You can’t deny the greats: The White Russian, Egg Nog, Mudslide, Ramos Gin Fizz, Brandy Alexander, oh and let’s not forget clarified milk punch. Yeah, dairy. What is it about dairy that keeps us coming back for more? Where would we be without it? A sad life without cheese and butter. A long list of pastries from the croissant to the brioche bun. No Alfredo sauce. Dry cereal. Pizza and burgers without cheese may as well be just dough. No cream in the coffee. Yes, that morning java which keeps the world turning would be in a strange place without that odd white juice.

And why, you ask, is it so good? Well, it’s nutritious, packs a lot of protein, but it’s more than that. It’s sweet, acidic, and silky all at the same time. It’s one ingredient is itself. Yes, it’s also heavily processed and there’s an entire industry out there surrounding this oh so common liquid that may be a little bit shady and not so good.

What happens when you mix dairy and citrus? Bad things. Really bad things. Total trainwreck. Curdle time. Curdle. What an awful word. Up there with moist and phlegm. Unless you want a drink with ricotta cheese in it (maybe you do), you want to keep these two apart in most circumstances. They’re like the two best friends in math class the teacher has to keep separate.

Here’s a fact: milk is an emulsification. Water, fat, and different types of protein (whey, casein), some other shit like lactose, vitamins, minerals, yada yada. The ph hovers around 6.7-6.9 whereas the ph of your common lemon juice is 3.5. Add the two together and boom, the casein proteins all stick together forming a chunky mass and the whey protein decides to stay by itself. Separation. It looks gross but how do you think most cheese is made, dumb dumb? Or your über processed dehydrated whey protein powder?

Anyway, the big secret here to make your drink taste better is the whey part. It adds a silkiness and creaminess as well as a nice acidity. Texture. Body. Flavor. And some sugar and booze and then a little citrus and you’re good to go. Over at the bar lately we’ve been obsessed with it. Mostly a clarified calpico recipe put out there by the one and only Nico de Soto that we tweaked a bit.

Calpico, if you don’t know, is Japanese in origin. A sparkling, citrusy, yogurt beverage. A lot of bartenders are putting it into cocktails as of late. They call it Calpis over in the land of the rising sun (pronounced Karupiso) but it had to be renamed over here because I suspect Calpis sounds too much like Cow Piss. The true name, of course, has deeper meaning. Cal for calcium and Pis for the sanskrit “salpis” one of the five tastes described in Buddhism. Hey, pay attention, you’re learning something here.

Our own experience with Cow Piss is surrounded by pure coincidence. Angel had some calpico drink out in Koreatown, quite possibly the soju-calpico duo they serve at Dan Sung Sa, and he started ruminating and obsessing about it. Within days, Nico de Soto put up a post with his recipe and voila, off to the races.

At any rate, here’s the recipe we’re using now:

4 cups Buttermilk

1 cup Leftover OJ

5 grams Malic Acid

8 grams Citric Acid

The citric and malic part comes straight from the citrus adjustment section of Liquid Intelligence. The basic clarified buttermilk from Nico de Soto’s instagram page. All we did was combine the two.

Put just the buttermilk in a pan and heat at 180 degrees Fahrenheit until you see curds form. It takes just a couple of minutes. While this is going on, combine the OJ and the citric and malic acid. Once the buttermilk breaks, turn off the heat and add the other ingredients which also help to cool everything down a tad while the sort of hot buttermilk also helps to incorporate the powders. One hand washes the other here.

Pass it all through double cheesecloth lining a chinois and then pass it through again. The result is a tangy clarified yogurt. To this we add a syrup, any old syrup, in a 2:1 ratio. So two parts “calpico” to one part syrup by weight. Any type of citrus sherbet also works quite well.

What happens next we call the “Beelebubba” spec named after Angel’s first drink he made with the “calpico.” Why Beelzebubba? Do you not remember the album by the Dead Milkmen? Try to keep up.

Beelzebubba

.25 oz. Fresh Lemon or Lime Juice

.25 oz. Lemon or Lime Sherbet

.25 oz. Any Simple Syrup

.75 oz. Clarified Calpico

2 oz. Booze

That’s really it. You can add bitters, etc. It works too well.