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That looks really nice -- I might have swirled the extra Ango a bit just for the cosmetic quality, but very nice. The other night I went to Tavern on the Park and had a drink made with Hendrick's, cucumber, and rosemary-infused syrup. I wonder what a rosemary syrup would do to the J&R. I guess I'll have to give it a try.

Hey Toby,

Any chance you could elaborate on where to find ginger juice? I have called Trader Joe's and Whole Foods here on the North side and they don't seem to have straight up ginger juice. Whole Foods has a ginger drink that contains water, ginger, honey and something else that is escaping me at the moment and Trader Joe's just has a ginger tea of some sort. Any leads or insight would be helpful.

Thanks!
Jeff

http://www.gingerpeople.com/pantry-esse ... juice.html

Also, Bonne Sante health foods store (1512 E. 53rd street in Hyde Park) will juice fresh ginger for you onsite while you watch if you ask them nicely. It's $0.75/oz, so $6 should last you quite a while.

Whole foods will do it for you if you ask nicely. What you do is pay for how much you want, and then go to the juice station, bat your eyelashes, say please a lot, offer to bring back a cocktail for them, ect. and hopefully they will oblige. I believe that it's about .99 cents an oz, so this is decidedly cheaper. Any place with a pulp ejector and sells ginger should do it. Sometimes they will complain that it smells up their juicer. Shrug and offer a tip.

Toby

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Perfect...thanks for the tips guys.

Hey, do any of you guys have a good margarita recipe? I mean, one that meets the standards of the drinks that have been mentioned in this thread? I imagine there is some fresh lime juice and simple syrup in there, but I know little about tequila or high-end triple sec, if the latter even makes it in a "good" margarita. Any insight would be appreciated, as always!

Jeff

5:1 that Toby's head explodes at this question. Get yer bets in now.

Margarita's Cointreau, tequila, lime. But I wouldn't use Cointreau just like I wouldn't use Don Juilo or even Herradura in one. Not to say simple drinks can't be lovingly treated and perfected -- see the daiquiri recipe earlier in the forum. But margaritas are the south of the border version of the cosmo IMHO -- they have their place (for some people) and time and can be enjoyed there but they shouldn't really be overthought. They're just sweetish liquor delivery systems.

Who knows, maybe the real bartender will disagree with me.

The Margarita is one of the hardest drinks to make well that I can think of. First you must be very very sure the person drinking the cocktail loves tequila. Good cocktails are a show case for the booze so you will really taste the tequila.

So it would go a little like this.

2.0 oz Tequila (use something good, like Don Juilo, maybe not the the 1942)
.75 oz Fresh Lime (if you can do this a la minute it's better, get no essential oil in)
.75 oz Orange Curacao (I Like Senior or Marie Brazard)
.25 oz Simple Syrup

It is interesting to try this before and after the simple. The difference is amazing.

Cheers,

Toby

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Cool, thanks for the recipe. I know that margaritas are probably looked down upon by the high-end cocktail crowd, but I figured there had to be a recipe out there for one with good ingredients, at least.

I don't look down on Margaritas. I have trouble calling the Strawberry Slurpee with a bit of cheap tequila in it a "Margarita." But an actual Margarita, much like a Martini, is still a solid drink - despite the modern liberties that people take with the name.

One more question on the Blue Ridge Manhattan (now that I finally managed to find Carpano Antica at Sam's)

For the Rittenhouse, are you using the 80-proof or the bottled-in-bond? I only happen to have the latter, and am wondering if the drink will work if I use it (do I have to stir it longer to round off the edges or will the extra water content throw of the drink?) Can I sub my Sazerac baby rye? Sorry if this seems trivial but the drink seems to be very very difficult to pull off and I want to get it as right as possible. Thanks!

Rittenhouse 100 all the way, baby. The stirring time is longer than if you would use an 80 proof.

I would stick with the high proofs with this drink as the other flavors are so bold. Turkey 101 rye would be a good sub.

Cheers,

Toby

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Toby,

Any chance we could get the specs for the Eyes Wide? I was back home visiting family for Easter, and this drink just about made my trip.

Thanks in advance.

Eyes Wide

2 oz Bulleit Bourbon
.25 oz House Made Raspberry Syrup
.25 oz House Made Ginger Syrup
.25 oz Lemon Juice
.5 oz Fresh Grapefruit Juice

Top: Soda Water
Float: .25 oz House Made Hibiscus Syrup

Glass: Collins
Garnish: Long Grapefruit Peel
Ice: Shard

Shake. Strain over Shard. Top Soda Water. Float House Made Hibiscus Syrup.


Lot of syrups I know. Will hunt around for the specs on them.

Toby

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Thanks!

Came in at opening yesterday evening and ordered a couple of drinks off the Spring menu, which isn't out yet but which I glimpsed over at the TVH egullet site. Ira made his Seeing Traces, which apparently didn't make it onto the final iteration of the spring menu (though it should have -- one of the best bourbon drinks I've had), and I also had the Sitting Limbo made by the bartender who looks like a slimmer Billy Ray Cyrus.

The Sitting Limbo was perhaps a bit too heavy on the pineapple for my taste, and while I could definitely taste all the ingredients (pineapple/apricot, gin, pimento dram) they came to me in three separate stages rather than as a unified entity. I asked for proportions on both, but I'll leave it to Toby to share them.

One other thing -- the ginger syrup TVH uses is so concentrated and good that even 1/4 oz left a real ginger kick at the back of every sip of the Seeing Traces. I wonder if scaling it back just a little (1/6th?) would add that last bit of balance or whether it would disappear entirely.)

EDIT: Made the Seeing Traces at home with slightly less ginger, and it turned out I actually preferred the way I had it at TVH. So, keep it like you have it.

The Spring Menu is out! So many that I want to try....

To keep my requests short, I'll go by spirit category. For gin, Toby, would you mind sharing the Cymbeline and the Oldest Living Confederate Widow? There are so many more that intrigue me, but maybe you could start with those two?

Thanks!

This is joyous news!

Time to make my way down Damen...

Hey Toby,

Love TVH, and introduce as many friends as possible. The service is always great, and Robbie has been very helpful discussing drinks when not too busy.

Had the Cymbaline, Eyes Wide, Six Corner sling, and World Cup last Friday, they were all stellar.

My questions are 1) Can you point me in the right direction for hibiscus syrup, and 2) I would love to try the World Cup at home.

Kudos to you and your staff!

Calvin

So far I've successfully made the Part and Parcel, Juliet and Romeo, Riviera and Blue Ridge Manhattan, all of which have been met with critical acclaim to anyone who would drink them .

My favorite way to make a Part and Parcel, actually, is with Hendrick's instead of vodka.

Any chance I could get the recipe to El Diablo?

I have been looking for some of the other requests and not finding the finished specs. But this oldie I had. From the Summer 2007 menu.

El Diablo

2.0 oz Sauza Hornitos
.75 oz Lemon Juice
.75 oz Ginger Syrup

Top: Soda water
Float: Cassis

Glass: Collins
Garnish: Lime Wheel
Ice: Chard

Shake. Strain. Top with soda water. Float with Barspoon of Cassis.

Toby

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Hi Toby,

Thanks! I can't believe it's that simple! I think when I had it on Saturday the bartender told me he used Herradura. I'm a sucker for anything with creme de cassis.

I thought I'd share a picture of my Juliet and Romeo I took. Except for the fact that I need a strainer that is a lot better at taking out cucumber seeds, and the mint I bought at Dominick's is pretty sad, they have come out pretty well.

Looks like a beauty, bjackson!

Had been in a bit of a cocktail rut lately, finally made a Part & Parcel last night (Plymouth gin) and Troy's White Lady from up thread.

Part & Parcel was terrific, and one of the less time intensive drinks, though I did have to run to the store to get a grapefruit. If I can remember to keep one on hand throughout the summer, this drink should easily enter the regular rotation.

The White Lady was good also, though I probably need to work on my mime shake...

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Out of sheer boredom, and mild annoyance at having to search through this thread a few times trying to find a couple of recipes (because I wasn't bright enough to print out the recipes that interested me when I first saw them), I threw all of the recipes that Toby has shared with us in this thread into a database, which I wired together into a few pages on my personal web domain:

Homemade Violet Hour

The coding is bush league, the aesthetics are rudimentary (assuming a font and a background color count as aesthetics), and the drinks are categorized more for my convenience than the way Toby originally sorted them in his menus, but hopefully this will come in handy for others as I believe it will for me.

Next on my to-do list are to put together a mobile version of this site, for use with iPhones & the like, for easy access from the gin aisle at Sam's. After that, maybe a no frames version of the original site, for any luddites among us

Excellent work - thanks!

Thanks so much for putting all of the entries together! I've been thinking of doing the same myself but haven't gotten to it!

Hey There Toby-
Back when Violet Hour first opened there was this great drink made with pear brandy- I'm pretty sure it was the poor liza, although there was another one I used to drink a lot that was just as good, I can't remember the name. Anyway, it had pear brandy in it and some how the distillery lost it's distributor and you were unable to get the same brandy so the drink was taken off the menu.

Is there anyway you can tell me how this drink was made? I know it won't be the same with a different brandy, but I'm sure it will be better than nothing.

My fiance and I went on one of our first dates there and it was our favorite drink- we were heartbroken when it stopped being served. I'd love to serve it at our wedding. any tips are always appreciated.

Thanks!
~n

I wasn't able to find premade ginger juice anywhere either. Whole Foods had a bunch of Ginger People products, but no dice on the plain juice. Fortunately, the nice folks at the smoothie/juice bar of the health food store down the street from me (see below for info) were willing to whip some up. At first they were like, "uhh...why?" When I explained ginger syrup & the El Diablo, they thought that sounded delicious and were happy to help. The best part is that they only charged us $4 for 16 ounces (but they ended up making 20 ounces, so they gave us the extra 4 ounces gratis...with tip it was $5 out the door). After straining out the fibers at home, I ended up with exactly 2 cups of fresh ginger juice.

The syrup came out really well, except after I was done making it I realized that I mixed up the demerara syrup & ginger syrup recipes, and had used 4 cups of turbinado suger instead of plain superfine sugar. Fortunately, despite the mix-up, it's still a delicious syrup with a lot of nice ginger bite. I'm sure there will be a lot left over after the El Diablos are made, so I see a lot of Dark & Stormy's (made with a mix of the ginger syrup, club soda & Gosling's Black Seal) in our future

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