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Drink of the Week: Painkiller

Painkiller

We don’t post enough tropical Tiki rum drinks on Summit Sips. It’s not intentional—it just works out that way. With winter behind us now and the magnolias in bloom, we thought it might be nice to catch up on a classic that we mentioned back in April of last year. We may not be quite ready to kick off our sandals and relax in the luxurious sunshine, but this string of 70-degree days and thundershowers has us thinking maybe we should get few summer recipes prepared. The Painkiller is a perfect drink to put on the summer menu, and unlike a lot of Tiki tranquilizers, this one is easy to make.

In order to make the Painkiller, you need to gather a few ingredients, but it’s not nearly as difficult as you might think. First and foremost, you need coconut cream. Don’t worry, we aren’t

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Drink of the Week: Algonquin

Algonquin

Named for the Algonquin Hotel on 42nd street in New York, this cocktail gained popularity after Prohibition as the hotel became known for the regular lunch gathering of Alexander Woollcott, Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, Harpo Marx and others. It’s still served at the hotel today, but you don’t have to go there to try one. Nor do you have to be a member of an exclusive roundtable lunch group. It’s a breeze to make and the ingredients are easy to find.

Algonquin 2 oz rye whiskey 1 oz dry vermouth 1 oz pineapple juice

Stir with ice. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

According to David Wondrich, this drink is even better with a few dashes of orange bitters. He recommends Fee Bros. West Indian but also suggests using a squeeze of orange peel. There’s definitely an improvement with the extra kick of orange, but you also have to pay

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Drink Of The Week: Riviera, two ways

Riviera Cocktail

Sometimes I feature classics, sometimes a riff, and once in a while it’s an exotic Tiki. There’s not really a pattern to the Drinks Of The Week here at Summit Sips, but I do think it’s important to understand classic recipes and techniques. Over the past year or so, some of the recipes (including a few that don’t fall upon a Thursday) required a little more preparation to pull them together. Such cases usually involved preparing some homemade ingredient. That can mean making a better version of something you can find on shop shelves, or  sometimes it’s an opportunity to create your own version of an ingredient that’s impossible to find anywhere. This week, I want to feature a recipe that relies upon a basic infusion for the base spirit. It’s the Riviera cocktail by Toby Maloney, a popular favorite from The Violet Hour.

I

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Drink Of The Week: Chartreuse Swizzle

Chartreuse Swizzle

A good friend of mine has been reading a collection of short stories by PG Wodehouse about a character named Bertie Wooster and his valet, Jeeves. He came across a passage in the 1924 classic “The Rummy Affair of Old Biffy” in which Bertie recounts his experience at an exhibition at Wembley in North London. There, he is drawn to a Planter’s bar where a man is mixing an unusual West Indian cocktail. Without going into specific detail, he simply states that the drink contains seven ingredients: “A planter, apparently, does not consider he has had a drink unless it contains at least seven ingredients, and I’m not saying, mind you, that he isn’t right. The man behind the bar told us the things were called Green Swizzles; and, if ever I marry and have a son, Green Swizzle Wooster is the name that will

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Drink Of The Week: Summit Sips Punch

The Bar-Tender's Guide by Jerry Thomas

Those of you who live in the Twin Cities might already know that this Sunday is Grand Old Day, the largest one-day festival in the midwest that takes place every June along St. Paul’s Grand Avenue. It’s a fun time with a parade, lots of food, music, art, sporting events and so on. They even created their own iPhone app for the event. What does all that have to do with the Drink Of The Week? Well, as a St. Paul resident, I like to host a backyard barbecue every year to coincide with the huge festival, and for several years running I have served a rum punch—in fish bowls, no less! This year is no exception, but instead of my regular basic fruit juice medley, I decided to make an honest-to-history punch that would make Jerry Thomas proud.

So, who’s Jerry Thomas, you might ask? Only the

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Pomegranates and How to Make Grenadine

Pomegranate

Randy explains how best to open a pomegranate and release the precious seeds within as well has how to use the juice from these seeds to make grenadine. Once you’ve made your own grenadine, there are several delicious recipes to try, including the Singapore Sling, Monkey Gland, and the Commodore Cocktail.

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