Creme de Noyaux Revisited
We saved a lot of pits over the last few months. My lord. There’s a lot of noyaux over here. I’m not exaggerating. We’ve got a couple gallons and we have three different types–cherry, peach, and plum. The verdict here is that the result of doing something so mind blowingly simple and having it produce…
Recent photos
-
The Building: Part Two
I’ve been writing about this building a bit because I’ve been a bit uninspired as of late working behind the bar. I maintain a daily writing regimen but am starting to veer a bit toward a book I’ve been planning for the last six months entitled Nocturama about a man (who suffers from voyeurism, ha)…
-
The Building: Part One
The building was located on Rossmore Avenue, at the northern edge of Hancock Park on a long, sweeping, busy block before it became Vine Street where it hit a crossroads at Melrose and the neighborhood took a hard turn away from the grimly lit tall apartment buildings and quickly shrank back to reveal drab strip…
-
Post Service: 10.8.23
Awake. No milk in the fridge. Sister in law on the couch. Squeezing my hands to pump out the fatigue. Are you supposed to wake up tired? Did this happen to our ancestors? Slight inflammation possibly from bread maybe just from gripping tins and shaking over a hundred drinks while under pressure. A short staffed…
-
New Cocktail: Cholo Shogun (2.0)
This cocktail started out almost entirely with scrap/larder ingredients from the booze closet. Some aji infused tequila, kumquat liqueur, and this really odd tequila we soaked in the leftovers from making kumquat shrub. The kumquat stuff still provided that odd numbing quality akin to grapefruit oil and was amped up a bit by the sichuan…
-
What Exactly is a Dragon Fruit?
Upon first glance, another alien. This one native to Central America where they call it pitaya. Super delish. Very juicy and the heavily edible tiny black seeds give a nice bit of crunch. I grew up picking berries in the early summer and apples in the fall, never in my wildest dreams (or nightmares) could…
-
Passionfruit!
This strange little thing, the common passionfruit. If you look at the above cross section you see a small spoonful of what it’s known for, the yellow, fragrant and tangy seed rich jewels surrounded by a bit of bitter, white pith and a protective purple shell. It’s more alien egg than fruit, right? An odd…
-
New Cocktail: The Third Martinez
All of a sudden we’ve got more passionfruit scraps than we know what to do with. We make the vermouth, but it’s a little edgy, so the way to round it out a bit is a less edgy gin. We use Barr Hill because it’s oh so soft. It’s one of the only gins you…
-
Weird Fruit of the Week: White “Sapote”
I bought a bunch of these for Angel last week and they finally ripened. They’re weird and less of a pain in the ass than the dreaded but delicious cherimoya and they also have this weird quality that make you sort of slightly groggy, a little sleepy, a bit like red wine or hearing someone…
-
My First Cocktail: Master Blaster
Before I started at Rustic my foray into the annals of cocktaildom was confined to a few good classics like the Salty Dog (gin), a dry gin martini, a Tom Collins, and every so often, a really shitty Cosmopolitan. Forget even something as simple and delicious as an old fashioned. The places I worked still…
-
New Cocktail: Morning Bell
Our apartment building exists within the borders of three very different neighborhoods. Hancock Park to the south, Hollywood to the north, and Larchmont to the southeast. One of my favorite things to do is wake up early and go walk to buy a coffee. I have many options here, especially toward Larchmont where there’s at…
-
Hey, Habanada!
If you’re like me, you like, no love, the flavor of the habanero, but the burn can be a little too much for your Northeasternly suburb rooted sensibilities. Yeah, I look forward to the singe, the blaze, the smolder, the lips afire, but something really happens to my white bread physiognomy when I go too…
The Aging Bartender 