January 31, 2006 :: Accidental genius

I invented a drink the other day.

I do believe I came up with a cocktail recipe that, while I'm sure somebody has tried it before, it's rare enough that I haven't been able to find a similar enough recipe for it anywhere that I have looked. I checked Webtender, and some books I have at home, and found nothing, so I'm declaring that I've looked hard enough, and I'm claiming it as my own.

I sort of stumbled on it by accident, sitting in Ozio one slow, lazy weeknight with a friend of mine. They have an in-house martini list, and one of the drinks on there is something called "Old Blue Eyes", named after Ol' Blue Eyes himself, Frank Sinatra. Of course, blue curaçao is what makes it blue, and I don't normally mess with blue curaçao ... it's long since been perverted from its origins into a dyed-up triple sec, suitable for girly drinks that draw oohs and aahs from lightweights and teetotaler pantywaists. But I was bored, and I decided to mix it up a little. The original drink was a little too sweet for my tastes, and the curaçao doesn't taste quite as good even as triple sec, never mind an upbrand orange liqueur like Cointreau. It needed some work. So I told the bartender to add a little pineapple juice to mellow out the blue (the barest amount), and to add a float of brut champagne to dry it out a little. The results, at least for my palate, were sublime. If you like sweet drinks, leave it alone. If you like a nice stiff martini (a real martini made with gin, or permissibly vodka, but never any fruit juices or anything else remotely sweet, unless the fruit is an olive), and you aren't afraid of bubbles, you might like it. But I'm not making any promises, except to say that if you happened to be present for the travesty that was a Tajhtini at the 2004 birthday bash (a situation that went WAAAY out of my control), rest assured this drink is better, and it will knock you on your ass with velvet hammers the way a good drink should.

Here's the recipe, with all the steps for you non-bartenders.

Blue Topaz

Ingredients
Vodka
Blue curaçao
Pineapple juice
Brut champagne
Lemon peel

1. Find a nice martini glass. Don't use plastic.
2. Fill the glass with ice, then fill the spaces between the ice with cold water. Let it sit for a minute while you get the rest of the ingredients.
3. Slice a thin lemon wedge, then peel the flesh away from the peel. Save the peel, toss the flesh.
4. Get a shaker, and fill it with ice.
5. Pour 1 3/4 oz of a good vodka into the shaker. That's 7 counts with a metered pourer.
6. Pour 1/2 oz of blue curaçao into the shaker.
7. Pour 1/2 oz of pineapple juice into the shaker.
8. Put the lid on the shaker and shake. Remember, shaken, not stirred.
9. Dump the ice and water out of the glass.
10. Rub the lemon peel around the rim of the glass, and then twist it up and put it in the glass.
11. Strain the contents of the shaker into the glass.
12. Pour a float of brut champagne on top of the contents of the glass, just enough to see it fizz.

posted by Rainmayun at 12:03 AM -