Spice – The Nice and The Not-So-Nice

Posted on July 12, 2009
Filed Under Guest Blogger | 1 Comment

Kara Newman is a New York-based writer and author of Spice and Ice: 60 Tongue-Tingling Cocktails, to be published by Chronicle Books in November 2009.

“Ever heard of a ‘death bucket’?” asked Brooks Reitz, one of the fabulous Cocktail Apprentices here at Tales of the Cocktail.

Apparently, it’s the brainchild of Johnny Iuzzini and some of the other molecular mad scientists, who have found a way to extract the heat of habanero peppers, leaving behind the pesky skin, flesh, seeds, and flavor. Just a big bucketful of pure searing heat, aka the “death bucket.”

And Corey Bunnewith, another talented Apprentice, was brazen enough to sample from the bucket in the Tales production kitchen. “I just dipped the tip of my pinky in, and tasted that,” he confided, “and I was still hopping up and down, it was insanely hot!”

Yes, this is the kind of insanity going on behind the scenes here at Tales.

Last year, we had just a handful of crazy-spicy-hot cocktails; this year, they seem to be everywhere, some nice, some not so much. Mixologists are painting bold pictures with broad strokes. At last night’s cocktail competition, NOLA’s Ricky Gomez whipped up a drink called “The Pinch Hitter,” a Tabasco-spiked pina-colada-and-Scotch mixture, described as a drink that “will hit you in the nuts.” (Easy there, big fella, even spicy drinks are meant to be enjoyable).

Another big, bold, buzz-worthy drink was Alex Valez’s “Caesar Valez,” made with anchovy dust, “Parmesan air,” and garlic water. I wasn’t at the seminar where this one was made, so I can’t say for sure where it fits in on the spice or the deliciousness scale.

And wayyyy on the other end of the spectrum, at the Christmas in July seminar, one of my favorite drinks so far was served up by Chesterfield from Mount Gay rum – an ever-so-gently spiced “Southern Christmas Punch.” The Barbados-style egg nog was made with Mt. Gay Extra Old rum, cream of coconut, condensed milk, almond essence, and a good dose of cinnamon and fresh clove. Lovely, drinkable, and a far cry from the “death bucket” experience.