Author: John Fladd

This column is an intervention for my editor and her aversion to a certain liqueur.

We Americans don’t deal well with bitterness.

The taste of bitter things, that is. We are fine with it as a character trait, but bitter tastes have a steep acceptance curve for us. Other cultures are much more accommodating to it. The Chinese concept of candy is more likely to be bitter than sweet. The British brew beers and ales that would make an American face collapse in on itself. But offer one of us an oil-cured black olive (the best kind of olive, by the way), and most of us will shrink back in horror.

“But, but that tastes like … leather!”

Yes. Yes, it does.

And this aversion makes a certain amount of sense, evolutionarily speaking. Long ago, we developed the ability to taste bitter things to help us avoid toxins in the wild. If a new berry or caterpillar tasted astringent or bitter, our ancestors knew to spit it out. But that logic breaks down in our modern world. There are huge numbers of us — granted, not so much in New Hampshire — who challenge ourselves to eat the spiciest foods we can stand. Sweating and gasping until we feel light-headed from a literal pain response? Fine. Bitterness? “What? Are you CRAZY?”

Intellectually, we accept that delicious, well-nuanced foods need a mixture of basic flavors. Bake a batch of cookies without salt, and they will just taste wrong. We love sweet-and-sour pork and chocolate-covered pretzels. Bitterness has a place at the table.

Which brings us to Campari.

Campari is a bright red, extremely bitter liqueur from Italy. You have seen it at the liquor store, or behind the bar at most upscale joints, but probably don’t have any around your house. It is the dominant ingredient in a Negroni.

To be fair, it is not universally loved. Some cynical critics have referred to it as “The Raisins of Booze.” [Editor’s note: As in “Why are there raisins in this cookie? This did not need raisins,” but with an otherwise perfectly good cocktail and Campari.] And yet, the fact remains that it is one of the best complementary counterbalances to sweet juices or syrups in mixed drinks. It is a team player; nobody is going to drink a glass of the stuff.

Actually, hold that thought.

Sound of footsteps going into the kitchen, various bartendy sounds, a brief moment of silence, then a gasp of shock and the sound of a tiny glass hitting the floor. More footsteps returning.

Yeah. I can’t recommend that.

BUT, I stand by my assertion that Campari deserves the space on your shelf where you are keeping that bottle of Crystal Head vodka that you bought on a whim that time and can’t bring yourself to open. (Open it and drink it, already. It’s vodka. It tastes like vodka.)

A case in point is a classic drink — the Chestnut Club (sometimes known as the Chestnut Cup), a modern classic developed in a California restaurant of the same name. It balances sweetness in the form of orgeat (an almond-infused syrup pronounced “or-szott”, as in, “It is unclear at this time whether the victim was stabbed or shot”), astringency from gin, sourness from lemon juice, and, of course, bitterness from Campari.

Chestnut Club

2 ounces gin (lately I like Death’s Door, out of Wisconsin.)

2 ounces Campari (Yes. Do it. God hates a coward.)

2 ounces fresh squeezed lemon juice

1 ounce orgeat

1. Combine all ingredients with 4 or 5 ice cubes in a shaker.

2. Shake until it is very cold — at least until condensation forms on the outside of the shaker.

3. Pour, without straining, into a rocks glass.

4. Drink sincerely, without irony, and, if possible, while sitting in a leather chair in an oak-paneled library with a taxidermied tiger head on the wall.

This drink is delicious. The flavor comes in waves. You really can taste each individual ingredient. It implies fruitiness, without actually embracing a Tiki mandate. It feels as if it should be too sweet and frivolous to take seriously, but it’s not.

Do you know why?

Campari, people.

Featured photo: Chestnut Club. Photo by John Fladd.

What’s lurking behind the milk?

Do you ever just do a deep dive into your fridge? It’s full of surprises.

That tub of “homemade” tartar sauce from that time you made fish and chips back in ’18. A mystery plastic container full of a thick, black liquid that smells like soy sauce and other less definable stuff. Or a bottle of Worcestershire sauce that’s been in there for who knows how long.

The same thing happens with beer; sometimes, brews just get lost in there.

I opened my beer fridge in the basement, which is a perfect replica of the tiny fridge I had in my college dorm room, and discovered I was getting down to the bottom of the barrel, so to speak.

There were a number of seasonal brews that weren’t in season — at least not this year. There was a canned, ready-to-drink “Bellini” cocktail, several of my wife’s hard seltzers and just a bunch of other really, really random offerings. And also a Founder’s KBS? None of it made sense.

It made me think of the Saturday Night Live digital short with Bill Burr where he’s “sampling” Sam Adams Jack-O Pumpkin Ale and says, “This is the kind of beer somebody brings to a party at your house, and then it just sits in the fridge for, like, eight months….”

We all have those beers in our fridge, and sometimes those beers we’ve been passing over for months can pleasantly surprise you.

Here are three back-of-the-fridge beers that I ended up enjoying.

Merry Monks Belgian Style Tripel Ale by Weyerbacher Brewing Co. (Easton, Pa.)

I don’t know why I held off on drinking this one for so long and I don’t even want to think about how long this one has been in my fridge. I like Belgian tripels a lot so there was no real excuse for it but there’s just something about the labeling on this brew that made it really hard for me to take it seriously: There’s a couple of, you guessed it, monks carrying a barrel, and, I don’t know, you’ll have to make your own call. But I finally dove in and regretted waiting so long to get after this one. It’s incredibly flavorful — fruity, spicy, sweet and well-balanced, and full of warming alcohol. This style is just kind of exciting. This was perfect on a very chilly early spring day.

Blood Orange Wheat by Jack’s Abby Craft Lagers (Framingham, Mass.)

Crisp, refreshing and not overly “wheaty,” this is an excellent choice for a warmer day. I think I was scared of the blood orange but I needn’t have been; while you can definitely pick up the citrusy sweetness from the orange, it’s not overwhelming. I am still, admittedly, fearful of this style because I might have had too many Blue Moons back in college, if I’m being honest. This is clean, bright and easy.

Flannel Friday by Harpoon (Boston)

This is another one that has had a remarkable hold on the back of my fridge. This beer is entirely inoffensive. It’s a little hoppy but it’s got a little malt character too that catches you by surprise. This is like the coming together of a pale ale and maybe a red ale? You get some citrusy zip from the hops and then maybe a little caramel from the malts — not bad at all.

What’s in My Fridge
Weekend Plans by Mast Landing Brewing Co. (Portland, Maine)
“Oh yeah” was the first thing I said after taking a sip of this one. IPAs abound these days, as we all know, so when you grab one that jumps out at you as fantastic, you remember it. Mast Landing continues to grow on me with its array of quality offerings from stouts to IPAs. This is hazy and juicy and so easy to drink it’s full-on scary. It seems crazy-talk to refer to a single brew as the perfect IPA, but that declaration rang awfully true as I enjoyed this one on a relaxing late March Saturday afternoon with friends. Cheers!

Featured photo: Blood Orange Wheat by Jack’s Abby Craft Lagers. Photo courtesy of Jeff Mucciarone.

So, apparently, it’s springtime.

The snow is gone. We’ve switched over to daylight saving time. My road is a morass of muddy ruts. The air smells like fresh soil and stale dreams.

I like to think I’m jaded and world-weary, but I’m not immune to spring.

I’ve been giving my wife what passes for a saucy look. I’ve been practicing smiling knowingly and raising one eyebrow, which is much harder than it looks. Every time I think I’ve got it nailed, my wife will ask me if I’m feeling OK.

“What?” I ask. “Don’t I look sexy?”

“More like constipated,” she replies.

In my book, that must mean it’s Cocktail Time.

There are, of course, several cocktails that we associate with springtime — mint juleps, for instance, or creative hipster drinks infused with snap peas, or variations on summer drinks named after flowers, honeysuckle margaritas or hyacinth highballs, maybe.

Personally, I’ve been pretty fond of a Sunshine cocktail lately — a classic made with equal parts white rum, pineapple juice, dry vermouth and hope, with a small amount of grenadine for color and sweetness. It is bracing, not too sweet, and a lovely rosy-orange color. It is thoroughly delightful. And yet….

As much as I like a blisteringly cold Sunshine, as delicious as it is, it doesn’t taste very springish. The flavors all go together well, and it looks lovely and respectable, but it’s restrained and self-contained. It wears a tie and a vest and tips the staff generously but reasonably. It greets you with a firm handshake and asks after your family. It does not dash through the wildflowers, strewing rose petals and singing, “Hey, Nonny, Nonny,” on its way to meet a secret lover. It doesn’t demonstrate enough questionable judgment, in my opinion.

So let’s mess around with a classic cocktail that’s just minding its own business and not hurting anybody.

White rum is a good base for a drink. It doesn’t have a pronounced flavor, which makes it a good starting point for a cocktail that won’t offend anyone — vodka with a passport. (In fact, I made some dynamite banana-infused rum last week with white rum that would — but I digress.) Since we’re looking to put some backbone into our spring cocktail, let’s swap out the white rum for golden rum — not too dark — something caramel-colored that knows who it is. In this case, I’m using Rhum Clement, but anything golden will work.

I’m leaving the dry vermouth as is. It is a solid utility player that can support the rum.

Maybe the biggest change I’m going to make is swapping out the pineapple juice for passionfruit cocktail. We’ve talked about this before; you’ll find it in the juice aisle at the supermarket, probably just out of reach on the top shelf. It’s like pineapple juice, if PJ was perfumy and slightly dangerous-tasting.

Let’s replace the grenadine with homemade strawberry syrup. The strawberry goes well with the passionfruit cocktail and is a little more springy.

I’ll leave the hope as is.

Effulgence Cocktail

(I looked it up in a thesaurus, and it’s a synonym for sunshine. I like the sound of it.)

1½ ounces golden rum

1½ ounces dry vermouth

1½ ounces passionfruit cocktail

½ ounce homemade strawberry syrup (see below)

Combine all ingredients in a shaker half-filled with ice.

Strain into a chilled coupé glass.

Drink while making direct eye contact with a stranger.

This tastes similar to its cousin Sunshine, but with a few striking differences. The Effulgence’s golden rum is firmly in the driver’s seat. It lets you know who you’re dealing with, but it also lets you know that it is a professional and knows what it’s doing. The passionfruit adds a note of exotic devil-may-care vernality. The vermouth and the strawberry are background singers in this very nice spring-like mixed metaphor of a cocktail. Hey, nonny, nonny.

Strawberry syrup

• An undetermined quantity of frozen strawberries (Make as much or as little of this recipe as you like. The frozen berries will give up their juice more willingly than fresh ones; they’ve had their hearts broken by ice crystals.)

• An equal amount (by weight) of sugar

Heat berries and sugar in a small saucepan.

As the berries thaw and start to give up their juice, mash them with a potato masher.

Bring to a boil (to allow the sugar to dissolve completely), then remove from heat.

Cool, then strain into a small bottle and label.

Eat the remaining berry jam left in the strainer on toast or chocolate ice cream.

Featured photo: Effulgence Cocktail. Photo by John Fladd.

I pulled into the parking lot to get my first Covid vaccine.

It was a bit science-fictiony/disaster-movie-y. Everything was being administered by the National Guard, all of whom were masked and wearing a disconcerting amount of mysterious equipment. As I pulled up to the second place in line, a guardsman had me roll down my window and told me, “OK, move up and talk to the Sergeant.” He emphasized the word sergeant, just the slightest bit, to let me know that this was somebody important, and that I’d better be on my best behavior. I was grateful for the warning.

I pulled up one slot, to where the Sergeant was waiting for me with a computer tablet.

He asked to see my identification, then pulled up my file.

Then he paused.

And gave me a Look. A very serious look. He was masked, of course, so I could only see his eyes, but even so, I knew I was under serious appraisal.

The issue, as it turned out, was my paperwork. Clearly, I had been in a goofy mood the previous night when I had filled out my medical forms. Under the category of Ongoing Conditions, I had written, “Chronic Handsomeness.”

After another moment, the Sergeant said, “I share your condition. I know the burden it can put on a man. Let’s get you out of here…,” and waved me into Parking Spot No. 1. It was a tiny moment of bonding.

I got my shot, and the sun came out, and birds and woodland creatures did a little musical number, etc.

But this got me thinking about the quality of handsomeness.

As it turns out, there is a drink dedicated to handsomeness — the Captain Handsome. I would not call it a classic cocktail, but it is not weirdly niche, and obscure, either. It is a fairly complex drink, with a surprising number of ingredients, but pretty simple to actually make.

So I made one. And it was good — one of those drinks that you aren’t really sure about with the first sip, but becoming more and more agreeable with each subsequent taste. It is made with crème de violette, which gives it a really lovely lavender color. It is crisp and floral, and washing the glass with absinthe gives it a strangely alluring hint of — something.

Here’s the issue, though. The Captain Handsome has five or six ingredients (depending on whether you count seltzer as an ingredient) and at least one of them — the crème de violette — requires a trip out of state to get. Absinthe is a bit pricey, and I’m reluctant to ask someone to lay out 30 bucks for the 1/8 of an ounce or so that it would take to rinse a martini glass with it.

So, here’s my thinking: Do any of us need the superhero level of handsomeness implied by the name Captain Handsome? I, for one, would be happy with a Mister Handsome level of alcohol-induced handsomeness.

Mister Handsome

A tiny amount of bourbon – Given the tiny amount you’ll be using, and the number of competing flavors in this cocktail, probably not your best bourbon.

2 ounces gin – I’ve been enjoying Death’s Door, lately.

½ ounce blue curacao – This will not give you the same handsome color as in the original drink, but rest assured it will be handsome.

½ ounce Campari – this will turn the color of the drink from a whimsical, tropical blue to a steely violet. It will also add a slight bitterness to balance out the sweetness from the curacao.

½ ounce fresh squeezed lime juice

5 drops of rose water – Rose water can be tricky stuff. You’re always risking adding one drop too many and making a drink taste grandmothery. In this case, though, be of stout heart. You will need the floweriness to replicate the floral note of the missing crème de violette.

1 to 2 ounces plain seltzer – I like Topo Chico for its intense bubbliness.

(1) Rinse a chilled cocktail glass with bourbon. Swirl it around to coat the inside of the glass, then pour off the excess.

(2) Add the gin, blue curacao, Campari, lime juice and rose water to a shaker, half-filled with ice. Shake thoroughly. If you shatter some of the ice, so much the better. Tiny ice shards really add to the drinkability of this cocktail.

(3) Strain into the prepared cocktail glass, then top with seltzer. (Don’t skip this step. The bubbles add a bracing mouth-feel to this drink, which raises it from a Mister Attractive-Enough-I-Suppose to a full-on Mister Handsome.)

The original Captain Handsome is garnished with a brandied cherry. This version doesn’t need it. Its steely grey color would contrast too much with the whimsy of the cherry.

This reimagined cocktail retains a lot of the mystery and allure of the original. It still has that “do-I-like-it?” quality at the first sip, then a growing amount of pleasure and affection as you work your way down the glass. (Or it works its way down you. Either/or.) The gin gives it an astringent air of authority. There is the barest hint of bourbon in the background, making you feel more like a grown-up as you drink it. There is the slightest kiss of sweetness from the blue curacao, but not enough to even hint that this is some sort of hipster, gimmick drink.

This drink lends itself well to small gatherings — even intimate ones. A sip or two will give you the confidence to make direct eye contact with a guest as you serve them one of their own. “Yes,” your gaze will say, “I know. But I am strong enough to be responsible with this amount of handsomeness. You are in good hands.”

Featured photo: Mister Handsome cocktail. Photo by John Fladd.

I’m finally attacking the intimidatingly large stack of books I’ve bought over the past year and never actually read. One of the most fascinating is Hear Me Talkin’ to Ya: The Story of Jazz as Told By The Men who Made it, by Nat Shapiro and Nat Hentoff (1955, Rinehart and Co.). Leaving its problematic subtitle aside (ahem, Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey and a parade of other unamused female musicians) the most fascinating part of the jazz story so far has been the descriptions of Storyville. Storyville was the celebrated red light district in New Orleans where, legend has it, jazz music was born. In New Orleans tradition, it has become mythologized so much that it has taken on a brassy, tarnished aura of being joyful and exotic. Nowhere more so than in the names of the “sportin’ men” and working girls who lived there: Flamin’ Mamie, Crying Emma, Big Butt Annie, Naked Mouf Mattie, Boxcar Shorty, Titanic, Bull Frog Sonny, Street Rabbit, Three Finger Annie, Charlie Bow Wow, Yard Dog, Knock On The Wall, and Tenderloin Thelma are all intriguing. Each of them deserves a song, an adventure movie, a mystery novel or at least a cocktail dedicated to them.

The two names that jump out at me, though, are Boo Boo and Big Boo Boo.

I don’t know who Boo Boo was. I don’t know how he got his name. I don’t know who Big Boo Boo was, though I like to think of the two of them as partners — Boo Boo being the brains of the operation, and Big Boo Boo lurking in the background, occasionally cracking his knuckles. If we were to make a movie about them, we would learn in one of the last scenes that Big Boo Boo had a beautiful tenor singing voice.

This is all conjecture on my part. For all we know, the Two Boo Boos might have been two women, calling to potential customers from their balconies.

Anyway, here are two drinks to honor them:

Boo Boo Shooter

It makes sense that if we are going to make a pair of drinks dedicated to Boo Boo and Big Boo Boo one of the drinks needs to be little and one needs to be big. This is the little one.

Ingredients:
¼ oz. hibiscus syrup (see below)
1 oz. jalapeño rum (see below)
½ oz. passion fruit juice cocktail (yeah — see below for that, too)
¼ oz. fresh squeezed lime juice
1 (seriously, just one) drop rose water

Add each ingredient to a chilled shot glass or very small juice glass. Drink it.

This is spicy, and sour, and floral. It’s rather delicious, but it hangs around in your mouth and your head for easily 10 minutes after you have drunk it, reminding you of all the exotic places you haven’t visited yet.

Hibiscus syrup: Bring 10 ounces of water and 9 ounces of sugar to a boil and boil it for a few more seconds, until the sugar seems to disappear. Take it off the heat and add ½ ounce of dried hibiscus flowers and 1 ounce of fresh-squeezed lemon juice. Stir, let it sit for half an hour, then strain it into a bottle, and store in your refrigerator. Depending on your hibiscus blossoms, the color will range from an exotic purple to a deep magenta.

Jalapeño rum: Roughly chop 4 or 5 jalapeño peppers, and put them into a large, wide-mouthed jar. Add a bottle of white or silver rum (again, probably not the good stuff; any subtleties of flavor will be completely covered up). Shake twice per day, then strain and bottle after 4 days.

Passion fruit juice cocktail: Find this in the juice aisle at your favorite supermarket.

Big Boo Boo

Yes, this is largely a scaled-up, highball version of the Boo Boo Shooter.

Ingredients:
1 oz. hibiscus syrup
2 oz. jalapeño rum
4 oz. passion fruit cocktai
1 oz. fresh squeezed lime juice
3-4 oz. plain seltzer or soda water (right now I like Topo Chico Mineral Water; it’s aggressively bubbly)
3 drops (again, seriously, only three) rose water

Fill a shaker with ice. Add hibiscus syrup, rum, passion fruit juice, and lime juice.

Shake until very cold

Pour into a large glass filled with ice. Strain it, don’t strain it — this drink does not stand on ceremony.

Add seltzer, and stir gently to combine.

Add rose water.

This drink tastes a lot like its namesake shooter but provides a more protracted experience. After a few sips you may decide that this drink is too spicy, or too sour, or too weird for you. A moment later you will find yourself going back for another taste. Then another.

Eventually you will probably find yourself back in the kitchen, making another, with a confused frown of concentration on your face. Which I think Boo Boo and Big Boo Boo would appreciate.

Featured photo: Big Boo Boo and the Boo Boo Shooter. Photo by John Fladd.