with something fun. Until next time. I'm Roger. I'm Pat. I'm Chris. I'm Greg. Keep tasting. Nothing says summer cocktail like little jars with wooden muddlers in them. This is Roger's Country House Cocktails. Roger, have I been holding the muddler backwards the whole time, or are you not paying attention, or you're using that with both ends? I'm using it correctly. This is the textured end. Oh, there's a textured end on that side. Have you really been smashing the thin end of the muddler into the bottom of your glass this whole time? No, I take it, but mine was plastic, and you're right, I didn't know there was a textured head.