Canada's only magazine dedicated to distillers, spirits and cocktail culture.
It’s the taste of a perfect summer afternoon: that citrus bite, the peppery hit of tequila, the touch of salt like the spray of a random ocean wave.
We’re talking about the Margarita, of course; the quintessential summer cocktail that holds a mysterious past. When it comes to this particular dame’s history, no one really knows what the truth is.
Nothing says Monday morning quite like arriving at a bar at 10.30 a.m. ready to drink all day. The scene at Main Street’s Cascade Room is organized chaos. Bartenders, usually never seen out before noon, are slugging coffee offered both straight up or spiked.
There are crates and boxes all over the place. Recognizable labels of Scotch, rye, mescal, Cognac and more jostle beside unlabelled bottles of homemade fat-washed and syrupy concoctions. This is clearly a serious affair.
It’s impossible to pass a day in Portugal, Spain or Madeira without being offered a glass of one of their famous fortified wines. Often presented in cocktails and mixed drinks, these local terroir-driven sherries, ports and Madeiras are as natural to drink as (and in some cases more than) water. Because of their blend of wine and spirit, fortifieds are highly useful and versatile in mixed drinks and cocktails, providing just enough of that spirited touch without all the booze of a straight spirit.
At Yaletown’s Revolución Cigar & Fine Gifts, Paul Agelidis welcomes clients from all over the world, curious to see his unique lifestyle products. Revolución is also a favourite for celebrities , including Halle Berry, Leonardo DiCaprio and Harrison Ford.
If you want something done right, do it yourself.
It may be a truism, but for Rebekah Crowley and Rob Rindt it’s also the organizing principle that inspired their newly opened Roots and Wings Distillery in Langley, and the reason their handcrafted vodka exists.
The rest of the world has moved on, but I’m still hung up on Game 7 of the 2016 World Series. Top of the eighth, the Chicago Cubs were ahead 6–3, then gave away three runs for the Cleveland Indians to tie it up heading into the ninth. When play resumed in extra innings after a rain delay, Cubs second baseman (and series MVP) Ben Zobrist hit an RBI double for the go-ahead run that brought a 108-year drought to its end.
Relief Cubs pitcher Jon Lester let in those three runs, but that’s OK. The guy’s a hero (a story for another time), and more germane to a cocktail magazine, he secured this historic victory through magic. When the Cubs started their pre-season in April, the Commons Club in the Virgin Hotels Chicago offered the Never Quit: a fundraiser cocktail for Lester’s favourite charity, with vodka, peanut syrup and leaf alcohol, topped with Old Style lager. The twist: the vodka was macerated with Lester’s pitcher’s mitt. Yes, it was a drink of fake grass, peanuts and leather, which sounds terrible — like a Moscow Mule minus all the good bits — except, to repeat, it appeared in the same season that Lester helped shutter a century-long curse. Coincidence? I think not.
It may not be immediately obvious, but politics and cocktails have an affinity to rival gin and vermouth.
J-S Dupuis, bar manager at Boulevard Kitchen & Oyster Bar agrees. “The history of spirits and politics — they’ve always gone hand in hand.”
For some, inspiration comes by way of music, meditation or motivational speeches.
Jean-Marc Dykes’ unexpected light-bulb moment came in 2015, in the bowels of a tall ship while mixing drinks for friends.
Katie Ingram is a sucker for history. The head bartender of Gastown’s L’Abbatoir is talking pisco, the South American spirit that shows up in sours the world over, and in no time at all, she’s taken us right back to the Ice Age.
Do you want to see the only way to shoot a bird?” asks Jorg Engel, owner of Maple Leaf Spirits, soon after we meet at his Okanagan distillery. I’m there with my daughter, Maya, and Engel is showing us the birds and chickens in the enclosure next to his tasting room.
I stare and my daughter’s eyes bug. Engel has a small green bird sitting on his finger and I’m wondering if I should cover Maya’s eyes. “Watch this,” he says, smiling gently. Without further ado, he cocks his finger like a gun at the little bird and quietly says, “Bam!” The bird swings and hangs upside down from Engel’s finger. A brief second of silence and then we burst into (slightly relieved) laughter. The bird is right side up again and chirping happily, obviously in on the joke.