Yeah, I just threw down the damn gauntlet. Vegans be damned, damned to hell. No more canned bean juice in cocktails please. Sorry, I know someone brilliantly called it aquafaba and a ton of people climbed on board this awful train bound for cocktail necropolis. When I see a bartender opening a can of chickpeas and dumping out the smelly, thick liquid inside to use as an alternative to egg white, I have to put the brakes on. Is there suddenly something wrong with egg white? Oh, but it tastes just like egg white! No, actually, and it smells funky because its been sitting in an aluminum can for who knows how long while an egg came out of a chicken’s cloaca somewhat recently. Eggs, fresh. Bean juice, not.

This adds to more things that vegans like that have to resemble something that tastes good. The list has grown over the years. Vegan bacon, vegan sausage, etc. Listen, I have nothing against vegans, per se, except for this constant need to make their fake stuff look like real stuff. Do you see meat eaters saying look at this fake broccoli made out of sausage? Hey, my motto for some time has been do whatever you want in life as long as you’re not harming yourself or others, the problem is, their stuff ends up containing all sort of weird chemicals and shit. Please be vegan, but don’t sell people faux meat products with 86 ingredients when mine only has one–cow, duck, chicken, whatever…

Before you ask, yes I tried an aquafaba cocktail once long ago and instantly felt that familiar barf reflex from dim college days of disorderly binge drinking. Ahem, Goldschlager…How did gold flakes get in my toilet? Gross imagery aside, theres a reason why, when you’re making a fast version of hummus, you drain the juice from the can and then rinse the damn beans. The juice is just nasty stuff.

I am here for you, vegans. Want to make a vegan version of a whiskey sour? You can do it! Theres’ a really cool product out there called methyl cellulose. Although it sounds science fiction, constructed in a New Jersey lab, and ultra chemically it is actually derived from plants. All natural. Yes, cellulose, as in the polysaccharide found in plants. It comes as a powder and works a bit like agar agar which I guess you can also use to make foams? Anyway, I have experience using “meth” for foams and agar agar to clarify juices.

Yes, you can do it. You’ll need a scale, a blender, a stove, a pot, a whisk.

Note: If you want to skip my tutorial you can blast right over to the Thunderbolt Bar Instagram page and look it up in their stories. That’s where I stole the idea.

Anyway. Add 1% methyl cellulose by weight to whatever solution you’re trying to foam up. In most cases you want to do this with a syrup, then add the syrup to your other cocktail ingredients and shake or whip the cocktail. Whipping works better with a cheap $20 ice cream shake thingamabob.

Another note: The syrup you want to meth up is better as a simple syrup to start out and not something flavored or super gooey. Simple syrup is a good medium.

Let’s say you want 1000 grams of your simple syrup. This would be 500 grams water, 500 grams sugar.

You want to split your water into portions of two thirds and one third. I know, a bit annoying. An easier way would be to start with 600 grams and split it 400 and 200. Keep the 400 grams as cold as possible. This would be 6 grams of methyl cellulose. Gently heat the 200 grams and whisk in your meth.

Once it is all incorporated, put the hot meth in your blender on the lowest speed and slowly add the cold water, then slowly add 600 grams of sugar. Allow your blender to incorporate this at the lowest setting for ten minutes. That’s it.

Like I said before, use the syrup as you would in a whiskey sour or whatever, a pisco sour. Works better if you batch it and pre dilute it, then whip it.

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