Jim said I had to be on this one because I love coffee, and I asked, and we didn't really explore this, do I love coffee? The answer is yes, I love coffee, but I don't, I just like it, drinking it and feeling happy. You're not a coffee snob. Do you like roasty, big, rich coffee? I like dark coffee. Yeah, it's like an Italian roast. Yes, that is what I like. Like Lavazza is your thing. Yeah. Like super rich, robust. Well, I mean, full disclosure, Hillbrow's Dark Satin, which did like almost double in price in the last year. Does it still come in a can? No, it comes in a bag. What the? I know. Well, whole bean, because that's about freshness, right? Yeah. So there's that, and then there's a couple of shots of espresso when I get to work. What are you using to grind? What? What grinder? The one with the button on the top that goes, that costs like $12.99. Yeah. That's a Pulverizer. I told him he needs to get a burr grinder and he- Yeah, and I said yesterday that's a missus version. She was like, no. No, you can get a good value burr grinder that'll last forever. I got a Good Grips one and it's still in great shape and it was cheap. No, do Baratza Encore. It's like 200 bucks and it'll last forever. I've had my- You can replace the burrs. It's so usable. Okay. Don't get me into coffee grinders. I'm going to get into a Baratza Encore. It's just pulverizing. You're supposed to use that for spices. Yeah. What? You toast and then grind your spices fresh. Yeah. Anyways, Rob's a coffee snob. Yeah. Obviously. Well, I like coffee. You're a coffee snob. I think important to note if you're a listener of the podcast, we don't just know a lot about beverages. That are alcoholic. Yeah. Also coffee. So we're here to talk about Espresso Martinis music. You're listening to Barrel to Bottle The Binny's Podcast, and we're recording this one in the morning. So in case any caffeine comes into my system, it won't ruin tomorrow. I'm Greg, I do communications at Binny's. I'm Rob, I work on the Whiskey Hotline. I'm Lexi, social media. Jim, communications, podcast producer. So we have several different Espresso Martini recipes and some premixed ready-to-drinks. Our favorite RTD Espresso Martini, our favorite RTD brands. Yeah, of this, don't call it a comeback. It's back. It is a comeback. It's back, baby. Espresso Martini, the hottest cocktail. Yeah, but it's cold. It's usually served cold. Right. Folks. It was back. Like it was here 20, 25 years ago, and now it's back. But it's not back with Appletini's or anything else. It's just Espresso Martinis. 2:50 Classic Espresso Martinis I think we should make the first cocktail and then talk about it as we taste the cocktail. That's a great idea. What's the first drink? Espresso Martini Classico. Okay. A few weeks ago, we had the dueling Mateos back to back. We had Matteo Maletti and Matteo Luxardo. Those guys were great. They both brought their coffee liqueurs in, and Maletti is a coffee liqueur, and specifically Luxardo is a espresso liqueur. They're made differently. The Maletti is a cold brew when the espresso is brewed hot. The Maletti one you need to add coffee to, so we brewed up some espresso. Then the Luxardo one, they told us not to add coffee. They said, you can do it without coffee. It says on their website, add coffee, but Matteo, right from the horse's mouth, said, you don't have to put coffee in. So we're putting that to the test. We're going to put that to the test, yeah. And zhuzh it up with some vodka. Oh, it's that crappy one. I don't know, the lids are all mixed up. Oh, that's the problem. I genuinely almost brought a shaker from my place just to make this easier. That's the problem is the lids are mixed up, because that one was just leaking all over my hand. I don't even know, we don't even know what the lids are. That's a Boston shaker. Boston shakers are terrible. No, they're awesome. No, they break. Entertaining. You need to get two pieces of metal, two metal shakers, one bigger than the other. Quite literally $15 on the table. Yeah. And even if you don't know how to do that thing where you crack it and strain it, you can just get a strainer and put it on top. Or, you know, get the, your metal shaker should come with, you know, the top and the strainer thing. I've got all of this. Yeah, most people do. Well poured. Okay. Well poured. Pass around and talk us through this. Thank you. Thank you. All right. This is gonna be a sticky episode. Yeah. Not if I can help it. Espresso martini number one is made with maletti coffee liqueur. Yeah. And what else? I did equal parts on this one. So I did vodka. Only the finest Clark and Sheffield Previa vodka. Oh, good call. Thank you. Espresso and the maletti. And then a tiny bit of sugar. They stole my espresso pods for this. Oh. Yeah. It's fine. All right. Let's give this a sniff. Oh, it smells so good. Yeah, I suppose it doesn't need the sugar, but. No. If you like sugaring your coffee, then I guess it's. There's a nice coffee bitterness to it. I feel like that didn't come through as much with just the liqueur. It's light and roasty. It's like a light roast. Yeah. Kind of quality here. Not as fruity, but really nice. I think it's nice if the spirit flavor comes through, because sometimes you'll have a cocktail and you're like, wait, it's gone. And you can definitely still taste vodka. Yeah, but it's way underneath. And it's not overly sweet and it's not super heavy. That's part of the problem with these is if they're made too sweet and syrupy, then you can have one instead of five. Also, there's like a frothy head. What do we call it? The crema on this? Oh, crema, yeah. Straight up just from the coffee and the sugar and the shakin. Okay, that's actually delicious. I'm realizing right now that I'm gonna walk away from this episode wanting to drink espresso martinis. Oh, yeah. It's like a dark chocolate. Mm, that's really good. Yeah. I've got a friend who recently found that he likes espresso martinis, so now he goes to the bar and will order two. And the bartender always assumes that there's a friend coming to join. Drinks the first one like an espresso shot about 30 seconds or less, and then sips the other one. Thanks for putting all the effort into it though. Yeah. How did this jump to popularity again? It's coffee, right? Like people, like Rob here, at some point just dove in headfirst to coffee culture. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's access to information, right? So, if you're curious about something, you can just get everything, and then there's YouTube videos, and there's all these things, and it's so accessible, and cost came down on so many things. You don't necessarily need to have an espresso machine that's going to cost you thousands of dollars. You can make a version of an espresso in an AeroPress. Yeah. It's lighter, but yeah. It's not one for one, but you can kind of do something similar. Hey, that's my morning routine every morning. First thing. Espresso Martinis AeroPress. Just an AeroPress of the darkest roast coffee I could find. You can also use cold brew. Yeah. If you're a cold brew enthusiast like I am, you can just swap it out. It'll taste better the more concentrated it is, but that's an easy swap for sure. Less acidic. Oh, much less benefit, much less. All right, cool. Cool. Espresso martini number two. What's the difference here? What are we on? This is the, oops, all Luxardo. So it's Luxardo and vodka. Oh. Without the coffee. There's no brewed coffee in here. No coffee. Equal parts. Because the, and sugar? No, I just swapped the coffee. So it's one ounce spirit and then two ounces of the... Luxardo. Luxardo. Luxardo espresso liqueur. Okay. Smells richer. Mm-hmm. Darker. Oh, yeah. 0.25 ounces of sugar. It's broader on the palate and a little bit darker and also really good. It's almost a little sweeter. Yeah. Sweeter, but somehow richer and almost like earthier. There's like a green note to it. And that's just from the espresso liqueur. Probably. Which we tried a couple weeks ago and I loved it. Yeah. Difference in approach, right? So the cold brew versus a hot espresso. Yeah. This is the one. This is the one you can drink one of versus the lighter version that we just had. Fuller, richer. Yeah, I agree. Sweeter. This is your dessert. I would have this for dessert. Yeah. Have this with tiramisu. Oh, my goodness. I think if you eat like an elderly person dinner around four o'clock. Right. Most wise. Gotta get those early birth specials. Which happens to be my favorite time to eat dinner. And then you have an Espresso Martini afterward. That's perfect. And you're in bed by seven. Or you're getting ready to go somewhere else. I feel like I'm almost aging into my mental age. Like I've almost reached how old I've been forever. Now. Old curmudgeon? Yeah. Yeah. Really? Yeah. There is something to be said that we're kind of always wearing sweaters. Uh-huh. It's fine. It's like a shawl. Yeah. I like the sweater season to cover up the body a little bit. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Stay comfy and wear a tie. Look dapper, but still. You're layered. You're never getting cold. You can always take a layer off. Yeah. And the old curmudgeon are speaking. Espresso Martinis, the button up... I forgot what this is called. We both got one. What is this called? Cardigan. Button up cardigan of cardigan. Yours has pockets, though. Yeah. I like that. It's like Mr. Belvedere over there. You ever had a spicy hot chocolate? Yes. Yeah. Okay. So spicy hot chocolate with mezcal, so it's spicy and smoky. Perfect. That sounds great. Amazing. I feel like that's the cardigan of fall. 10:34 Tequila Espresso Martini Espresso Martinis 3. We've had two very faithful to form Espresso Martinis. We're going to do something weird? We're going to get nuts. We're going to get nuts. I was looking up coffee, I think because we were talking about putting tequila in one of these. I think they were talking about that in the Maletti or Luxardo. One of those guys was talking about it, or maybe both of them. They were talking about how popular tequila and mezcal is over there. So I was thinking about tequila, and then I was thinking about Mexican style coffee, which is cafe de olla, which is a Mexican coffee that just brewed, and then you add piloncillo, which is a brown sugar that comes in a little cone shape kind of thing about the size of a shot glass, and then cinnamon. And so I made some espresso, concentrated espresso, and then I put in one chunk of piloncillo. Which is a lot of sugar. Yeah, well, I made three cups of it. I don't know why. I just made three shots of espresso, and then that sugar, and then some cinnamon sticks. This sounds Roger approved. Yeah, it sounds flavor blasted. Definitely. What kind of sugar? Turbinado? Well, yeah, piloncillo is, you know, it's very close. It's not, you know, not basic sugar. It's very rustic. We got caffeta oil ready, and that's just going to be that and luna azul reposado. All right, so here we go. We got this tequila based espresso martini. That's a good crema. Good crema on there. Oh, the spice on the nose. I think it actually is a froth, and I think it comes from the sugar content. I think that's why it's bigger on this one. Because there's more sugar? Yeah. Did you use any of the liquid sugar, too? No. Oh, this is only? Yeah, but it's all ground. I mean, I really mashed it up, and I put it in hot coffee, so I mean, it's... It just melted in. Yeah. Yes. That cinnamon. Not sweet. That cinnamon just jumps. That's more my style. It smells gorgeous. I love when something is cinnamon, but not like a sugar bomb cinnamon. Yeah. That's lovely. Oh, that's really well integrated. And the coffee roast here is really good, too. The genuine espresso here. Yum. Yeah, just the right thing. The bitterness on the back end is like bitter chocolate. Well done. This plays really well with the tequila. Yeah, exactly. That's what I was just thinking. And it's funny because sometimes with this, I get like a green pepper note, or sometimes I'll get like a black pepper spice. In the tequila. In the tequila that comes through in the cocktail that kind of throws it off a little. Yeah. But this doesn't. It's not overly earthy. It's just really well integrated. It's Luna's wool, right? Luna's wool. That is the most mixable tequila I've had in such a long time. And at an amazing price at $21.99. Yeah, one of the best budget tequilas ever. It was on our budget tequila episode. I know. It was one of the... That's when I started buying it. Yeah. And the 175 is like super cheap also. Yeah. Yeah, it's a great price. This would be a good holiday cocktail. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. With that baking spice. Holiday cocktails, you could batch this. Oh, that would be great. Your party, you would be a hit at the party. Maybe I'm doing this this year. I wonder how this would taste warm. Yeah, I do too, because it's got that Abuelita kind of character. Probably good. Like throwing a mini Crock-Pot on warm. Mm-hmm. A little ladle. I mean, you could just have it as a mulling setup, as a mulled coffee with just peel and silo and cinnamon sticks. Okay, this is fabulous. All right, and also easy to make. These have all been super easy to make. I don't even know that you have to use espresso, just use a dart. You don't have to have an espresso machine even to make espresso. I mean, you can just get espresso beans and make a concentrated coffee with it. Concentrate it better because you're mixing ice in there. Even if you don't have a coffee maker or anything, you could do cowboy coffee where it's just grounds and hot water, and then you just filter it out after a few minutes. I mean, yeah, that's true. I mean, that's basically a French press. So if you have a cocktail shaker, you're filtering stuff anyways. Or if you'd like the lazy girl method, you can just buy cold brew concentrate. Yeah. There you go. Or if you don't even want to take the time to do that, you can get one of these fabulous premixes that we're going to taste right after this little jingle. RTD. 15:03 RTD Espresso Martinis Look at that, I just did a teaser for another segment. Man, that's crazy. Segue! That's gonna be in 10 seconds. Yeah, stick around for right now. We don't have any ads for mattresses. This segue from our sponsor. All right, so we've got some RTDs, which stand for Ready to Drink. Ready to drink. Your Espresso Martinis were pretty good. They were very good. And I have had some RTDs that I trust, but I'm leery right now. Well, these are fully vetted though. Yep. So, Canapaluza only out of over 100, only about five made the cut. That's great. You're doing a public service by doing that. These guys take- It's a whole day. They opened literally hundreds, multiple hundreds. Don't just say these guys. We all have to do it too. No, I took that day off. Jeff makes us do it. He makes us sit in that conference room. And you got to rank them. We do this. We opened literally hundreds of canned cocktails, Espresso Martini and otherwise. I mean, it's heavily curated. Jeff goes through and puts stuff in order that he thinks it would be wise to drink in. That's true. And then we just have first impressions on every single thing. And there's a lot of people involved. And hundreds don't make the cut. Hundreds of canned cocktails. All right. So you're looking at the creme de la creme. These are the ones that made the several steps of filtration. Everything that is carried has made the cut. I always think of Binny's Buyers as consumer advocates. So this is Tip Top. Tip Top, cute, teeny, tiny little can. Vodka, espresso and vanilla. Oh, vanilla. That's a nice addition. So. And shaking over ice. These all should be shaken. I don't know if they all say that, but come on, just shake it. Yeah. Class it up a little bit. You're not even pouring the spirit in. You're just dumping a can. Like just shake it. Would you say I'm slumming it if I just poured it over rocks? Yeah, I would say, as the can says, if you would like maximum enjoyment, shake with ice. Yeah. All right. This Tip Top is pretty good. Super chocolatey. There's more dark roast chocolate, dark chocolate here. It holds up. What's the alcohol in it? Vodka. Percentage? Yeah. Twenty-two percent. High five. Way to go, Tip Top. Yeah, it's got a lot of that dark chocolate bitterness. Well, that's part of it. Cutting it really cuts through some of that booziness as well. This is legit. The thing I like about Tip Top is that they really truly make full strength cocktails. And that they're Tip Top? That you would get at a bar. They're Tip Top cocktails? They're Tippy Top? They're apt-a-nim'd, named Tip Top. There's Tippy Top. Okay. That's very good. I was afraid there was going to be too much milk. There's no milk here. Well, I was afraid there was going to be way too much vanilla. Vanilla can just overtake. Yeah. Do they ever have milk in Espresso Martinis? Well, we had- They should not. They had one at Canapalooza. They should not. They should not. Yeah, the vanilla is just a ghost. It's just a whisper underneath. It makes it like adding to the chocolate because it's in chocolate too. That's rad. Delightful. How much caffeine is in there? They should have to disclose that. It's a drug. I think they should have to. Yeah. Doesn't say. It's probably a range every time. But it did win silver at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition. Oh, not double gold. What the hell? No, no, no. No, no, no. The hell? That's $19.99 for a four-pack. $19.99 for a four-pack? Five bucks a drink. It's like ordering it at a bar, a very cheap bar. Yeah. Go to your dive bar and get an Espresso Martini. No, they look at you with the hairy eyeball. You think? It's not going to be good. Tip top, big thumbs up from me. What's next? Moth Espresso Martini made with vodka, coffee, liqueur, cold brew, 14.9%. And the moth is regularly $19.99, 14.9% alcohol. That's still hefty for improvements. Wouldn't call it full strength, though. Moth with a very, very minimalist label design there. It's like one of those t-shirts that says, you know, like, I can't think of any of them right now. Rizzo and Bryant. Rizzo and Bryant and Baez. Yeah. One of those shirts. Oh, Cubs. Obvious. One of the obvious shirts. Looks like an obvious shirt. Obvious shirt, yeah. Interesting to see this pour. Clearly lighter than the rest. Lighter in color and it has a haze. Looks like slightly translucent. Volume, too. Oh, and this froth is starting to rise. Okay, this is looking pretty good right here. Actually, yeah, once the froth rose out of it, it's a nice nutty brown. Oh, this smells so good. It smells like chocolate ice cream. Oh, yeah. Very chocolatey. Oh, yeah. It's like a chocolate shake. Fudgicle. Fudgicle. Fudgicle or fudgicle? Fudgicle. It's got to be fudgicle. Dreamcicle. It tastes like hot chocolate. It tastes like hot chocolate. It tastes just like hot chocolate. Yeah, hot chocolate is exactly what it is. It tastes like hot chocolate but cold. A chocolate frosty. Yeah, yeah. It reminds me of being like, I would eat like an ice rink and you go and you get the hot chocolate at the little stand, but this is a cold version. And caffeinated and there's booze. Oh, even better. Oh, this is super good. Okay, so let's say it's lighter, the coffee is almost gone because it's all like a milk chocolate quality instead. Higher toned, lightly sweet, not heavy and glowing. It's almost bright. Yeah. It's like, why is it so chocolatey? I don't know. This is kind of plentiful. Probably the type of beans or something that they've used. I could finish a four pack of these. Also sometimes though, like a cold bird will have that chocolate note, so I wonder if just everything that they chose just has a chocolate note and playing together, it's on 10. And despite this being 14.9% and having sweetness, the spirit comes through. You can actually pick up some spirit on this, which is actually pretty welcome in my mind. Cause, you know, I could drink a hot chocolate anytime. Yeah. Mocha drinkers, this is for you. Good call. Because that like bitter, roasty coffee just doesn't exist here. Okay, hand me back all of your cups. This one says chill, shake well, then pour with vigor, so. Chill, shake well. Did we chill it? So they don't say to shake it over ice. No, but it's nitro, so I don't want to. I'm just gonna pour it over a big cube. Interesting. Straight away. Brand new. Lexi is carefully expressing single cubes from the bag. Out of a quarry ice bag. A quarry ice bag. Clear, beautiful, big cubes of ice. Into a glass with the smallest lid possible. Yes, really. Barely fitting in there. Squeezing that square peg into that round hole. Open on Mike. Open on Mike. I'm gonna, I don't, I have nails. Okay, we have, we all have microphones. We can crack that for you. Aren't nails for opening stuff? No. No? No, definitely not. They're not functional nails. Yeah. Oh, that wasn't very exciting. That didn't sound. There was no like nitro. That still sounded good. I mean, that's a good sound, but there was no. That was like the beginning sound. There was no nitro sound. Like one of the Coke or Pepsi ads. Yeah. That's not vigor. Not enough vigor. The nitro didn't come through. Now you get the smallest cans. That's super disappointing. You want to lower these? Should I try to shake it in a thing? No. I don't know. Maybe. Why don't we do this, see how it tastes, and then I can shake the next one if we need to. If we need to. Yeah. All right. Straight away. This is new. This is a new brand, correct? Smells like Cocoa Puffs. I think this is new to Binny's. I get a little of that. Not a new product. There's a lot more roastiness. Yeah, there is. Yeah. We're back to actual coffee. This is like a can of Folgers Grounds when you first crack it. This part of it. It's bitter. This cube is so big and this glass is so small that I can see through the cube. There's no brown liquid underneath it. It's true. It's just like right on the bottom of the glass. Oh, so different. Bitter and delicious. So much more bitter. A ton of that really roasty coffee. I think that's why doing them in a lineup maybe has changed my palette a little bit, but I think that this one was my favorite for a long time. And now trying it, I think it's the most bitter of the three. This is the most bitter. The most coffee-like of the three. And by far the least sweet. We just went from milk chocolate to like one of those 94% cocoa. This is your cold brew without sugar kind of person. Just black. This is black. I think I love this. I like this. Because that's how I would want to drink it. Yeah. It's broad and weighty on the palette, but it's not overly sweet. Yeah. I'm just disappointed with the lack of nitro. I'll try to shake it, see what happens. Is it nitro? We're not lying to ourselves about this? This also is made with Stumptown Coffee, so if you are a coffee snob, you've probably heard of those guys. Oh, yeah. And if you're a beer snob, because I feel like their coffee ends up in a lot of different beers, even though they're way out in Oregon. This is fabulous. It's also got the longest finish. This is not a bad one here. Yeah. They're all very good and different. Yeah, this definitely is heftier. Freaking nailed it. It's all about leverage from the nails table. Oh yeah. Gracias. Oh, that's so much fun. Oh, there we go. Wow, so foamy. Okay. That looks like an espresso pour. Okay, I've been kind of wondering why we're going through the trouble of shaking these, but that just made it very clear why. So we just opened another bottle of Stumptown, and Lexi shook it on ice this time. And boy, howdy, the froth, the palate, it's like, I mean, it's still delicious and it smells about the same, but the experience here is elevated. That froth, the creaminess, and any of those chocolatey notes that were hidden before are starting to express themselves. It became lighter. It's lighter in body. Brighter. Yeah. Wow, okay. Unintentional, I learned something today. That was very good and it became pretty fantastic. That really makes a difference. Okay, Rob, you gotta tell me, what Amaro should I buy to shake over ice? Because I was standing in the aisle and I couldn't decide, so then I just bought Doumanet yesterday. I'm so partial to Chinar that I'd say Chinar. Okay. But all I needed was for you to say one so that I can do it. Okay. That's all I needed. Okay. Another fun fact, if you're an Amaro, Amari lover and you like an Espresso Martini, you can just buy Averna. Averna. And put it over a big queue, like an old-fashioned. And maybe if you've got like a microplane or maybe some cinnamon, a little bit of that on top, done. That sounds great. Somebody left the cinnamon sugar in the break room and I sprinkled some on my Espresso this morning. How much is straight away? Regularly $19.99? Yeah. Down to $16.99. You should buy those. $16.99 a four pack for a very good Espresso Martini. All six of the drinks that we tried today are fabulous. Shaking it over ice made it even more fabulous. I'm glad we tried not and then with because that is neat. I am curious. It says chill and we didn't have it chilled. I'm wondering if you had it chilled if you need to shake it. But it probably doesn't matter. Obviously, there's no carbonation in it, so you're not making it flat or anything. All it could really do is further help the nitro-ness of it. Awesome. Okay. Very easy cocktails to make. If you don't want to even go through that trouble, grab one of these prefabs because they're really good too. Oh, yeah. These are all, I'm sold. Geased up. I don't want to mix my uppers and my downers like this, but these are fabulous. They're great. How much alcohol is in this straightaway? 20 percent. Okay. Lexi, thank you for doing the mixing and the shaking today. Jim, thanks for putting together the Cafe de Oya version. Cafe de Oya. Delicious. Oh, yeah. Really good. I don't think that caffeine just absorbs into your cheeks, but it might happen a little bit. I hope it does. I hope it does. A little peppy now. Alcohol absorbs into your cheeks. I'm going to go do a lot of work very fast. Thank you. Don't sleep on this trend. These are fabulous. You wouldn't be able to sleep after. Don't sleep on this trend, because it will keep you awake. Cool. Thanks, guys. And thank you for listening to Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. Back up in your business real soon with something great. What? Does that mean something? Straighten the biz. This is like a- No more caffeine on the podcast. 6.45 on a Monday night ending. Dude. Thank you for listening to Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. We're back in your feed very soon with something great. As good as this. Until then, I'm Greg. I'm Rob. I'm Jim. And I'm Lexi. Keep tasting.