Fairly intriguing name. Not sure of the origin.

This is Brandy washed with Soda.

After 5+ hours of driving for three successive days, I was as good as dead – I was so tired this evening. All the more reason to make a drink fairly appropriately named – Obituary!!

There are lots of variations of this cocktail but this is the classic version – gin, dry vermouth and pastis.

Speaking of obituaries, coincidentally, Thomas Latimer sent me a Ted Talks video – What I learnt from 2000 obituaries – that I found to be fascinating.

Did you know today is International Pisco Sour day? I believe the Peruvians first started celebrating the first Saturday of February as their national drink (pisco sour) day. And then eventually it became an International day.

The drink has Pisco (I used one from a distillery in Ica, Peru), Lime juice, Sugar, Egg White and Angostura Bitters.

Vanilla Vodka, Dry Vermouth, Absinthe and Angostura Bitters.

This drink’s name has a fascinating root. Back in the 1880s, a private members-only club called Tuxedo Club started in the planned community of Tuxedo Park in Orange County, NY. This is the same club that gave us the menswear called “tuxedo”. Around the same time, a new cocktail was served at the bar in the club. As you must have guessed, it was called Tuxedo. This is a nearly 140 year old drink.

Vodka, Dry Vermouth, Maraschino Liqueur and Orange Bitters. (There is a variation that uses absinthe too)

This gin has enough of nose and especially palate that I would recommend neat or on the rocks and no tonic water.

Equal parts Brandy, White Creme de Menthe and Feret Branca.

From an earlier post, you might remember how I had run into an old bartender friend – Tathagata – in Westin hotel in Kolkata last month. If you carefully notice the picture in that post, you will see a small jar of some black stuff on the right bottom corner.

That is one of the tricks I learnt from Tathagata that day. Those are butterfly pea flowers. He infuses them into gins which renders the gin a dark blue color. Here is the cool thing… as you pour tonic water into the gin, it changes its color to pink!!

Instead of getting butterfly pea flowers, I found a gin – Empress 1908 – made in Canada that actually uses these flowers in the latter stages of the distillation process. The result is a dark blue gin. Since gins usually do not have color, you might mistakenly think that the bottle is blue in color.

I was making the usual gin and tonic for Sharmila last evening when I decided to try out the trick. You can see how the bright blue gin slowly becomes lavender in color and then becomes bright pink. Pretty awesome!

Incidentally, it is a great gin too!!

BTW, I should have used white background for these pictures and not black.

Blackberry Liqueur, Dry Vermouth, Vodka, Angostura Bitters and Lemon juice.

Unlike most other cocktails, the bitters is not put in before shaking with ice but floated on the top after pouring it into the martini glass.

Yesterday, Sharmila and I had gone to one of the very few bars open on Christmas day (Taffer’s Tavern). I had asked for a Sazerac. The cocktail was served without any ice on it. Which I found to be strange. This evening I made one the traditional way – with the ice and all that.

I have to admit I liked the non-ice version!! This might go against the traditionalist in mixology but the consistency stayed much better without the ice and I preferred that. I will have to try one with a King ice to see if slower melting helps in keeping the drink cold while maintaining the consistency…