Proof Reads

liquorsandlace:

Wine & Spirit Notes: London’s Secret Speakeasies
I’ve been a little reluctant to write anything about the secret speakeasies that are popping up all over London as my view is that perhaps they’re best kept on the hush hush. However, TimeOut London wrote a piece online today outing the trend so I suppose it’s only a matter of time before people all over the capital are knocking on unmarked doors, hoping to find a palatial drinking den behind.
I was introduced to Purl a couple of weeks ago, where a theatrical and scientific approach to their cocktail making would be sure to please the Heston Blumenthals of the world. My ‘Mr Hyde’s No. 2’ cocktail was served infused with smoke in a medicine bottle and surrounded by billowing Lapsang Fog escaping from a cooler. Depending on how smoky I wished my Ron Zacapa 23-based cocktail to be, I could either pour the drink straight away into my tiny metal cup, or leave the cork in the bottle for a while longer. A friend of mine chose the ‘Green Fairy Sazerac’, which was topped with an Absinthe ‘Air’ the consistency of lightly whipped egg whites, and was made in a way which would preserve the alcoholic content of the Absinthe. Hic!
With wood floors, exposed brickwork and leather Chesterfield sofas casting shadows in the dim light, Purl is cosy without succumbing to the usual faux-luxe trappings of velvet and sparkly bits. Even though we were seated at the bar, curiosities were to be seen all around us from punch bowls to taxidermy, and I hear there’s a piano room if you venture further…
My second secret speakeasy, where cocktails were a birthday treat a few days ago, is the Experimental Cocktail Club. Hidden away in Chinatown, it occupies the two floors above one of the Chinese restaurants and has the interiors of townhouse turned boudoir, where waiters in red bow ties squeeze past merrymakers whose heels sink into the pile of the soft carpet underfoot. Even though it was only 7pm on a Thursday night, the Experimental Cocktail Club was packed with a mixture of people who were there for the cocktails and others who were having a post-work glass of Champagne. Not quite as niche as Purl but when it came to the cocktails, I couldn’t complain. I have a bit of a sweet tooth so my choices were rum and Calvados based. The rum cocktail, called ‘Jamaican Pogo’ definitely had a Caribbean punch vibe to it with the ingredients list containing spicy bitters and pineapple flavours. A friend’s ‘Old Cuban’ was an interesting twist on the classic Mojito, while the ‘Havana’ is recommended by the bar staff if you’re not afraid of a stiff drink.
While Purl and the Experimental Cocktail Club are quite different in terms of atmosphere and clientele, both offer cocktails that are actually worth paying £10 for and have an individual character which is so often lacking in many of London’s identikit bars. There are more Prohibition-inspired speakeasies popping up so catch them before the rest of London does.
(Photo taken with iPhone & instagram, unfortunately not at a speakeasy)

Wine & Spirit Notes: London’s Secret Speakeasies

I’ve been a little reluctant to write anything about the secret speakeasies that are popping up all over London as my view is that perhaps they’re best kept on the hush hush. However, TimeOut London wrote a piece online today outing the trend so I suppose it’s only a matter of time before people all over the capital are knocking on unmarked doors, hoping to find a palatial drinking den behind.

I was introduced to Purl a couple of weeks ago, where a theatrical and scientific approach to their cocktail making would be sure to please the Heston Blumenthals of the world. My ‘Mr Hyde’s No. 2’ cocktail was served infused with smoke in a medicine bottle and surrounded by billowing Lapsang Fog escaping from a cooler. Depending on how smoky I wished my Ron Zacapa 23-based cocktail to be, I could either pour the drink straight away into my tiny metal cup, or leave the cork in the bottle for a while longer. A friend of mine chose the ‘Green Fairy Sazerac’, which was topped with an Absinthe ‘Air’ the consistency of lightly whipped egg whites, and was made in a way which would preserve the alcoholic content of the Absinthe. Hic!

With wood floors, exposed brickwork and leather Chesterfield sofas casting shadows in the dim light, Purl is cosy without succumbing to the usual faux-luxe trappings of velvet and sparkly bits. Even though we were seated at the bar, curiosities were to be seen all around us from punch bowls to taxidermy, and I hear there’s a piano room if you venture further…

My second secret speakeasy, where cocktails were a birthday treat a few days ago, is the Experimental Cocktail Club. Hidden away in Chinatown, it occupies the two floors above one of the Chinese restaurants and has the interiors of townhouse turned boudoir, where waiters in red bow ties squeeze past merrymakers whose heels sink into the pile of the soft carpet underfoot. Even though it was only 7pm on a Thursday night, the Experimental Cocktail Club was packed with a mixture of people who were there for the cocktails and others who were having a post-work glass of Champagne. Not quite as niche as Purl but when it came to the cocktails, I couldn’t complain. I have a bit of a sweet tooth so my choices were rum and Calvados based. The rum cocktail, called ‘Jamaican Pogo’ definitely had a Caribbean punch vibe to it with the ingredients list containing spicy bitters and pineapple flavours. A friend’s ‘Old Cuban’ was an interesting twist on the classic Mojito, while the ‘Havana’ is recommended by the bar staff if you’re not afraid of a stiff drink.

While Purl and the Experimental Cocktail Club are quite different in terms of atmosphere and clientele, both offer cocktails that are actually worth paying £10 for and have an individual character which is so often lacking in many of London’s identikit bars. There are more Prohibition-inspired speakeasies popping up so catch them before the rest of London does.

(Photo taken with iPhone & instagram, unfortunately not at a speakeasy)

1 year ago -

Amaretto, Amaretto, Amaretto (Never) Let Me Go*

By Patrick Garrigan

In my first/previous/only guest post I whinged on about getting berated for not liking beer or wine. Well, to begin this post-of-two-halves, a retraction. I recently drank two things that call my ramblings into question. Firstly; Prosecco. Bellinis are nice and, by extension, this substitute for champagne is not too awful. Secondly; Veuve Clicquot. I won’t get into the circumstances under which I was allowed to freely pour many bottles of a well priced vintage of this down my throat, and you can feel free to call out my working class roots if it takes your fancy, but come on! This stuff was simply yummy. As I can’t be considered to even be from the same gene pool as a connoisseur, I have no further tasting notes on either of these grapes. Sorry.

What I am here to talk about though is amaretto. And to begin, a quote from the masters, Disaronno, themselves:

“Disaronno is produced with only carefully selected ingredients such as the pure essence of 17 selected herbs and fruits soaked in apricot kernel oil. It is characterised by an unmistakeable amber colour due to caramelised sugar…”

Now doesn’t that sound just lovely? And they haven’t even changed the recipe since 1525 so they must be doing something right. The name, amaretto (and I can promise you my knowledge is so full that this required zero minutes on Wikipedia until I wanted to corroborate my story, and I cross my heart and swear on my one litre bottle that I haven’t changed a word) translates literally as “a little bitter” as the almonds from which it is made taste so. Anyway, I digress.

The reason I’m bringing it up is because Disaronno Originale is the only alcohol I’ve ever truly loved. And I’m not using loved in the “can’t live without” sense, you should have a wife for that, but in the “above all beverages,” this is the one. The king. The last taste I would wish upon my dying lips. Forget about a witty epitaph, I want an amaretto drip as I slip drunkenly out of life in old age.

I can’t join in with people when they start liking a really good bottle of wine or find a stunning Bavarian ale, but if what happens in their mouths is anything like what happens when I swill some amaretto around then, well, crikey, it turns out there is a heaven. There’s a smell of sweetness before you drink it, and that’s the initial flavour but it goes slightly bitter on your tongue, before becoming almost too intense to hold in your mouth and so you swallow it and it is warming and suddenly sweet again and you are glad you chose to drink it with ice because you can imagine that even being slightly warm would ruin it (it does) - and right here is where the potential to lose me to not finishing this paragraph but having a drink of it lies…

…Nice. So, next time you’re out, and you see the square bottle peeking out from behind the bar, try an amaretto with some ice. Or, if it does sound too much - it can be quite harsh if you’re not prepared - then get it with some coke. An Italian restauranteur once told me off for doing this, but you get snobs everywhere and if you like it, have it. And with coke, amaretto works just fine. (But only Coca-Cola, with Pepsi it goes all horrible and too saccharine - don’t say you weren’t warned). But whatever you do with it I promise, promise, you’ll find a way to drink it that you can enjoy. And if you don’t, I’ll have what’s left.

*Within one paragraph I already regretted not working harder than to end up with a Queen reference for a title.

1 year ago -