The Cocktail Thread: Help, I Bought Grappa

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Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Kenning posted:

It depends on the size of the punch. Right now I have 3 bowls I use for punch service, a 1 gallon clear Pyrex mixing bowl I use for small gatherings, a 7 qt. Anchor Hocking punch bowl I borrowed from a friend and haven't returned in months, and a 12 qt. stainless steel mixing bowl I picked up at a hardware store for those really big parties. If you don't want to invest in a nice glass bowl (which I can understand, if you're not a regular punch maker) stainless steel mixing bowls are a great choice, since they're cheap, reasonably attractive when new, and easy to find.

If you decide that this is a thing you wanna do a lot, the Anchor Hocking bowl is available at Target for like $25 and is a great bowl for mid-size gatherings (8-15 people).

Fill a stainless steel mixing bowl with water and freeze it overnight to make an ice block. To remove it, turn it upside-down and run water over the bowl for a couple seconds and it will pop right out.

The punch bowl should be about 25% larger than the punch you're serving in it, to fit the ice. For Frank Forester's you'll want a 3 gallon bowl and a 2 or 3 quart ice block.

The practical reason for putting the ice in last is that it's hard to stir everything together with a big chunk of ice in the bowl, and if the sugar hasn't dissolved before you put the ice in it's never gonna dissolve.

The real reason you put it in last is that the ice block is the most important ingredient in a bowl of punch. This sounds ridiculous, but bear with me. When I made Frank Forester's for my friend's birthday party, nobody was paying much attention as I poured in $100 of cognac and Gran Marnier, and even the half case of champagne just aroused a muted "Wow that's a lot." But when I brought over this big ice block and slipped it into the bowl everybody started chattering excitedly about wow where did you get that ice man this is like a real bowl of punch is it hard to make that man that's cool. The ice block is a signal that something special is going on, that this is no lovely jungle juice, this is a real party.

The ceremony of punch is at least as important as the ingredients. That's why you never omit the ice block. It's why you use small, clear plastic cups rather than those wretched red solo cups (clear plastic is attractive, and you want a small cup for two reasons: first, so that the cup of punch will stay cold as people drink it � a warm glass of punch is gross and will make people think they don't want more, when they definitely do; second, small cups force people to repeatedly return to the bowl to refill themselves, making it the focus of the party and a locus of socializing). That's why the first round of punch is passed out to everyone and cheered with a toast. And it's why, at the end of the night, I always toss out the ice block and drink the last quaff directly from the bowl.

As for people who don't drink punch, well, the main way I've gotten around that problem is by not offering other drinks at my parties hahah. But seriously, punch has a bad name, and lots of people will steer clear because they assume it'll either be a gross, sticky-sweet thing that barely contains alcohol, or it's some Everclear-powered hellbroth that will make them wish they were never born. Letting people see what you're pouring is a good way to assuage some of those doubts, and persistence is another. Lots of people who initially hang back will notice all the punch drinkers gathered around the bowl, and will often approach and give it a shot. Pretty soon the party is made, at least in my experience.

Listen, this is a lot of words on the internet, but good drinking in general, and punch in particular, has been a passion of mine for a few years. I am only very slightly exaggerating when I say that Wondrich's Punch! changed my life. There's a lot of proselytizing you've gotta do when you're trying to get people to drink well, cause people don't drink well, usually. But if you talk it up, and show them a serious cocktail (or a serious bowl) a few times, pretty soon they learn to RSVP immediately when you mention you're having a punch party, even if everywhere else they drink they stick with beer or a G&T.

God drat, I want this right now. About how much does it cost to make up a bowl of this stuff?

# ¿ May 11, 2012 21:46

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 19:20

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Kenning posted:

It depends on the recipe you use and the brands you buy. I never skimp on punch, but over all I find that about 80% if the punch I make comes out to within 15 cents of $2/drink (where 1 standard drink = 0.6 oz. of ethanol).

At my prices Frank Forester's Punch is about $175, and the yield is about 80 drinks.

USS Richmond Punch is more like $200, with a yield of 65 drinks or so ($3/drink), but that's just because you have to buy 2 bottles of each spirit to make a quart � if you scaled it to one bottle each it would be 50 drinks for about $100, which is more cost efficient.

Boston Club is a little curious, because it calls for just an ounce or so of 4 different spirits, and if you don't have any of those it'll be expensive to buy it all at once. Let's assume that as a good cocktail person you have Gran Marnier and Cognac sitting around. If you only need to buy the kirsch and the rum then a triple batch of Boston Club punch is $120, for 30 drinks, which is pretty expensive. However, if you have all the liquors and you just need the champagne, wine, and fruit, the cost drops down to $60, which again is right in that $2/drink mark.

My personal favorite punch, Admiral Russel's, gets you almost 40 drinks for $65, which is like $1.60/drink. And that is a tremendous punch.

United Service Punch will cost $45-$50 and yield 23 drinks.

The punch I've made the most frequently is Limmer's Club, because it's light, pleasant, and cheap as all hell. 40 drinks for 30 bucks. For a while I was sick to death of it, and couldn't bear to drink it anymore, but I've since come to an accord with it, since it's so popular and cheap. The thing that really makes this punch is leaving the peels to sit on the sugar for hours and hours. 5+ hours makes for a much, much better punch than 1 hour or so.

My own Irish whiskey and barleywine punch is like $25-$30 and gets you 18 drinks.

I feel like that provides a very good spread of costs and flavor profiles, and I hope it encourages someone to go out there and make a bowl this weekend and report back! Hell, I'll prolly make one just to celebrate the fact that I've gotten people excited about punch over the internet.

Thanks for running the numbers. I think the plan is going to be to start with the Limmer's Club punch, since its cheap, and if no one likes it/chips in for it then I'm not out that much.

And when they try it and love it, they can pay upfront for me to make the fancy stuff.

So expect to hear a punch trip report after next weekend. Assuming I can find Orange blossom water anywhere. Is that something that a higher end "organic" grocery store would have?

# ¿ May 14, 2012 20:24

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Kenning posted:

Awesome, I hope you enjoy it! Remember to leave the peels on the sugar for hours and hours. In terms of soda water, Jarritos Mineragua is one of the strongest soda waters on the market. I don't know if you have a Mexican grocer nearby though. Failing that anything will work, really, but stay away from fancy glass-bottle mineral waters like Perrier or whatever, since those are only lightly carbonated and you want serious sparkle.

Does the peels and sugar need to be refrigerated? It's probably going to get to sit for 5-6 hours.

Will the regular cans of club soda work? I can check the little Mexican grocery around here, but I don't have high hopes for it.

# ¿ May 15, 2012 17:33

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

GoGoGadgetChris posted:

Alright, my office is having a party friday afternoon and I'm in charge of making "jungle juice or punch or something, enough to get 24 people drunk". Coworkers are aged 23 to 55 with a mix of people who are beer drinkers, wine snobs, cocktail artisans, and people whose dream drink would be described as "something sweet that doesn't taste like alcohol".

Any recommendations for a punch? I know that Admiral Russell punch recipe is the first one in the arsenal, but that won't go over well here.

There is a gin based punch mentioned a few pages back that would probably do the trick. Should be pretty sweet, and if you get some decent gin, not taste like boozy pine sol.

Speaking of gin, I am throwing a gin cocktail party tomorrow night and wanted some recommendations for a good workhorse mixing gin.

Right now the plan is pick up some Cointreau, sweet vermouth and campari (maybe some maraschino if I can fit it into the budget). A friend said he would bring some champagne for french 75s. So we will have a huge amount of different drinks to make. Another friend is bringing the bottoms of a few different bottles of gin for some variety, but we will need more.

# ¿ Aug 16, 2012 16:01

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

nrr posted:

A French 75 is finished with a dash or two of absinthe on top, so that'd be your only challenge really, seeing that it'd be pretty tough to do an absinthe float on an entire bowl. I mean, you could just not bother. It's up to you really how detailed you want to get, and it kind of depends on how it's going to be served as well. If it's self serve, then it's probably not the best idea to have a bottle of absinthe lying around for people to add themselves, but if you're going to be manning the bowl all night then you could add the absinthe to each glass, and be able to garnish with a lemon twist as well.

When you say absinthe, do you mean the real stuff, or a "substitute" like pernod?

# ¿ Aug 16, 2012 23:45

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Does anyone have any good suggestions about to make with orange bitters? I remember reading that they are a must buy after angostura, but now I don't know what to do with them.

# ¿ Sep 27, 2012 20:07

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Vegetable Melange posted:

An Astoria. It's a 50/50 (gin/dry vermouth) with two dashes orange bitters, stirred, served up.

Is there a good way to tell if vermouth has gone off? We have had a bottle of dry vermouth sitting on the shelf for months now.

# ¿ Sep 27, 2012 21:52

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Found a copy of PDT last night, and I don't think I will be making anything from it anytime soon. Almost everything in there has a very specific ingredient in it that I'm not going to buy/make for one drink. Definitely going to be sticking with the essential cocktail

# ¿ Dec 14, 2012 18:52

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Vegetable Melange posted:

Recipe calls for a semi-obscure ingredient found only in specialty stores or swanky, geeky bars? I say buy a bottle and have a party.

Someday. I'm still fairly new at this so I am working on getting all the basics first. I mean I'm out of gin right now, so I'm definitely not going to track down something obscure yet.

Someday though...

# ¿ Dec 14, 2012 21:23

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

I tried my first aviation last night and I wasn't a huge fan. I got no maraschino from it and a flowery /potpourri aftertaste which I'm assuming was the violette.

Definitely need to get a bottle of maraschino and try my own.

Edit: since each drink was 2oz, I wonder if the proportions were off a bit.

# ¿ Dec 15, 2012 17:26

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

I have decided this summer that I want to get into some tiki/rum drinks, where is a good place to start?

# ¿ May 11, 2013 03:26

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Kenning posted:

What is your current rum collection and how prepared are you to acquire 6-8 bottles in the next couple of weeks?

I've got half a bottle of Havana club left. I'm ready coach!

# ¿ May 17, 2013 04:13

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Kenning posted:

Ahem.

I need more friends before I can have a punch party.

Kenning posted:

Giant Info dump

Awesome, I already have some cointreau, so thats handy. I love negronis so I always have campari on hand.

What are some good starter drinks I could do with the havana club and the coruba (holy poo poo the deluxe is available at the liquor store by my house)

Also for any other Alberta goons, this site is magic http://www.liquorconnect.com/ You can look up any spirit and it will tell you what store carry it.

E:Whats the difference between barbados and puerto rician gold rum?

Demon_Corsair fucked around with this message at 20:47 on May 17, 2013

# ¿ May 17, 2013 20:40

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Those both sound delicious. Now to get my friends to pony up some bottles so I can start making this. And the book to get here.

E: And absinthe wise, looks I'm pretty much stuck with Taboo.

Demon_Corsair fucked around with this message at 22:54 on May 17, 2013

# ¿ May 17, 2013 21:37

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Got the tiki remix book the other day, and jesus gently caress is it a mess.

So far my plan is to look up the classic stuff from Don the beach comber and Trader Vic and skipping the stuff that came from some random place in Arizona in 1954.

# ¿ Jun 7, 2013 19:51

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Tiki drink check in. Do far I'm so so on most of them. Hell in the pacific is one of my favorites but the maraschino pretty much drowns out the 151 flavor. I do lack a 1/4 oz measurement so I've been ballpark in it on a half ounce which may be the problem.

Holy hell are zombies a poo poo ton of work. My fridge is now full of assorted alchemical concoctions.

But drat are they worth it.

# ¿ Jun 29, 2013 00:58

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Kenning posted:

Sometimes Beach Bum Berry is a bit on the sweet side. And yes, Tiki is a loving *lot* of work for a private individual. I can only do it for a few months at a time and then I spend a season just drinking beer and wine and neat spirits.

And to make things worse I was making tiki drinks for all the friends that helped me move. It was a busy night.

Overall I don't know if the effort to reward ratio is right for me and I will probably be done with tiki once the rum runs out.

Not sure if I want to make some orgeat to try all those other drinks out or not.

Except for the 151, I quite like that, with the hell in the pacific is being one of my favorites so far. What are some other, preferably simpler recipes that use it?

Are there any other good uses for Wray and nephew other then falernum? I still have most of a bottle of that left.

# ¿ Jun 30, 2013 07:12

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Jyrraeth posted:

I found Angostura bitters in Safeway, and I'm in Calgary. It was in the aisle where the daiquiri mixes were, near the pop. Your profile says Alberta, so I assume it's the same over the rest of the province. (You could probably find it in your grocery store of choice.)

A liquour store near my boyfriend's carries all the bitters you'd ever want, too. There might be a good one somewhere near you.

Silk Road Spices in Inglewood has a pretty large selection of bitters as well.

What magical liquor store carries lots of bitters?

# ¿ Sep 4, 2013 22:08

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Tried a last word last night, and it tasted just like an aviation, which pretty much just tasted like marashino. Is there a way to make it not overpower any other ingredients in a drink?

# ¿ Oct 8, 2013 19:34

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

bunnyofdoom posted:

I can't get Rittenhouse in Ontario (All the LCBO's around me sold out). Is this an acceptable substitue? http://www.lcbo.com/lcbo-ear/lcbo/product/details.do?language=EN&itemNumber=337600

No, white dog is pretty awful.

Kenning posted:

You had a poorly-made Last Word.

edit: Don't drink white dog.

Strange, every other drink I have had at that bar was delicious. Only drinks that haven't been fantastic are ones with maraschino. Are there lots of other good uses for green chartruse to make it worth getting a bottle?

# ¿ Oct 8, 2013 20:55

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

bunnyofdoom posted:

Well then, time to find some cheap aged rye

Alberta Premium is the only Canadian 100% Rye. It's also dirt cheap. Not sure if you can get it outside of Alberta though.

# ¿ Oct 8, 2013 21:42

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

nrr posted:

If you can find some, grab the Dark Horse from Alberta Premium, it's loving fantastic. Higher alcohol volume at 45% (not as high as rittenhouse, but it's closer at least) with a big, dark, rich, well rounded body to it. Aged in heavily charred barrels, we've probably sold a couple of bottles of it and drank the rest of the case we had. Makes great whisky cocktails.

I have seen it around, but it doesn't list whats in it, so I was worried it was another "canadian rye whiskey" which have little to no rye in them.

And I want to like marashino, so far I find it just completely overpowers anything else in the drink.

# ¿ Oct 9, 2013 16:15

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Unlike the strict Rye and bourbon regulations in the states, Canada has no such rules when it comes to "Canadian Rye whiskey" you can have as little Rye mash as you feel like and still call it Rye.

# ¿ Oct 10, 2013 16:53

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Since bluecoat isn't available to me up in Canada, what is a good gin for drinks like a last word and a martinez? Right now I have a bottle of Bombay, and about half a bottle left of the Botanist.

Also, other then making falernum what is a good use for some Wray and Nephew overproof rum?

# ¿ Nov 12, 2013 19:16

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

BrosephofArimathea posted:

My go to where I don't want something floral is Martin Miller's Westbourne. Which you should have in your bar anyways, because it makes the world's best Negroni.

I think Beefeater 24 would rock. It's all spice and aniseed. Tanq 10 is peppery all over the place and would be right at home. And both are available everywhere.

I do love my negronis, so the world's best negroni sounds right up my alley.

# ¿ Nov 13, 2013 00:50

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Last word trip report.

Some sips all i can taste is marashino. Other sips... its loving magical.

I may drop the marashino a bit for the next one since to me it really seems to dominate anything its in.

Also I wasn't paying attention and put in 1.5 oz of everything instead of just 1 oz ...

Canada/ Western Canada goons, Alberta Premium Dark Horse seems pretty good. And its still only $28 for 750ml. I need to get some vermouth so I can get it into a manhatten.

# ¿ Nov 13, 2013 05:00

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

rxcowboy posted:

If you don't mind me asking what gin are you using? Because I only get a hint of almond in mine. I'm going to try subbing in Grand Mariner instead of maraschino and see what happens.

Just some plain jane Bombay Sapphire.

# ¿ Nov 13, 2013 14:39

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Does anyone have any good recipes for moonshine? I've come into possession of a flasks worth and other then making my friends shoot enough to go blind I'm not sure what to do with it.

# ¿ Mar 9, 2014 21:11

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# ¿ Apr 27, 2024 19:20

Demon_Corsair: Mar 22, 2004; Goodbye stealing souls, hello stealing booty.

Does anyone have a good recipe for brandied or maraschino cherries? Just picked 4 liters of sour cherries on the weekend.

# ¿ Aug 4, 2016 01:28

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