Showing posts with label David Lebovitz. Show all posts
Showing posts with label David Lebovitz. Show all posts

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

Pedro Collins (Drink # 8)

I watched the season finale of Big Love this evening.  If you haven't seen it, or don't want to know the general story line of the show - skip down to the recipe.


Big Love
This season has been a weird one.  I felt like the show had too many balls in the air, and every story seemed crazier and crazier.  Bill turned into an asshole, plain and simple.  And the idea that he'd come clean about his polygamist family right after the election never quite made sense to me.  How blinded must Bill have been to think that he'd be accepted and not run out of office immediately after he admitted his polygamist-ways? 

Let's talk about the speech for a moment...

Why would a state senator get a platform like that, in front of what I presume was the capital building, for his acceptance speech?  He wouldn't!  It's as though he became a U.S. Senator.  It looked ridiculous.

In any event, I did not think that he would follow through with admitting his family's secrets to the rest of Utah (and the world, I suppose).  None of the wives looked particularly happy, and who can blame them - they're all getting screwed out of what they want.  The end of the show mirrored this season's new opening - filled with blowing hair, and pouty lips.  I'm not sure where the show goes from here, but there isn't enough room for too many more story lines.


Recipe
The Ultimate Bar Book, page 271

Pedro Collins

2 ounces light rum
1 ounce fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon sugar
3 to 4 ounces chilled club soda
Lime slice
Maraschino cherry

Pour rum, lime juice, and sugar into an ice-filled collins glass. Top with clubs soda and stir gently.  Garnish with the lime slice and cherry.


I used my trusty old Bacardi Rum bottle for this one.  This bottle is getting more use in the last month than it had did in the 6-7 years prior.  I'm enjoying rum far more than I ever thought I would.  I guess the last few times I had rum would have been in a rum and coke, or something similar.  Rum and cokes aren't terrible, but they aren't my favorite.  As a result, I never gave rum much of a chance.

This is one hell of a refreshing drink.  Anything with rum, lime juice and ice is bound to taste a little lime-aid-ish - and it surely does, just like the Daiquiri.  And unfortunately, the sugar won't dissolve in the cold liquid, so it's left sitting in the bottom of the glass.  I'm not sure how much additional sweetness is really necessary for the drink.  If it did dissolve, the drink might become a little syrupy.

The Pedro Collins is fairly light on the alcohol relative to the rest of the drink's contents, so you can drink a couple of these and still be sitting pretty.  The club soda adds only a small amount of fizz, but just enough to add a little pop to the drink that would otherwise be sweet and flat.

This is another in a string of summer drinks (see also the Daiquiri and the Sidecar).  There's a reason rum is an alcohol out of the tropics - in the high heat, the Pedro Collins is a good bet.  Next time though, I may mix everything without the ice, in the hopes the sugar dissolves at least in part.  Like I said above, the sugar may be unnecessary in the end, but it seemed silly to have the sugar sitting idly at the bottom. 

I actually think that this phenomenon is a big reason artificial sweetners are so popular - they dissolve in cold liquids far better than regular sugar.  You can read more about this at my new blog:
www.randomthoughtsbasedonlittleornoscientificevidence.com.

Check back tomorrow when I try the dreaded tequila drink I wrote about the other day, the Toreador!  Honestly, I'm not looking forward to it.  I have a soccer game this evening, and there may be nothing worse than tequila after running around like an idiot for an hour.  Though what do I know, perhaps there's nothing better - only one way to find out...

Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Side Project: Chocolate Chip Cookies

In the office kitchen today, there was a bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips, leftover from Friday's milkshake fixings.  I poured a small amount of the chocolate chips into my hand and threw then into my mouth.  They were delicious.  They also inspired me to make some chocolate chip cookies - AND THUS - the first Side Project on The Amateur Mixologist website! 

I've made chocolate chip cookies from a number of different recipes over the years.  I haven't found a go-to recipe just yet, despite many attempts (all of which have been good, but not great).

I found my recipe on a fantastic cooking and food website: 101 Cookbooks.

The recipe comes from a cookbook by David Lebovitz, called The Great Book of Chocolate, available here:  http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1580084958/heidiswanson-20

Here is the recipe (borrowed liberally from the 101 Cookbooks website):

Great Chocolate Chip Cookie Recipe

1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
1/2 cup (120 grams) firmly packed light brown sugar
8 tablespoons (1 stick) (115 grams) unsalted butter, cold, cut into 1/2-inch (1cm) pieces
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 cups (175 grams) all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups (200 grams) semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup(130 grams) walnuts or pecans, toasted and chopped


Adjust the oven rack to the top 1/3 of the oven and preheat to 300F (150C). Line three baking sheets with parchment paper.

Beat the sugars and butters together until smooth. Mix in the egg, vanilla, and baking soda. Stir together the flour and salt, then mix them into the batter. Mix in the chocolate chips and nuts.

Scoop the cookie dough into 2-tablespoon (5cm) balls and place 8 balls, spaced 4 inches (10cm) apart, on each of the baking sheets.

Bake for 18 minutes, or until pale golden brown. Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack.

Store at room temperature in an airtight container for up to 3 days.

Makes about 20 cookies.

I made a couple of executive decisions:

1. I only formed 12 cookies and not 16.  I doubt it makes too much of a difference, the cookies I made are just a touch bigger than the recipe calls for.  As a result, they required a bit more time in the oven - 20-21 minutes as opposed to 18 minutes.

2. I left out the walnuts or pecans, and just added more chocolate chips.  I like walnuts.  I like pecans.  I like chocolate chips more.

The results were outstanding.


Right of the oven, they were perfectly chewy.  The low baking temperature, and long baking time, allowed the chocolate chips to melt away better than cookies past.


One benefit of my executive decision to make the cookies bigger is that the middle doesn't overcook, like smaller cookies might.  And, they're easier to dunk in milk - a huge plus.


There you have it - the first Side Project.  Big ups to Mr. Lebovitz and 101 Cookbooks for the recipe.
 
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