Might I suggest you check out the whole set: www.flickr.com/photos/50728681@N06/sets/72157626097659244… and click on that slide show icon up there and just let the images slide by as you sip a cocktail? One with a dash of bitters, perhaps?
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Color, color, color and flavor, flavor, flavor! I made a batch of bitters last year, making up the recipe as I went along, and it turned out heavenly. A few drops of the finished product in a cocktail, a soda, a glass of juice, or even water, and the beverage is transformed into something wonderful and complex.
The trick, I think, is to layer flavors.
I’m not replicating last year’s recipe exactly, but so far I have put in:
fresh lavender
fresh ginger
fresh rose-scented geranium
mace
anise
star aniseed
cloves
allspice
cardamom
cinnamon
vanilla bean
fennel seed
juniper berries
and
dried elderberries.
The base is vodka. I’m using Tanquerey vodka because it’s a nice neutral platform. It is the stuff they use to make their gin.
Eventually I will get around to topping off the vodka and putting in some citrus peel. In about six months, this should be magical.
Shooting it, I was delighted to see how quickly the elderberries were releasing pigment into the solution. I was lucky to have some cloves still on the stem and some mace that was not ground
The Ball jar holds a gallon. It was water spotted. I was going to get some vinegar and clean that off, but decided it added a nice texture.
I popped the jar in a sunny window and started shooting. Held my little camera inside the jar at one point. The colors and textures made me very happy, as did the light and the distortions.
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And I have to add the science note here. ALL of these flavors are wartime biotechnology. They evolved as the plant kingdom’s weapons in their war against the insects who preyed upon them. But, like they do to the insecticides that humans use, the insects simply evolved to have tolerance for toxins.
So all these gorgeous flavorful aromatics? This is war!
This is an arms race, a delicious, delicious arms race.
Posted by Ellen Bulger on 2011-02-20 22:41:05
Tagged: , herbs , spices , flavorings , bitters , aromatics , infusion , lavender , rose-scented geranium , cloves , cinnamon , cardamom , ginger , fennel , star aniseed , anise , juniper berries , elderberries , mace
