This drink is not kosher, halal or safe for vegetarians.

As I said, as long as I had leftover base ingredients from my Thanksgiving mixology experiments, I would share the fruits of my research and testing. And tonight, I have something that may shock, terrify and amaze you. Those of you with sensitive dispositions, please leave the room now. If you have small children...why the hell are they reading this blog with you?

Tonight's drink requires you to devote several hours over the better part of a week making one of the ingredients, and the guide for that will follow the main recipe. Believe me, though, it's well worth the effort. Behold! I give you...

The Bacon Old-Fashioned

2 ounces bacon-infused bourbon (recipe follows)
1/4-1/2 oz maple syrup (less if you use Grade B, which is stronger in flavor)
2 dashes Angostura bitters
orange zest
Urban Moonshine Maple bitters (optional, but if you have them, great)

Place orange zest in the bottom of an Old-Fashioned glass with Angostura bitters and maple syrup. Gently muddle to express oils. Add ice and bacon-infused bourbon, stirring gently to combine. Add two dashes Maple bitters to top.

Bacon-Infused bourbon (makes about 750 ml)

750 ml bourbon (nothing too pricy...I used Evan Williams)
4 strips of bacon
a 1-liter Mason jar with lid

Slowly cook bacon over low heat, in a cast iron skillet if you have a well-seasoned one, reserving drippings (which should total about 1 ounce). Eat the bacon or set aside to eat later. Allow drippings to cool slightly. Meanwhile pour the bourbon into your scrupulously clean Mason jar (rinse well with boiling water, and swish a little high-proof neutral grain spirits around inside if you have them) and add the bacon drippings. Store at room temperature overnight (or about eight hours) then move to the fridge for three days. Move to the freezer for one day, and then strain out solidified drippings. Run bourbon through a paper coffee filter, rebottle and refrigerate. Bourbon should keep for several weeks in the fridge.

Yes. Bacon-infused bourbon. No, I have not lost my mind. It really is fantastically good...the sweetness of the bourbon is the predominant flavor to begin, but then the smokiness of the bacon makes itself known. It's also wonderful for horrifying your friends when you tell them what you've made. Well, horrify or delight...the reactions usually go to one of those two extremes.

Adventures in horrible drink names

I was just hanging out in the chat room for Tiki Bar TV, and an unofficial challenge was hanging in the air. Create a drink or shot themed around "sweat." I decided to go with something that I've termed:

Frog Sweat

1 oz absinthe
1/2 oz gin
3 dashes Jamaican bitters (or Bittermens grapefruit bitters if you don't feel like waiting a week while your homemade Jamaican bitters mature)

build in a chilled shot glass.

Very spur of the moment, but the name's kinda whimsical, in that absinthe is traditionally associated with the French, those Frenchy-froggy-froggy-Frenchies. Tastes good, though.

Here's a quick photo I snapped off of it.

For the full list of Sweat themed cocktails (some of which may not be very good...they wound up drifting toward the theoretical), please visit www.tikigeeki.com. Dogs and cats, living together...mass hysteria.

If this drink is Irish, then Sean Connery's a Spaniard...

As promised, I'm bringing you a drink this time that's about as un-Irish as you can get, despite it's name. You see, this one is named, I suspect, for it's color, not it's cultural awareness. You'll see why when you run down the list of ingredients...gin, Cointreau, and green curaçao. Yes, green curaçao. Remember, it comes in many colors, but only one flavor. If you don't have green curaçao and don't feel like tracking down a bottle of it, just use triple-sec (which, if you'll recall, is "white curaçao") and add a couple drops of green food dye to it. That way, you can mix up your own:

Hibernian Special

1 1/2 oz London Dry Gin
1 1/2 oz Cointreau
1 1/2 oz green curaçao (or your homemade equivalent)
splash of lemon juice

shake all with ice, strain into cocktail glass. toast in the direction of the Auld Sod, or possibly the Caribbean.

Yes, as Data said about Aldebaran Whiskey in an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, "It is...it is green." I suspect that's what made this drink's creator think of Ireland. Perhaps he was homesick, perhaps he was just really quite drunk, who knows. That being said, it's not bad tasting...it's very orangey, but you get the botanicals from the gin and the sourness from the lemon keeping it out of cough-syrup territory. Worth a shot. But then please wash it down with something authentically Irish...Jamesons or Guinness or something. Even a wee dram of poitín, if you've a mind...

In which I attempt to not get sued...

Tonight's drink is one where I get to use a name that I've been itching to use for quite some time...and one that I've been afraid of. You see, I'm naming it after a much beloved fictional character in a tremendously popular series of books. Now, the author and publishers have shown wonderful restraint in not going after, say, writers of fan-fiction who use their characters names, perhaps because there's no profit to be made there. I should point out that I really don't make any profit on this blog, either (current Google AdSense total for the first 5 months of operation: $1.35, plus one generous donation from a reader). So in that spirit, and recognizing that there's alcohol in the books as well, I hope that they'll be lenient about my introduction of a ginger-laced rum punch named after the most amusing ginger-headed clan I know of. I give you:

Weasley Rum Punch

3/4 oz berry shrub base
1 1/2 oz ginger liqueur (or ginger syrup if you want it to be a little less boozy)
3/4 oz black strap or other molasses-y rum
1 1/2 oz aged rum
2 oz seltzer
scant 1/8 oz homemade spice extract
2 dashes Bittermens Grapefruit bitters

Combine first three ingredients plus spice extract in a shaker full of ice, shaking well to combine. In an tall-ish glass, add two cubes of ice, dashing grapefruit bitters over the ice before pouring in rum mixture and topping with club soda.

It works as a Weasley because of both the "ginger" connotation and the color...it's pretty much a fiery red. I really like this drink's flavor, as it's an unusual take on the classic Planters Punch formula of 1 of sour, 2 of sweet, 3 of strong and 4 of weak, plus spice. The vinegar base of the shrub really works in a very subtle way, and the heat of the ginger plays with everything as well, as shrubs were traditionally topped with ginger beer. I like how the spices play with the smoky molasses nature of the rum, and the brightness of the grapefruit bitters really makes it all sing.

Now, as long as I don't get sued out of existence, I'll be happy! Ms Rowling, if you read this, please enjoy the drink as much as I enjoyed your books. (And please don't sue me!)

No photo tonight, but I will give you a novelty drink!

I came up with this utterly ridiculous drink about 5 years ago, when I was still working at my old restaurant, and we were entertaining the notion of movie nights in the bar. We were thinking about running trilogies every week, and the Star Wars series came up, and we started brainstorming what sorts of drinks we could serve. I suggested one solely for the name, and then we had to figure out what it would consist of. I present to you, the Flaming Wookiee.

Flaming Wookiee
serves two
2 oz amaretto
1 oz orange juice
dash of Angostura bitters

Shake over ice to combine, strain into two shot glasses. Float a layer of overproof rum on top of each shot glass and light.
Encourage patrons to extinguish before drinking.

Sometimes you've just got to cut loose, make a goofy drink and make no apologies. What would've been really bad is if we devised a "Flaming Anakin."

EDIT! A dear friend, code name "Earl," has pointed out a perfect confluence of events surrounding this drink. Not only are Star Wars Weekends occurring presently at Disney's Hollywood Studios park in Orlando, but we're also coming up on Gay Days in the Florida parks. "Flaming Wookie" is the PERFECT drink for the festivities! Drink up, me hearties, yo ho!

Monkey Gland v. 2.0?

In the 1920s, a "fad drink" was making the rounds in Paris. It was called the Monkey Gland. To make a long story short, this was the sort of the "Slippery Nipple" of the time, a titillating name and nothing too special to back it up. Long story short, the name came about from a certain "doctor" (and I use the term loosely) who was transplanting monkey testicles into humans, with the notion that it may pump up the libido of the recipient. Sounds like a good recipe for Ebola, but that's just me. For more info on the drink, see Darcy O'Neil's post on his blog, "The Art of Drink."

So, I got to thinking on this one...it never really caught on here in the US, I think in part due to the already increased stigma on absinthe, an ingredient which was barely used in the original, but was thought to have some serious mind-warping juju in its depths. If it did come to the states, though, it probably would have come in through New Orleans, because with transplanted monkey parts, it sounds like voodoo already. So here's a small, more cordial, slightly more exotic take on the Monkey Gland; call it:

Monkey Gland v. 2.0

1 oz gin
1 oz orange juice
dash of Pernod (or absinthe if you have it)
dash of raspberry syrup
dash of Peychaud's bitters
3-5 drops of black pepper and orange extract*

stir all ingredients together with ice and strain into a cordial cup.

*to make this, just mix 1/2 tsp mixed peppercorns (some crushed, some whole) and 1/4 tsp of dried orange peel for every two ounces of overproof rum, let steep for a week, and then strain through a coffee filter.

Well, it turned out OK, but as Darcy says in his post, it's basically gin n' juice with a dollop of anise. The raspberry syrup's there for color more than anything, and the bitters and black pepper/orange extract, while present, are left kind of going "Well...here we are, Bartleby. What now?" (I have no idea who Bartleby is...he just showed up.)

So I got to thinking some more...what could I do to make it a little more interesting? And then it occurred to me...why not use some of the berry shrub base instead of the raspberry syrup? It'll add some more personality, and some more complexity, with the berries and vinegar playing off the rest...so here's:

Monkey Gland v. 2.1

1 oz gin
3/4 oz orange juice
3/8 oz berry shrub base
1/8 oz Pernod or absinthe
dash Peychaud's bitters
5 drops black pepper and orange extract

This one has a lot more appeal...it's not nearly so sweet for one, and it's got a lot more depth. The black pepper extract adds a little bit of heat right at the end, but not enough that you go "Why is there pepper in my drink, Bartleby? Did you get me a strange Bloody Mary? Is this some kind of new Sangrita?" The modified version's not quite got the same electrified hue of the original...it's a bit mellower due to the less refined nature of the shrub base blotting out some of the more fluorescent aspects of the raspberry syrup, but it more than makes up for being not quite as vibrant appearance-wise in the flavor department.

It's definitely worth a try...if you didn't, I'd say you were bananas.

See, I have this weird problem...

I like to drink Windex.

You see, I have the tendency to take off my clothes for no reason and go running around the neighborhood...so I drink Windex to help me with it. It helps to keep me from streaking.

*rimshot*

Actually, it's not really Windex in the photo (or I'd be on the phone with my local Poison Control Center). Rather, it's a very appropriate drink for today...it's a Blue Monday. The Blue Monday is one of the first "novelty drinks." It's nothing special, taste-wise...it's just fun to look at, because let's face it, blue foods are not exactly common on this planet (Tattooine has blue milk, apparently, if "A New Hope" is accurate, but as Alton Brown says, "That's another show." Probably the one in which I give you all the recipe for my "Flaming Wookie" shooter. It's on fire. Seriously.)

The Blue Monday is just vodka, Cointreau/white curaçao/triple sec, and blue food dye. It's citrusy, but a little sweet. So I did my usual futzing with the drink to make it a little more interesting, and came up with this:

Blue Monday
2 oz vodka (I used that Clementine-infused stuff I've got)
1/2 oz Cointreau or another good white curaçao or triple sec
2 or 3 drops blue food dye
dash of orange bitters

Stir well with cracked ice and strain it into a cocktail glass.

It's not a great drink, it's not a bad drink. It's just a blue cocktail that tastes, paradoxically, of orange. It's a goofy drink, and some days (usually Mondays), that's all you need.