What's in my Glass?

Italy has been making wine since before Julius Caesar kicked the butts of those barbarous Gauls in what is now Burgundy and Bordeaux. But that happy, disorderly, ancient nation has so many types of wine and historically such resistance to organization that French wine terminology is better known in this country. Italian winemakers produce white wines, roses, and red wines that range from almost pink to almost black.

They have four levels of sweetness and three levels of effervescence.

Sweetness:

• Dolce - sweet and viscous dessert wines, like Sauternes and Vin Santo 
• Amabile - semi-sweet 
• Abbocato - off-dry 
• Secco - dry
• Asciutto - very dry

 Effervescence:

• Tranquillo - still (This is usually not mentioned on the bottle since most Italian wines are still.)
• Frizzante - lightly sparking, like good Prosecco
• Spumante - fully sparkling, like Champagne (and Asti Spumanti)

You have to try new things or your life goes stale.  That’s why I bought the bottle of Rhum J.M. I knew it could be a mistake, but it was made in Martinique, which is actually a Department of France, where they make Cognac, Champagne and paté de foie gras, so why, on a Caribbean island, wouldn’t the French make wonderful rum?  And it's an AOC (Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée) Rhum Agricole, made from fresh-squeezed sugar cane juice, not molasses. It sounded very intriguing!

I have been a big fan of rye whiskey ever since I was first introduced to it in Vancouver almost 20 years ago, long before its current resurgence. I like its dry, crisp flavor, that goes well with many liqueurs and bitters.

Rye has a long, deep tradition in American mixology and drinking. Even George Washngton produced rye whiskey.

Some people think of Canadian whiskey as rye whiskey, and that was once the case, but these days most common Canadian whiskeys have no more rye in them than a Jamaican rum has.

Fortunately rye became fashionable again about three years ago, and a number of brands came upon the market, including some real boutique ryes. Some have survived. Through it all, Old Overholt has persevered; that's the kind I use in my rye cocktails, including my favorite Sazerac Cocktail.

For a lot of people, bitters are the little paper-wrapped bottle in the door of the fridge that isn't Worcestershire Sauce. Many bars these days don't even have bitters, especially portable bars set up for events. The next time you go to a wedding reception, if you want a decent cocktail, you'd best bring your own bitters!

Bitters (obviously) are used to balance the sweetness in a drink that is typically added by simple syrup or a liqueur. You don't usually use bitters in drinks that have lemon or lime juice because those ingredients provide their own tartness and mask the delicate flavors of the bitters.

Bitters are catching on again, after a long period out of favor. Fee Brothers makes an eye-popping range of bitters (see photo above). but many of these are of very limited interest. To make virtually all classic cocktails, your well-stocked bar needs only:

• Angostura Bitters, available everywhere, used in many drinks, especially whiskey drinks
• Orange Bitters, less widely available, see Fee's or Regan's No. 6. Used in some gin drinks (including some Martini formulations), nice with rye.
• Peychaud's Bitters, used in the Sazerac and a few other less common but delicious cocktails.

You can find Chocolate bitters, Rhubarb bitters, Cherry bitters, and more. What you'll do with them is up to you. I have not yet found a need for them.

Triple Sec, a clear, sweet orange-flavored liqueur, is an important part of any well-stocked bar. It is a component in many, many classic cocktails, starting with the venerable Fancy Whiskey cocktail.

Other orange liqueurs include Cointreau, Grand marnier, and the Curacaos (blue is most common, but you can get orange as well, and "white" (clear) seems to be extinct. Orange Curacao has a similar flavor to Triple Sec, but it is not colorless so it may not be an acceptable substitute if you want your cocktail to look as it should.

There are a number of common brands of Triple Sec, and most of them are little more than orange sugar-syrup suitable for pouring on orange sherbet. Two excellent brands that I have found are Stirrings and Marie Brizard. Lorna and I tried a side-by-side blind taste test of DeKuyper and Marie Brizard last night, and the latter won easily. It was interesting to note that the Marie Brizard Triple sec is not only stronger flavored, but at 39% alcohol it is much stronger than the common varieties. It also costs more than twice as much, but you don't need so much to get the same amount of orangey flavor, and it's a much better flavor at that.

When it comes to cocktail research, sometimes smaller is better. You can learn as much from a small drink as from a larger one, and you keep your wits about you longer.

These days, when you get a cocktail at a restaurant or a bar, it is likely to be served in a glass that is far larger than was the norm when the classic coktails were formulated. It serves the bar's interests to get a reputation for generous drinks, and the markup on liquor is so good that they can afford to be generous - to a fault.

It is not hard to find older glassware in antiques shops, some of them quite attractive.