Halloween means one thing, OK, maybe more that one thing, but one is certainly - Candy! And what is the most popular? Candy Corn.

Invented in the 1880s at the Wunderle Candy Company, candy corn os meant to mimic a whole kernel of corn. Today candy companies produce nearly 35 million pounds of the corn candy each year.

How big is candy corn? So big it needs it’s own day, so as not compete with Halloween. So Candy Corn Day is October 30!

So spot on, one sip of this cocktail might make you forget you aren’t actually eating candy corn…

Candy Corn

1 1/2 oz. Kettle Corn-infused Bombay Sapphire Gin*
1/2 oz. Moscato wine (sweet dessert wine)
3/4 oz. home-made citrus peel grenadine syrup**

Add all ingredients to a cocktail shaker with ice and shake very well.  Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
Garnish: 3 candy corns

*to make Kettle Corn-infused Bombay Sapphire: for every 750ml bottle of Bombay Sapphire, add in 1 cup kettle corn and allow to infused in an airtight container for approx. 24 hrs.  Fine strain kettle corn and re-bottle.  Store in fridge.

**to make grenadine syrup: for every 1 cup of POM wonderful pomegranate juice, dissolve 1 cup granulated sugar over stove top.  Once dissolved, add in the skins of 1 orange and 1 lemon and simmer for 10 mins.  Remove skins and chill syrup.

more Halloween Cocktails and Punches
Recipe created by Jonathan Pogash, Cocktail Guru
Recipe & photo courtesy Bombay Sapphire Gin

Related articles

• Halloween Cocktails from Skyy Infusions (drinkoftheweek.com)
• Spider’s Kiss (drinkoftheweek.com)
• Vampire Ritual (drinkoftheweek.com)

Mixology Monday time again. We are hosted this month by Vidiot at Cocktailians who choose Vermouth as our theme. This includes sweet (Italian) or dry (French) vermouth, quinquina, aperitif wines, or any fortified, aromatized wine such as Lillet or Dubonnet.

With Halloween upon us I figured I could scare up something. I decided to go with this classic 1920s cocktail “Satan’s Whiskers” a gin cocktail sportinig both dry and sweet vermouth, orange juice, Grand Marnier and Orange Bitters. It can be made with blood orange juice if you wish to serve it blood-red rather than pumpkin-orange for your Halloween party.

Satan’s Whiskers

½ oz. gin
½ oz. dry vermouth
½ oz. sweet vermouth
½ oz. freshly squeezed orange juice
½ oz. Grand Marnier
1 dash orange bitters

Stir with ice, then strain into a stemmed cocktail glass. Garnish with orange twist.

Mixology Monday XLIII
more Halloween Cocktails and Punches

Related articles

• Halloween Cocktails from Skyy Infusions
• Vampire Ritual

What’s a Halloween party without the blood? Here’s a blood-red Halloween cocktail for your dark rituals.

Don’t be frightened by the inclusion of beets. They’re a great dye and impart only a very mild sweet and earthy taste to the drink.

Vampire Ritual

1 1/2 to 2 oz. gin
1/2 oz. triple sec
1 1/2 oz. blueberry-beet syrup (recipe below)
10-15 blueberries
3/4 oz. lemon juice

Muddle blueberries and syrup together, then pour mixture and all other ingredients into cocktail shaker with ice. Shake vigorously and strain into martini glass. For garnish, use a lemon slice colored with beets.

For syrup: Boil equal parts water and sugar along with several slices of raw beet and small handful of blueberries. Strain out solids and let liquid cool before use.

More Halloween cocktail recipes

Finally! Season 3 of “Mad Men” premieres August 16. And it’s just not “Mad Men” without booze.

Who can forget when Sally Draper mixed a Tom Collins for the grown-ups? Or when Don Draper wooed Rachel Menken with one of the prettiest Mai Tais I’ve ever seen? And of course there was Freddy Rumson’s … incident in the office after one Screwdriver too many.

So what better way to celebrate the start of this new season than with a 1960s Mad Men cocktail party!

Here are a few cocktails we’ve seen characters order, plus some additional suggestions appropriate for the era.

Old Fashioned (Don Draper)

1 sugar cube
1 dash bitters
1 tsp. water
2 oz. rye whiskey

Muddle the sugar cube, bitters and water in an old-fashioned glass. Add rye and stir. Add ice plus a twist of lemon peel. (Don’t leave the peel in the glass) Garnish with an orange slice.

Vodka Gimlet (Betty Draper)

1 oz. lime juice
1 tsp. simple syrup
1.5 oz. vodka

Shake with ice then strain into a cocktail glass.

Gibson (Roger Sterling)

2.5 oz. gin
1/2 oz. dry vermouth

Stir with ice, then strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a cocktail onion.

Brandy Alexander (Peggy Olson)

1/2 oz. Creme de Cacao
1/2 oz. brandy
1/2 oz. heavy cream

Shake with ice and strain into cocktail glass.

Other 1960s cocktails:

Greyhound
Moscow Mule
Bloody Mary
Negroni

Related articles by Zemanta

• Mad Men and Drinking, Season Two, Part I (offthepresses.blogspot.com)
• 12 of My Favorite Mad Men Quotes (slideshare.net)
• countdown to season 3: mad men (popbytes.com)

Our new friends at Nirvino have been filming San Francisco’s best barterteder’s making some incredible cocktails. In this episode, Danny Louie shows us how to make his cool summer creation, the Peony. This refreshing cocktail combines gin, coconut milk, flower water, chili and an easy to make hibiscus masala nectar.

get the whole recipe at nirvino
Dosa - SF

The first session I attended during last week’s Tales of the Cocktail in New Orleans was a panel titled “2009 Big Trends in Cocktail & Spirit Service”. The panel consisted of Jim Meehan - PDT, NYC, Michael Waterhouse, Devlin Tavern, NYC, and Simon Difford - Source Guide and was moderated by Ryan Magarian - Aviation Gin. The program covered the 4 Ps of Cocktail Service Success, not unlike the 4 Ps of marketing, Product, Precise Execution, Promotion, Passion. It was here that I discover the magic of Tales of the Cocktail, this was no boring seminar and they were serving drinks! A few samples of the cocktail being discussed. Sure is was 10:30 am , but this was New Orleans.

The Panel started off with a discussion product trends.

Spirits
Overall the trend is for full-flavored spirits, moving away from the vodka craze of late. Mezcal, Gin (the new vodka?) and Rye Whiskey are at the forefront of the full-flavored Renaissance. In addition, aged rum is exploding and Jameson sales are through the roof. Cacacha is also making huge strides from just a few years ago.

Sweet
Fortified wines like Sherry, Lillet and vermouth are popular ingredients in cocktails, as well are rice wines sake and shochu. St. Germain elderflower liqueur appears on just about every cocktail menu, and other flower based liqueurs are popping up. Other trending sweeteners include specialty sugars, Agave nectar, Maple syrup and orgeat.

(more…)

Nothing like a cool cocktail to help you chill out during the summer heat.

This fruity and refreshing cocktail, created by Beefeater London Dry Gin, is a great way to celebrate the season. Cheers!

Summer Gin Punch

2 parts gin
1/2 part maraschino liqueur
1/2 part water
1/4 part Gomme syrup
1/4 part fresh lemon juice
1/2 part fresh orange juice
1 lemon twist
1 orange twist
2 fresh raspberries
2 chunks of diced pineapple
1 part soda

Build all ingredients in a mixing glass over ice, then transfer contents into a punch cup.

More gin cocktails
Beefeater 24 gin
Photo courtesy of Beefeater Gin