MJ Flair (Taipei Boozehunting)

Well, not booze – cocktail and bartending supplies.

I took advantage of a rare break in my weekday schedule to finally visit this place, MJFlairshop, which is only open during office hours. (Not that a visit’s really necessary, you can buy their products online here).

MJ Flair are probably the only place in Taiwan dedicated to selling bartending and cocktail-making equipment and supplies. You can get mixing glasses, jiggers, cocktail picks, strainers and much more besides. As far as consumables go, they have a fair selection of bitters unavailable elsewhere in Taiwan. Some of it is rather expensive, but your only other option is to get it from overseas yourself.

I’ve already bought my basic mixing equipment, but it was found at a number of places around Taipei (City Super, Hola, Hengjiu, Ikea etc). It’s nice to have some supplies in a single place like this.

The guys running the shop seem pretty laid back and friendly. You can pop in and take a look, but it’s really more of an office for their online sales business.

If you’re starting a home bar in Taiwan, their starter’s kit might be a good buy, with a Boston shaker, jigger, barspoon, hawthorne strainer and a few other bits and pieces.

Hot Buttered Rum

As the temperature dropped below 12 degrees a couple of days ago (that’s practically sub-zero in Taiwan terms) I continued with hot drinks.

I revisited Hot Buttered Rum. For some reason, I hadn’t liked it much when I tried it last winter. This time, it was fantastic. I made it again the next night, doubled the recipe and almost wiped myself out. It’s deliciously potent.

There isn’t much hard historical knowledge about Hot Buttered Rum. Wondrich says that buttered drinks date back to at least Henry VII, and that it was quite likely in rum-loving New England that the rum version was popularised.

The drink has had its haters. Celebrated 1940s cocktail writer David Embury hated it, and I’ve often read that people just don’t like the butter (or the ‘layer of slick’ that it leaves). In my opinion, it really works. Anyway, it’s not worth getting hung up on. Try it, and if you don’t like it, leave it out and you’ve still got a great drink – Hot Spiced Rum.

There are, of course, many different versions, but once again I tried and loved the one given by veteran New Orleans bartender Chris McMillian – check out the video below.

Hot Buttered Rum

2 oz Jamaican-style rum

3 oz hot water

3 tsp brown (Demerara) sugar

1 cinnamon stick

2 whole cloves

a little allspice

very large orange zest

knob of butter

Pre-heat a glass with hot water and discard after a couple of minutes. Dissolve sugar in a little hot water. Add rum and spices. Add hot water and stir. Dissolve a knob of butter on the top.

I really liked this drink. I didn’t have Demerara sugar, but I’m sure the brown sugar made a lot of difference over the white I probably used last time. It was nice and rich. The Christmas spices were great, even though I didn’t have allspice. I used the zest of almost a whole orange, and again, it was killer. The butter? I think it added a bit of body. Hot drinks can be a bit thin sometimes. I certainly didn’t dislike it.

You can double this mixture, but if you’re using 58% overproof rum, like I was, you might not be able to do much afterwards!

MXMO: The Black Krampus

The holiday season is upon us, so I’m going to bring you a nice hot drink, courtesy of that traditional Yule figure from the north. The one who keeps a list of which children have been naughty and nice, and visits them at Christmas time to give them what they deserve.

No, I’m not talking about the fat man, but this guy:

Meet Krampus.

Yeah. He looks like a cross between Beelzebub and the Pedo Bear, right?

According to some Germanic traditions Krampus accompanies St Nick (or sometimes works of his own accord) and punishes the naughty children at Christmas. If you’ve only been a little bit naughty, he’ll just swat you with his birch branches, but if you’ve been bad, he’ll carry you off to eat or to throw you into the fires of hell (at least that’s what he tells us – I wouldn’t trust my kids alone with him).

So why a Krampus cocktail?

Well it’s time again for Mixology Monday, the monthly gathering of cocktail bloggers.

Edit: You can now see all the great contributions to the theme here. Go on, check them out!

This time the theme is Humbug: Something that turns traditional Christmas drinks on their heads, or goes against the spirit of Christmas, or celebrates a Christmas villain, or … well let me quote this month’s host JFL from Rated R Cocktails:

Lets face it the holidays suck, yeah I said it. You put yourself in debt buying crap people will have forgotten about in a month. You drive around like a jackass to see people you don’t even like, or worse they freeload in your house. Your subjected to annoying music, and utterly fake, forced kindness and joy. Plus if you work retail your pretty much in hell, so don’t we all deserve a good stiff drink? So for this Mixology Monday unleash your inner Grinch. Mix drinks in the spirit of Anti-Christmas. They can be really bitter and amaro filled. They filled with enough booze to make you pass out in a tinsel covered Scrooge heap. They could be a traditional holiday drink turned on it’s ear. Or they could be a tribute to your favorite holiday villain. If you celebrate Hanukkah or Kwanzaa then you still suffer through the holidays, so feel free to join in with your Anti-Holiday drink as well. Whatever it is add a hearty “Humbug!” and make your drink personify everything annoying or fake about the holidays.

Bugger that!

I love Christmas, and those anti-holiday wankers who profess to hate it can sod right off.

That said, the aforementioned Krampus, who I just found out about last year, fits the bill. He must be the original Christmas villain, right?

So this idea is a Krampus toddy. Taking the nice soothing hot toddy and turning it into something bitter and vicious that all but hardened boozers would turn their noses up at. A Toddy not for Santa, but for Krampus.

So it’s black and mean. I took a Scotch Toddy I made a couple of weeks ago and amped up the nastiness.

The first little helper – Fernet Branca. This is a very bitter (and black) amaro (bitter liqueur) from Italy. Unfortunately it’s not available in Taiwan, and I only have my bottle thanks to my network of booze mules (well it’s really a triangle, rather than a network, and each of my three mules has only made an annual average of one trip over the last year, so I’m always looking for volunteers – apply within). If you are in Taiwan, you can get Luxardo Fernet from Sundy, which is apparently very similar.

The second little helper is Blackstrap Molasses, doing duty as the sweetening component of the toddy. I knew I was on the right track when someone online called it ‘nasty stuff’ when I put out a help call while trying to find it in Taiwan. Blackstrap is thick and strong. Its most common cocktail application is the Black Strap (aka Black Stripe) cocktail. You can read more about it here.

The Black Krampus

2 oz Islay Scotch

1/2 oz Fernet Branca

1/2 oz blackstrap molasses

Warm a glass with hot water for a few minutes before discarding. Dissolve molasses in 3 oz of near-boiling water. Add the booze and stir. Serve hot.

Optional additions: grated nutmeg or a twist of lemon might make nice garnishes, but I didn’t have any on hand to try. Fees Brothers Black Walnut Bitters are good, and help with the ‘black’ theme, but you need a good 4 or 5 dashes to stand up to the other strong ingredients. Edit: and I just discovered that a few dashes of orange bitters (Angostura) – instead or as well as the Black Walnut – cuts through the nastiness very well.

Verdict: It looks like motor oil in colour and consistency. It tastes like Chinese medicine. That said, the three powerhouse ingredients do balance each other out quite well, and if you like strong bitter flavours, you might like it. Also, I swear it’s doing wonders for my sore throat.

Certainly a toddy for Krampus, or perhaps one to leave out for Santa (if you don’t want him to come back next year).

Merry Christmas!!! (and don’t be too good)

Hot Toddy – A Template

The last week or so, I’ve been messing around with a template recipe for some hot toddy variations. It’s a little rough, but I got a few nice results.

Reading a few blogs, I’ve noticed that I’m not the only one drinking hot drinks these days, as the weather turns cold in the Northern Hemisphere. It’s not freezing in Taiwan yet, but it has been cold, grey, wet and miserable. Perfect Hot Toddy weather.

Most modern recipes for Hot Toddies are whiskey (or other spirit), honey and lemon juice, with some cinnamon and cloves, but this not what the original hot toddy was. David Wondrich explains (and the old recipe books back him up) that the Toddy (hot or cold) was a descendent of the punch, with the fruit taken out. The recipe goes something like this:

Old School Hot Toddy

2 oz spirits

1 tsp sugar

3 oz hot water

That’s it. You should warm the glass with a soak in hot water first. You can grate a little fresh nutmeg on top, too (I haven’t got any, so haven’t tried it). Brown, raw or Demerara sugar is recommended, but white or simple syrup work fine.

Dark spirits tend to work best, with Scotch, Rum, Brandy and Bourbon being favourites. I’ve tried them all before and last week (the first day it got cold) had one with Woodford Reserve that was delicious.

After that experience I wondered about varying the recipe with liqueurs for sweetener. This is something which the writer’s don’t really suggest, but I thought worth a try. Then I got fancy (my first attempt lacked something) and tried adding some extra strong flavour in small quantities. That gave me this template:

Fancy Toddy Template

2 oz spirits

1/2 oz sweet liqueur

1 tsp strong modifying agent

It could probably do with improvement, and might not be to the taste of purists, but it’s certainly fun playing around with on cold winter nights.

The drink that led me to experiment with this template was made with (sadly the last of) my bottle of Bowmore 12-Year Islay Scotch. Toddies usually call for smooth single malts, but I’d decided they’d be much nicer with a bit of a kick, and I think a smokey Islay really works. I think I had a drink called ‘Under the Tartan Sun’ (from Boozehound) in mind when I thought of Tuaca as a sweetener. Tuaca is an Italian vanilla liqueur, so you could also use Licor 43, or maybe even Galliano. I thought it still wanted a little something and I felt that was Fernet Branca, the beautiful bitter minty ameri.

Scotch Toddy

2 oz Islay Scotch

1/2 oz Tuaca

1 tsp Fernet Branca

3 oz hot water

It was great. 5/5

Next day (or possibly the same night) I went for brandy, and did it B & B style.

Brandy Toddy

2 oz Cognac

1/2 oz Benedictine

1/2 tsp absinthe

Also very good. 4/5

Next I tried gin, and think I have to agree that aged spirits work better in Hot Toddies. The first attempt (with Botanist, Yellow Chartreuse and Maraschino – I don’t know why I thought it might work) was just awful. The second matched some floral flavours, was alright and could be worked on.

Hendrick’s Toddy

2 oz Hendrick’s Gin

1/2 oz St Germain Elderflower Liqueur

2 drops rose water

It was alright. The flavours matched nicely, but it was rather thin. 3/5

Next was rum. I started with the high-proof Bundaberg OP and realised that you can’t use high-proof spirits (or too much spirits) in Hot Toddies. The evaporating fumes make it impossible to drink for a couple of minutes. I had to use my only other aged rum at the moment, Havana Club Especial. It was still a great drink, but I think a more full-bodied sweeter rum would have been better. Having never made Tiki drinks I was also not sure about the (Fees) Falernum. Really, I just threw it in for the hell of it. I was, perhaps, forcing things to fit the template. But it ended up really improving the drink, so why not?

Rum Toddy

2 oz dark rum

1/2 oz Chambord Raspberry Liqueur

1-2 tsp Falernum

Great. It only misses out on 5 stars because I think a more suited rum would have been better 4.5/5

Next I tried Calvados, which is true apple brandy (that is not a liqueur called brandy, but a distillate made from apples). I think I was reaching for things to match it with, but the Chartreuse more or less worked, and I think Angostura suits Calvados. I really wanted to try it with Peach Liqueur, but didn’t have any. The result was fairly nice, but nothing special.

Calvados Toddy

2 oz apple brandy

1/2 oz Yellow Chartreuse

3 dashes Angostura Bitters

O.K. 3/5

Finally I tried a toddy with Genever – the Dutch ancestor of gin, and a bit of a favourite of mine, although I never really know what to mix it with. The ingredients I ended up with – Cynar artichoke liqueur and rhubarb bitters – were a weird match, and though I really liked it, I’m not sure that many other people would.

Genever Toddy

2 oz Genever

1/2 oz Cynar

1 dash rhubarb bitters (Fees)

I liked it, but doubt it would have broad appeal, so 3.5/5.

And that’s it. I can’t really say that any of these are better than plain Woodford Reserve Bourbon with sugar, but it’s good to have a variety. Do you have any favourite toddy recipes?

Linkage

Long overdue, I’m adding some links to other blogs on my front page.

When I started this blog, I was not a blog reader. I still don’t read all that many, but a pleasant surprise of writing my own blog was discovering the friendly and supportive cocktail blogging community.

There are big old famous blogs and there are great new ones. This small selection is by no means comprehensive, but just a few of my favourites.

But before I share, I have a sincere question: What are your favourite cocktail, Taiwan or otherwise relevant blogs? I’m keen to discover more good blog reads. Drop a comment and let me know.

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Drinks Blogs

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Putney Farm

Stuart grows food, photographs it, cooks delicious meals, blogs about and mixes up a cocktail to celebrate. A wonderfully holistic blog.

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Boozed and Infused

Alicia introduced me to the practice of infusing spirits to make your own liqueurs; something that is not nearly as difficult as it sounds. I’ve made about five so far, and loved every one.

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Measure and Stir

A great cocktail blog from an enthusiastic hobbyist.

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Cold Glass

Certainly the nicest looking blog I read and the cocktail writing is great too.

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And One More for the Road

Rhett is a working bartender with a great blog. I particularly like his ‘science‘ posts about such topics as the science of taste.

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Bunnyhugs

My old friend Seamus is from New Zealand, like me, but I met him in Taiwan over a decade ago. I’m still here, and he’s now in China where he writes for their national magazine ‘Drinks’. His blog has been dormant for years, but is just now stirring back into life, so go and check it out.

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Jeffrey Morgenthaler

Very sporadic nowadays, but my favourite of the ‘old-timer’ cocktail blogs.

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Mixology Monday

An event rather than a blog. Once a month, cocktail bloggers join together to post about their mixological experiences or discoveries based on a pre-arranged theme. The results end up on a different host blog each month, but the main blog here will point you there.

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Taiwan Sites

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Hungry Girl

A Hungry Girl’s Guide to Taipei is the premiere English-language guide to the wonderful world that is eating out in Taiwan. I’m getting hungry just thinking about it.

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Jaysun Eats Taipei

The newcomer to Taipei food blogs, Jaysun approaches his topic with passion. There’s certainly enough eating to go around.

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Tearroir

A wine-lover’s guide to tea: Great concept and the perfect country for it.

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Graci in the Kitchen

Graci is another New Zealander living in Taiwan, and making waves with her ‘moody’ online cooking show.

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Forumosa

The big daddy of Taiwan English-language forums.

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Taiwanease

Smaller (and possibly friendlier) Taiwan forums and business directory.

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Gig Guide Taiwan

Outstanding site for everything that’s going on in the Taiwan music scene.

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