cocktail review no. 73 - Highball

I've been talking so much about highballs lately that I might as well tell you about the grandaddy of them all, the original sin, the Very First Highball: the highball.

Yes, that's its name. Highball. It's the first highball, so every highball after it was called a highball too. Geddit? Kind of like how everybody calls tissues "Kleenex" or sticky bandages "Band-Aids" even when they're not Kleenex or Band-Aids.

As you can probably tell, I love highballs. I just adore them. They're simple, they're quick, they taste good and they go down easy.

No dirty jokes, please.

From Wikimedia Commons

To clarify, highballs are a large family of drinks composed of a spirit and a larger proportion of an alcoholic mixer, and sometimes incorporating a simple garnish. That's it. Two or three ingredients in a highball glass. The name "highball" comes from the old days of railways and steam engines, when a station master would raise a brightly-colored ball on a chain or a pole (see photo) to let incoming trains know that there were no passengers or mail to pick up. The train wouldn't slow down and waste a lot of coal and time getting up to speed again. It would just blow right through the station at top speed. Hence "highball"...a quickly-made and satisfying libation.

The original "highball" was whiskey and ginger ale. And it's still around today. And still called a "highball," thus confusing bartenders everywhere. Here's the recipe:

• 2 ounces whiskey
• 4 ounces ginger ale

Pour the whiskey and ginger ale into a highball glass half-filled with ice cubes. Stir well.

In the interests of accuracy, I printed this recipe as I saw it in The Bartender's Bible. One part whiskey to two parts ginger ale (or whatever proportion you desire) is just fine and dandy. This is a highball, after all. They're customizable.

No dirty jokes, please.

cocktail review no. 68 - Presbyterian

"A man with God on his side is always in the majority." 
— John Knox, the father of Presbyterianism

Continuing on in the vein of simple cocktails you can make at home ('cause who likes to go out and hunt up a whole bottle of blue Curaçao just for one measly drink?)...

This is one of the most well-known highballs—and yet, well, it isn't. It's the most famous cocktails that nobody's ever heard of. You wouldn't hear it mentioned at a party or a rave, even though its roots go back further than many other lauded alcoholic creations. It's rather like one of those scratch-'n'-win things you'd buy at a gas station: unknown and inscrutable from a distance, but a little digging and the information is revealed.

And what a wealth of information. Famous drinks always have a plethora of variations—everyone has their own margarita recipe, for example, and everybody likes their martinis a little different. But the Presbyterian has a staggering number of variations: literally trillions. Before I go any farther, I should give you the (baseline) recipe. Here it is:

• 1.5 ounces whiskey
• 3 ounces club soda
• 3 ounces ginger ale
• 1 lemon twist

Pour the bourbon into a highball glass half-filled with ice cubes. Add the club soda and ginger ale in equal measures. Add the lemon twist and serve.

A few words about the flavor: simple, direct, easy, and fine. The fire of the whiskey is tempered by the fizz of the ginger ale and the club soda; the ginger ale adds sweetness while the soda tempers it; and the lemon twist adds just the perfect touch of citrusy tang. If you're looking for something a bit more exciting than the classic highball, then this is the drink for you. And if you like anything that resembles a whiskey fizz or an old-fashioned, then you'll love the Presbyterian.

But you wanna know the best part? You can customize this drink. Mix and match the ingredients until you find a winning combo. You can use bourbon, American rye, blended Scotch, or Irish whiskey. Some people substitute 7-Up for the ginger ale and some people add lime instead of lemon. It's up to you. Whatever floats your boat.

Isn't having choice great?

cocktail review no. 47 - Moscow Mule

I can't believe I haven't done this one yet! It's one of my favorites. And I don't even like vodka. Plus, I found out a little while ago that it's a classic cocktail from the 1940s—something Audie Murphy or Ricardo Montalban might've sipped on. 

No, it's not a chick drink. Just because there's vodka in it doesn't make it limp-wristed (ever heard of a Kamikaze?). Audrey Hepburn drank Glenlivet, for Pete's sake. Doesn't get much more badass than that.

And speaking of ass...

I have solved the mysterious case of the "Moscow Mule." I figured out why it's called a "Moscow Mule." I can't express to you what a triumph this is. What glorious relief. I've been going mad. The name of this beverage has bugged me for ages. I had no idea where the "mule" part came from. Mules in Moscow? Huh? What's ginger ale and lime have to do with mules?

Well, I found out. I'll tell you after I give you the recipe.

• 1½ ounces vodka
• 4 ounces ginger beer
• 1 lime wedge

In a highball glass half-filled with ice cubes, combine the vodka and ginger ale. Garnish with the lime wedge.

I'd like to tell you that there's an interesting story behind the name, but there isn't. Some guys got drunk, pulled some ingredients off the shelf, mixed the cocktail, got more drunk, and named it. In 1941, on the leading edge of a vodka craze, Jack Morgan and two friends were hanging out in a bar. (The location is highly disputed. Some say it was in New York's Chatham Hotel; others allege it was in Los Angeles somewhere.) Morgan was the owner of a company called Cock 'n' Bull Products, and owned a restaurant in Hollywood of the same name. With him were John G. Martin, president of G.F. Heublein Brothers, Inc. (a noted distributor and producer of alcoholic beverages), and Rudolph Kunett, who presided over Heublein's vodka division. A trainload of Cock 'n' Bull Ginger Beer had just pulled in and the three men in the bar decided to mix it with some vodka and see what the result was. They liked it, and (after a few brisk rounds) dubbed it the Moscow Mule: "Moscow" for the Russian origins of vodka, obviously, and "mule" because it was a "mule" or "buck" cocktail.

What are "mule" or "buck" cocktails?

Well, I'll tell you.

They're cocktails which contain ginger ale or ginger beer, citrus juice, and any particular hard liquor. The "gin buck" was a popular cocktail at one point. Rum bucks (also called Jamaica bucks or Barbados bucks or Wherever-The-Hell-The-Rum-Was-Made bucks) are quite well-known, too.

The Moscow Mule caught on like wildfire. It was especially popular in Los Angeles, getting a nod from Insider Hollywood magazine. According to legend, it was served in copper mugs—a marketing gimmick cooked up by Martin. Reportedly he bought one of the first Polaroid cameras and asked barmen around L.A. to pose with a copper mug (labeled "Moscow Mule") and a bottle of Smirnoff vodka. He'd leave one photo at the bar and send the other to the bar next door, just to unsettle the competition.

Bet you didn't know that, did you?

One disclaimer: I know the recipe says "ginger beer" and not "ginger ale" but hey—I didn't have any ginger beer. Moreover I have tasted ginger beer (in England) and, aside from being more intensely herbal in flavor, it's not that much different from Canada Dry. So. I thought ginger ale an adequate substitute.

Ginger ale mixes quite well with most liquors. I wouldn't recommend blending it with tequila, but it certainly coordinates with whiskey and rum. Certainly vodka. Vodka, the "necklace of negatives," is a sponge-like liquor that absorbs the flavors of whatever's been mixed with it. (Gin does likewise to some degree.) Add orange juice to vodka and you get orange juice. Add tomato juice to vodka and you get tomato juice. Add cranberry juice to vodka and you get lots of women drunk, and fast.

So, the ginger ale-vodka mix is a harmonious one, and the lime kick at the end provides both an extra burst of flavor. There's variations on the recipe, of course. Oprah prefers her Mules with sugar syrup and a sprig of mint. Some ballsy folks in the 1950s added bitters to this thing. Whoo-ee, I don't know if I'd try that. This is a sweetish, gingery, slightly sour sort of libation; it doesn't need extra flavor, particularly not one that'd make you pucker up. Taken all around, presented as I've communicated to you here, the Moscow Mule is an agua dulce worthy of a notable spot on your after-dinner repertoire, or a fun summery drink to serve at a picnic or barbecue on the back porch.

Pour, mix, and enjoy. You're sure to get a kick out of it.

cocktail review no. 14 - Dark and Spooky

Now, normally I'm not the kind of man who goes poking through recipe databases and plumbing the bowels of Martha Stewart's Web site for inspiration. Nuh uh, not me. No sir. But my mom is. That's how I wound up with this recipe. And I'm awfully glad she went to the trouble to hunt it up for me, because it was a hit at my Halloween party last night (more about that later). So, without further ado, here it is, courtesy of Claire Robinson for Food Network Magazine (and my mom):

• 2 ounces dark rum
• 2 ounces ginger beer or ginger ale
• juice from 1 lime
• 1 lime wedge
• 1 black gummy spider
• black decorating sugar

Spread out the black sugar on a small plate. Rub the lime wedge around the rim of a rocks glass and dip the glass into the sugar. Then fill the glass with ice. Combine the rum and lime juice in a cocktail shaker filled with ice. Shake well, and strain into the glass. Top with the ginger ale and add the gummy spider. And what have you got when you're finished doing this? If you've done it right, you should have an orange-colored drink with a black crust of sugar on the rim of the glass and a black spider hovering at the bottom. I didn't quite obtain that nifty result. The only gummy spiders I found (at Wal-Mart) were small, and multicolored. But the rest of it came off without a hitch, and the guests at the party who sampled the drink (yours truly included), thought it a tastefully sour, mellow sort of cocktail.

cocktail review no. 7 - Barkis is Willing

I've bloviated frequently about cocktails which, in my opinion, have too many mixers in them, which obscure the flavor of the liquor upon which they are based. I believe I have now found a cocktail which has made me recant that view, or at the very least given me reason not to regret said obscuration.

1½ ounces light rum

1 ounce lime juice

1 teaspoon grenadine

½ teaspoon superfine sugar

2 ounces club soda

2 ounces ginger ale

1 orange slice

First, mix the rum, lime juice, grenadine and sugar in a shaker half-filled with ice cubes. Strain the results into a collins glass almost filled with ice cubes, top with the club soda and ginger ale, and garnish with the orange slice. (As always, all my recipes for drinks and cocktails come from Gary Regan's excellent reference book, The Bartender's Bible.) This is excellent stuff. It's fruity, yes, but it's damn tasty. The ginger ale, lemon juice, grenadine and sugar combine to form a singular flavor that create an overture for the rum's subtle undertones (even despite the fact that the rum itself can hardly be tasted in its own right). Thanks to the combined efforts of the ginger ale and club soda, the drink is pleasantly fizzy in addition to being flavorful. The orange slice provides just the right touch of extra sweetness. In all, it's an exceedingly pleasant experience, perfect for a warm summer evening...and people of all tastes in drinks.