[Cocktails] Feng Shui–A Perfect Harmony of Chinese, Japanese, Mediterranean, and Dutch Flavors

It feels good to be blogging again…I have been MIA for the last 3 months or so – winter is never slow in the oil patch.

I love mixing drinks…even though most uninformed and close-minded people think it’s gay, they don’t really understand the art and the joy in mixing different flavours to produce something that is beautiful.

One of my favourite books to try mixes from is the Food & Wine Cocktails ‘09 Guide. No one drink is the same as the other and almost each drink invariably requires some special ingredients that you will need to stock up on. But it’s always worth it afterwards, so even after 3 years of owning this book, I continue to try new drinks from this little handbook.

Feng Shui is an aperitif mixed up by Jamie Boudreau who got his chops making pre-dinner drinks at Vancouver’s legendary restaurant Lumiere. Boudreau apparently falls under the category of “molecular mixologist” and has experimented with some cool shit including bacon and bourbon (!).

I have wanted to try out Feng Shui for a long time, but didn’t do so out of shear laziness. I managed to finally gather all the necessary ingredients:

- 1 lychee fruit OR 1/4 oz. lychee liquor (like SOHO)

- 1 oz. sake

- 1 oz. gin

- 1/4 oz. lemon juice

- 1/4 oz. simple syrup

- 1 fresh thyme sprig

- 1 thyme sprig and skewered lychee for garnishing (optional)

In a cocktail shaker, muddle the lychee and thyme sprig.

Add ice and the rest of the ingredients (except the garnishes) and shake well for 20-30s until the shaker is all nicely frosted. Double-strain the drink into a chilled coupe and Viola!

I couldn’t find any lychees at the local Co-op and was too lazy to drive to T&T, so ended up using SOHO for the lychee flavour, which ended up working deliciously.

This is definitely a great way to start your pre-dinner drinking. The wonderful aroma of lychee harmonizes really well the gin and thyme. I couldn’t necessarily pick out the individual flavours and aromas of the thyme and juniper berries, but that could be because I was using SOHO and not lychee fruit.

Either way, a must try for all the budding mixologists and cocktail hackers out there!

-Kiran

[Cool Sh*t] Japanese Plum Wine (Umeshu)

I am a big fan of dessert wines, so I am constantly trying to find new variations on the traditional notion of using grapes to make dessert wines. I got my first taste Japanese plum wine when I was at Ippudo, NYC – I was an instant fan. So, a couple of months ago, when I ran across a bottle in my local liquor store, I immediately bought one to relive my culinary adventures in The Big Apple.

Ume can be had neat, on the rocks, or as part of a tasty cocktail. I tried it neat to get a undiluted taste of the liquor itself.

Appearance: very clean, light straw-coloured golden hue

Aroma: sweet apricot, plum, peach flavours (I can’t distinguish between them anyways)

Taste: very sweet, light, and clean tasting liquor. No harsh or lingering after-taste. Doesn’t burn your throat (it’s only 10% ABV). Mouth feel was very crisp.

Palate: my palate isn’t very well-developed, so I have nothing really to add. I can’t taste things like grass, honey-dew, cilantro or other kinds of crazy shit the real pros taste. I think they make that shit up anyway…

So all in all, a pretty delicious way to end your dinner if you have the craving for something sweet. Ume, unlike dessert wines, is also actually pretty dead simple to make. In fact, in Japan, it is common to make it at home, according to this blogger. There’s no real fermentation process involved, although patience is a must as it takes up to a year for the plum to infuse the liquor. If you are interested in making some, check out this youtube video as well.

A Side Note…

I would consider plum wine to be a dessert wine, although in the strictest sense, it really isn’t. Also, plum wine isn’t really a wine, it’s more a liquor as the plums are literally steeped in a white liquor for a year before the “wine” is ready. Dessert wines, on the other hand, are fortified wines where brandy (distilled wine) or other neutral spirits are added to the fermenting must (freshly pressed fruit juice that contains the skins, seeds, and stems of the fruit). The spirit kills the yeast before the fermentation process is complete, thereby leaving some sugars behind and making the resultant beverage sweeter and stronger in terms of ABV (usually in the 20% range).

The Niagara region is famous for its wines, but a lot of people don’t know that Canada is, in fact, the world’s biggest producer of ice wines. The consistent winters allow the grapes to be frozen while still on the vine, hence concentrating the sugars and other dissolved solids in the must. Unlike dessert wines, ice wines are fermented from the must of ripe grapes that were frozen at −8 °C or colder on the vine, i.e., no distilled spirits are added. These grapes are then crushed mechanically and the resultant must fermented for months using special yeast strains that are able to process the larger quantities of sugars present.

Fortunately, Japanese plum wine or umeshu (ume for short), is a much simpler and easier wine to make. It also quite easy on the palette and can be appreciated universally. So, if you come across a bottle in your neighbourhood liquor store, don’t be afraid to pick one up and give it a taste.

-Kiran

 

 

Delicious Japanese Curry

I am generally a pretty lazy person (but I would consider myself efficient). So I usually don’t like to invest too much time into cooking my meals. If you are like me, then you might enjoy this curry recipe (thanks to Margaret for sending this to me).

This is my take on it:

• The dish doesn’t take much time to whip up

• The curry is not spicy, and it is not supposed to be, so you’ll have to throw in some extra spices if you want to make it more interesting

• The ingredient list is not complicated – go to your nearest T&T to pick up the Japanese curry cubes.

• It tastes like my momma’s curry (and it is a pretty damn tasty curry)

 

Bingo, bango, bongo. Can’t get easier than that.

 

Love,

Kenter