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Happy Hour: Sparkling Pomegranate Elderflower Cocktail
There's no better way to get in the spirit of the season than by pouring a fizzy and festive cocktail like this sparkling pomegranate-elderflower concoction. It's blushing color is reminiscent of Fall sunsets and falling leaves, while the effervescent texture screams holiday.
The elderflower adds a hint of syrupy sweetness that's not cloying or overly floral.
Happy Hour: The Normandy
Over the weekend, something monumental happened: I discovered what is quite possibly the world's most perfect Fall cocktail. The Normandy, as it's called, has cool weather written all over it, with ingredients like cranberries, green apples, and Calvados, a type of French apple brandy from — you guessed it — Normandy.
The tipple balances all the elements you'd ever hope for in a drink.
Happy Hour: Sage Sangria
Just because Summer is long gone but that doesn't mean you have to stop enjoying sangria. Depending on the ingredients you employ, the wine-based punch can be sipped all year round. Instead of using a warm-weather fruit like peaches, this sangria is infused with Fall's most woody herb, sage.
Happy Hour: Buffalo Bill's Pumpkin Ale
These days, my street isn't the only thing covered with pumpkins; so is my kitchen. I've been using the gourds in everything from moist pumpkin bread to chicken pumpkin stew, and so I decided it was high time I enjoyed it in ale form, too. Although it's believed early American icons like George Washington and Ben Franklin enjoyed pumpkin ales, one Bay Area craft brewhouse, Buffalo Bill's, brought the beer back into vogue when it became known for its special blend in the 1980s.The whisky-colored amber ale ($7.99 for six), which is brewed with fresh roasted pumpkins and malted barley, possesses only a delicate squash flavor, but has lingering pumpkin pie spices like cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg that become more prominent as the beer warms.
Happy Hour: Eyeball Highball
All month I've been fixated on trying my hand at as many spirited Halloween cocktails as possible. And with only five more days until the scariest night of the year, I wanted to shake up something that was more frighteningly festive than anything else I've made.
I was going for something creepier than my slime rickey, but not as gross as the infamous brain hemorrhage.
Happy Hour: Quinta da Aveleda Vinho Verde 2008
If you've never tried Portugal's most famous white, Vinho Verde, I suggest you sample Quinta da Aveleda's 2008 Vinho Verde. Literally translated, Vinho Verde means "green wine," but the name doesn't refer to the grapes, rather the fact that the wine is consumed young.
Voted one of Wine & Spirits top 100 wines of 2009, the Quinta da Aveleda is a lush slightly effervescent white that has a pale amber color and crisp finish.
Happy Hour: Jade Cocktail
Last week's candy corn cordial and slime rickey were such a playful way to get in the spirit of Halloween that I couldn't wait to continue on with the fun.
This drink's day-glo-green hue hints at just the right amount of macabre without being too kitschy. It's also a last relic of the now-defunct Jade Bar, formerly one of my favorite haunts in San Francisco.
Happy Hour: Whiskey Sour
It's Whiskey Week here in San Francisco and to invite you along for the fun, I thought I'd share an easy and classic cocktail, the whiskey sour. According to Dale Degroff in The Essential Cocktail, the standard recipe is a combination of spirit, egg white, simple syrup, and lemon juice. The recipe I like jazzes it up by throwing in a small amount of orange juice.
Happy Hour: Codorníu Sparkling Pinot Noir Rosé
My favorite dance scene from the 1963 Ann Margret musical Bye Bye Birdie is entitled "Lot of Livin to Do." In it, she sings of "drinking Champagne as if it were water." But, not just any Champagne — pink Champagne.
Happy Hour: Slime Rickey
After tossing back a few of PartySugar's Candy Corn Cordials last weekend, I was ready to get into the spirit of the holiday with a chilling concoction of my own. A slime rickey isn't just a wordy play on the classic lime rickey of gin, lime juice, and club soda — it's also softened with the sweetness of simple syrup and eerily bobbing frozen grapes. The beverage is so easy to drink that the pitcher I made was gone in under an hour!
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