I am not much of a drinker.
Oct. 9th, 2020 06:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
which_chickI say that. You probably don't hear it but I will say it again with some evidence.
When I had a Sam there were beers in my fridge. There has not been a Sam since mid-2018. When he visited (as a friend) the other weekend, there was still a Sam beer in my fridge. This is not because I don't LIKE Sam beer. It's fine beer and I like it well enough. I just don't have any interest in drinking it for no reason.
Brother the younger made me some wine in... 2008? I still have it, unopened. It's probably very drinkable. He does not suck at wine.
My bottle of Bacardi (for mojitos) has dust on it. My bottle of Cointreau (for margaritas on the rocks which is how ADULTS drink them, with a salted rim and actual lime juice and halfway decent tequila) has dust on it. So does my tequila though probably I should get a grown-up quality tequila instead of the cheapest Jose Cuervo offering.
I am not a huge drinker. Also one drink (standard 2 oz pour), these days, puts me half in the bag, which is where I am now.
I cannot explain how or why I thought it might be nice to explore tiki drinks.
I do not know what the appeal of faux Polynesian island stuff is. I am not generally in favor of fake shit from Hollywood that is pretending to be a real thing. Plastic is not my jam. Ticky-tacky mugs are not a thing I am ever going to pretend to like. I will never ever go somewhere in the dead of winter and put on a plastic, neon-colored lei and pretend that I know anything about a pupu platter. That is not me. I do not have any interest in the various trappings of tiki.
However, I really like coconut. Hell, I adore coconut. I think it's wonderful.
I like pineapple, lime, orange, and lemon.
I like rum in concept and execution.
Most of all, I would like to be off in some not-quite-real tropical paradise where I didn't have to engage with, y'know, colonialism or climate change or the fact that it's almost November in the Mid-Atlantic and there's a pandemic and a looming election worrying me to death. Since I can't travel and the aforesaid tropical paradise does not actually exist... that's not gonna happen.
I can, however, crank up the blender and the stove, make an effort to generate some syrups from scratch, and see about making some drinks that might help me PRETEND that I'm in never-never land on an island which has litter-free crystalline sand beaches that glare white in the sun against the sparkling and bizarrely blue water. Possibly palm trees rustle in the offshore breeze. It could be that I have cultural-appropriation cornrows in my hair that I happily paid some island inhabitant to install, with beads, so that I would be able to get sunburned lines on my head and not have to dick around with hair care for a week, a decision I will probably regret for at least a week upon returning home.
And what drink will Take Me There?
Today I'm trying a Painkiller. Technically this is supposed to be made with Pusser's Rum. My local liquor store does not carry Pusser's Rum but the nice dude at HTD on youtube made his with 5 year Plantation, which comes in a bottle that appears to be engaging in raffia-based shibari (this makes it easy to find in the liquor store's confusing rum section), and omg, this is plenty good.
How? You are to source the following items...
Real fresh oranges
A real fresh pineapple (or in a pinch those frozen dole hunks from the IQF bag, those are good too, way better than canned)
Coconut creme that you make. Buy a can of coconut milk. Empty the whole thing into a saucepan. Fill the empty can clear full with sugar. Dump that also into the pan with like 1/4 teaspoon of salt. Hot this up to a brief boil. Let cool, pour into a bottle of your choosing. (You could also buy a can of Coco Lopez but I like making things.)
The aforementioned 5 Year Plantation with bondage raffia enclosure.
Ice that does not smell like frozen fish. (Buy some, or just make fresh at your house for this.)
Steps to assemble the drink:
1. Juice the pineapple. I do not own a juicer. I took the pineapple and cut it into hunks and threw it in the blender. I did not juice so much as pulverize into a frothy pulpy thing. It was an expensive pineapple and I don't mind pulp in my drink, so yeah. If you live near a fancy grocery that sells fresh pineapple juice, you can probably buy that. If you have a juicer, use that. Do what you gotta do. You need 4 oz. fresh pineapple juice or slurry.
2. Juice half an orange. You'll need 1 oz of fresh orange juice and that's slightly less than half a navel orange.
3. In shaker, combine 4 oz. fresh pineapple juice-or-slurry, 1 oz. fresh orange juice, 1 oz. coconut creme, 2 oz. of the 5 yr plantation, plus also some ice... cracked plus some big pieces.
4. Shake the hell out of it until the shaker is cold, cold, cold.
5. Open pour (do not strain) into a suitable glass. We're not going to pretend that you have fancy types of drink glasses. If you do, go right ahead and use them. I have pub-style pint glasses because basically I am not civilized... and I used those. They are sturdy and smooth-sided and easy to wash. It was fine. (My shaker is a glass canning jar with a plastic screw-on lid. I measure with measuring cups. I am going to cocktail hell, I am sure.)
6. Serve with some grated nutmeg overtop. If you have a real nutmeg, use that. If you don't, Penzey's has them. Order one and use it. Or not. Again, half in the bag. Don't care. You do you.
7. Drink. Allow the bright fruit flavors and the soothing taste of the coconut and rum to transport you to a place where, for about two hours, nothing much matters. Queue up something not too difficult to follow on the Netflix or Hulu and let your cares drift away.
This is a delightful fucking drink. It is yummy as hell if you like coconut and orange and pineapple.
When I had a Sam there were beers in my fridge. There has not been a Sam since mid-2018. When he visited (as a friend) the other weekend, there was still a Sam beer in my fridge. This is not because I don't LIKE Sam beer. It's fine beer and I like it well enough. I just don't have any interest in drinking it for no reason.
Brother the younger made me some wine in... 2008? I still have it, unopened. It's probably very drinkable. He does not suck at wine.
My bottle of Bacardi (for mojitos) has dust on it. My bottle of Cointreau (for margaritas on the rocks which is how ADULTS drink them, with a salted rim and actual lime juice and halfway decent tequila) has dust on it. So does my tequila though probably I should get a grown-up quality tequila instead of the cheapest Jose Cuervo offering.
I am not a huge drinker. Also one drink (standard 2 oz pour), these days, puts me half in the bag, which is where I am now.
I cannot explain how or why I thought it might be nice to explore tiki drinks.
I do not know what the appeal of faux Polynesian island stuff is. I am not generally in favor of fake shit from Hollywood that is pretending to be a real thing. Plastic is not my jam. Ticky-tacky mugs are not a thing I am ever going to pretend to like. I will never ever go somewhere in the dead of winter and put on a plastic, neon-colored lei and pretend that I know anything about a pupu platter. That is not me. I do not have any interest in the various trappings of tiki.
However, I really like coconut. Hell, I adore coconut. I think it's wonderful.
I like pineapple, lime, orange, and lemon.
I like rum in concept and execution.
Most of all, I would like to be off in some not-quite-real tropical paradise where I didn't have to engage with, y'know, colonialism or climate change or the fact that it's almost November in the Mid-Atlantic and there's a pandemic and a looming election worrying me to death. Since I can't travel and the aforesaid tropical paradise does not actually exist... that's not gonna happen.
I can, however, crank up the blender and the stove, make an effort to generate some syrups from scratch, and see about making some drinks that might help me PRETEND that I'm in never-never land on an island which has litter-free crystalline sand beaches that glare white in the sun against the sparkling and bizarrely blue water. Possibly palm trees rustle in the offshore breeze. It could be that I have cultural-appropriation cornrows in my hair that I happily paid some island inhabitant to install, with beads, so that I would be able to get sunburned lines on my head and not have to dick around with hair care for a week, a decision I will probably regret for at least a week upon returning home.
And what drink will Take Me There?
Today I'm trying a Painkiller. Technically this is supposed to be made with Pusser's Rum. My local liquor store does not carry Pusser's Rum but the nice dude at HTD on youtube made his with 5 year Plantation, which comes in a bottle that appears to be engaging in raffia-based shibari (this makes it easy to find in the liquor store's confusing rum section), and omg, this is plenty good.
How? You are to source the following items...
Real fresh oranges
A real fresh pineapple (or in a pinch those frozen dole hunks from the IQF bag, those are good too, way better than canned)
Coconut creme that you make. Buy a can of coconut milk. Empty the whole thing into a saucepan. Fill the empty can clear full with sugar. Dump that also into the pan with like 1/4 teaspoon of salt. Hot this up to a brief boil. Let cool, pour into a bottle of your choosing. (You could also buy a can of Coco Lopez but I like making things.)
The aforementioned 5 Year Plantation with bondage raffia enclosure.
Ice that does not smell like frozen fish. (Buy some, or just make fresh at your house for this.)
Steps to assemble the drink:
1. Juice the pineapple. I do not own a juicer. I took the pineapple and cut it into hunks and threw it in the blender. I did not juice so much as pulverize into a frothy pulpy thing. It was an expensive pineapple and I don't mind pulp in my drink, so yeah. If you live near a fancy grocery that sells fresh pineapple juice, you can probably buy that. If you have a juicer, use that. Do what you gotta do. You need 4 oz. fresh pineapple juice or slurry.
2. Juice half an orange. You'll need 1 oz of fresh orange juice and that's slightly less than half a navel orange.
3. In shaker, combine 4 oz. fresh pineapple juice-or-slurry, 1 oz. fresh orange juice, 1 oz. coconut creme, 2 oz. of the 5 yr plantation, plus also some ice... cracked plus some big pieces.
4. Shake the hell out of it until the shaker is cold, cold, cold.
5. Open pour (do not strain) into a suitable glass. We're not going to pretend that you have fancy types of drink glasses. If you do, go right ahead and use them. I have pub-style pint glasses because basically I am not civilized... and I used those. They are sturdy and smooth-sided and easy to wash. It was fine. (My shaker is a glass canning jar with a plastic screw-on lid. I measure with measuring cups. I am going to cocktail hell, I am sure.)
6. Serve with some grated nutmeg overtop. If you have a real nutmeg, use that. If you don't, Penzey's has them. Order one and use it. Or not. Again, half in the bag. Don't care. You do you.
7. Drink. Allow the bright fruit flavors and the soothing taste of the coconut and rum to transport you to a place where, for about two hours, nothing much matters. Queue up something not too difficult to follow on the Netflix or Hulu and let your cares drift away.
This is a delightful fucking drink. It is yummy as hell if you like coconut and orange and pineapple.
