Ever since I was a young ‘un, both of my parents have been avid jammers.

I remember weekend trips to the berry picking farms and eating my bodyweight in raspberries, dripping wax on jam filled jars and eating marmalade on thick cut toast every morning before school. Later in life I would receive packages of marmalade while living in Tokyo shipped from London and still receive them today in San Fransico (dad, if you’re reading this, I’m almost out).

Putting  whiskey in marmalade has always been a favorite of mine. So when I decided to team up with Blue Chair fruit company for the Good Eggs party this weekend I relished the idea of putting some marmalade in my whiskey.

It was very difficult to choose from Blue Chair’s wide selection of delicious preserves but I narrowed it down to these two:

Marmalade Whiskey Sour:

1 tsp lemon & pink grapefruit marmalade
2oz bourbon
0.5oz orange juice
0.5oz punt e mes
1 dash orange bitters

Blackberry & greengage gin fizz:

1 tsp blackberry & greengage jam
1.5oz gin
0.5oz lemon
0.5oz sutton cellers vermouth
0.25oz simple syrup
1 dash angostura
top soda

I can’t wait to come up with some cocktails with their other preserves…

Rhubarb is starting to appear at the local farmers markets and gourmet grocery stores here in San Francisco so it’s time to get into the lab and make some magic happen.

I got together with Christopher Jurach, a visiting professor of mixology and the dark arts, currently doing a fellowship with Mobile Libations and here are the results.

We made a shrub using the fresh rhubarb, sugar, cinnamon, star anise and apple cider vinegar. If you’ve never tried a shrub cocktail, you can try one at Hacked Organic on April 6th.

The technique is an old one, designed to preserve fruit past the summer months. After macerating the fruit with sugar, it is preserved by the vinegar. For this one, we used apple cider vinegar but darker fruits such as cherries or blackberries are great with balsamic. In cocktails, the acid in the vinegar is used to replace acid from citrus with astonishing and mouthwatering effects.

The first thing I wanted to do with the shrub was make a hot toddy for the Project Bly launch party this week. The event is outside at Mission Dispatch so I wanted a drink to warm everyone up.

12 year Zaya Rum is the perfect base for the rhubarb shrub and a little meyer lemon ginger syrup.

1.5 oz rum
0.75 oz rhubarb shrub
0.25 oz meyer lemon ginger syrup
top with hot water and garnish with a clove studded lemon twist.

We used a similar recipe for the rocks version of the drink for Serpentine in the dogpatch, where a few of the Mobile Libations bartenders ply their trade. Come and check it out next week.

Making barrel aged cocktails – The Manhattan Project from Mobile Libations on Vimeo.

Ingredients:

Aged for three months in a Blandy’s Madeira wine barrel, we created the Blandy’s Barrel Aged Manhattan. It is in the style of the perfect manhattan which is half sweet and half dry vermouth.

Roland Blandy (owner of Mobile Libations), Chris Ventura (head bartender of Serpentine) and Carl Sutton (owner of Sutton Cellars) decided to split the sweet vermouth component into a special blend of two different components to best compliment the Madeira barrel. Our substitution is comprised of Sutton Cellars La Solera (a dessert wine based on Syrah, Zinfandel, and Carignane) and Benedictine (a barrel aged herbal liquor from a 500 year old recipe).

The rye whiskey base was chosen for its high proof and to stand up to the aging process which smooths out the whiskey flavor over time. We tested this by keeping a jug of our original cocktail recipe under carbon dioxide to compare the initial taste with our barrel aged version. In this barrel aged Manhattan, the Rittenhouse is mellow but leaves a nice warmth on the finish.

After taste testing from the barrel every week until it seemed ready, we corked a total of 82 bottles to be distributed as gifts, at Mobile Libations events, and at Serpentine restaurant in the Dogpatch, San Francisco.

Carl Suttons signature smirk as he adds the Solera blend to the mix.

Finally siphoning into the barrel, saving a gallon for topping off.

This is the ultimate zombie apocalypse survival book! This encyclopedia volume, given to me by a friend, explains 6422 processes and recipes! Apparently “receipt” used to be the word for “recipe”. Among them are alcoholmetry, cordials and liquors, bitters, cider, brewing, aromatic extracts, syrups, explosives, elixirs… the list goes on.

I first opened it to the bitters section. There is a recipe written in flowery antiquated language for amazon bitters which are described as “the finest bitters in the market” and yields 120 gallons.  Other interesting descriptions include the famous Boker’s bitters recipe from the pre-prohibition era, Curacoa, and caraway cordial. I can’t wait to get started making some new/old shit.

What’s the difference between a cordial and a liqueur? I read this and I’m still not sure.

Inspired by the slew of barrel aged beers that have been going around recently I’ve had a go at incorporating beers into spirit driven cocktails. My second batch, the Black Butte Porter Liqueur, has a smooth maple taste from the sugar and chocolate coffee finish.

Dogpatch Dispatch no.2
1.5oz Pampero Aniversario Venezuelan rum
0.5oz Black Butte Porter Liqueur
0.3oz Aqua Perfect Pear Liqueur (St. George)
Shaken and served up with an orange twist.

It tastes like a summer rum manhattan with lush pear and a hint of porter at the finish which become strong as the drink warms a little.
Perfect on a warm afternoon.

Some of our customers sent us photos of the cocktails they made from our gift boxes.

Grapefruit Rosemary Essence (for atomizing)

Starting with an assortment of herbs, roots and spices, this Mobile Libations side project led to the production of Blandy’s Bitter Half, the perfect little bottle for a DIY gift box.

Mobile Libations mix master Roland is also a sculptor of found objects and a collector of pretty and unusual things.