Copenhagen Stick

The moment I saw that pineapple was the theme for this edition of Mixology Monday I knew I wanted to work with a childhood summer treat: Københavnerstang. (Literally meaning: Copenhagen Stick)

Bartending Notes challenges us with the mighty pineapple and even made us a sweet little pineapple MxMo-logo:



The idea is to: "...bring the king of fruits back! After being canned, mixed with all sorts of sugary liquids and blended into… some 80s dreadful cocktails, the pineapple needs more respect! Once a symbol of hospitality, the King of Fruits might be know misunderstood. One of the greatest non-citrus souring agents, used for crazy garnish ideas, infusions, old gum syrup flavoring, the pineapple is a fruit to be reckoned. Be in a tiki cocktails, an old school classic like the Algonquin, a crazy flavor pairing or just mixed in a delicious Verdita, get creative and make a cocktail using any part of this delicious, juicy fruit or share you favorite pineapple cocktail with us!"

Since sometimes in the 50's the major ice cream company in Denmark have produced an ice cream lolly with a center of vanilla ice cream center and then a thin layer of pineapple sorbet on the outside. The wrapper is decorated with drawing from Copenhagen and Tivoli - the amusementpark in the city center all befitting the name Københavnerstang.

There is nothing gourmet or New Nordic about it - it's most likely made from margarine, fake vanilla and artificial pineapple, but I've always liked it.

In other to recreate it in a glass I had to decide on a base spirit. I do believe Danish bars since back in the 80'ies have made one with vodka and overly sweet pineapple juice. But that's not what I wanted.

So I decided to go with Del Maguey's Crème de Mezcal, it has a little smoke from the mezcal and added sweetness, the vanilla I introduced by way of Galliano and then I mixed a little lemon juice into the pineapple juice to balance out all the sweetess. It workes well and would make a lovely summer dessert cocktail.

• 4,5 cl Creme de Mezcal
• 6 cl pineapple juice (I just put chunks of a pineapple in food processor and strained the juice of)
• 2 cl Galliano
• 1,5 cl lemon juice

Measure everything into a shaker, add ice and shake well. The pineapple juice will give you cocktail a lovely head of white foam.

And then since I couldn't find a place close by selling the original ice cream lolly (it's mostly enjoyed by old folks like me) I crochet one as a garnish. (jump past photo for instructions:)


Round 1: Using yellow cotton yarn sc 6 in magic ring (6)
Round 2: 2 scs in each st around (12)
Round 3 : * sc in next st , 2 scs in next st *. Repeat from * around (18)
Round 4: * sc in next 2 sts , 2 scs in next st * . Repeat from * around (24)
Round 5-Round 8: sc  in each st around
Round 9-Round 10: sc in each st around using off white cotton yarn

Spring has Sprung - MxMo

The theme for this month's Mixology Monday is a great one. Craig of A World of Drinks wants us to work with preserves. Or as he writes in his annoncement post:

The aim of the challenge is to go back to the days of the preserve, pick an ingredient, seasonal or not and treat it as if you won’t be seeing it again for quite some time. Syrups, sorbets, jam, shrubs and the like are all fair game, anything that will preserve the integral character of your favourite ingredient.

My absolutely only problem with it, is that there are very few fresh ingredients in this part of the world worth preserving at this time of year. However I did manage to lay my hands on three stalks of early and costly rhubarbs.

I've done quite a bit of mixing with rhubarb previously, like Rhubarb Rum Fizz, Balmy Rhubarb and Rhubarb Club but I realized I had never mixed it with aquavit.

So I started out by chopping the rhubarbs into pieces and adding them to a pan with some lemon juice, ground cardamom, whole black peppercorns, brown sugar, water and some vanilla.

The vanilla was what was available after turning a pod into a vanilla straw using this method from a video, I can't find anymore.

Once the rhubarb cordial was cooked, passed through a sieve and cooled off I was ready to mix:

• 6 cl aquavit - I used Brøndum which is not that heavy on caraway but it's there
• 1 cl Galliano 
• 10 cl rhubarb cordial

Shake the ingredients over ice and then strain the cocktail into a double old fashioned glass over a huge ice cube. Serve with a natural vanilla straw.

Harvey Bonghead

This morning I took a catch up tour on Small Screen Networks many lovely presentations and I came across Jamie Boudreau's video How to Smoke a Cocktail that I have somehow missed previously. 

Also as I had found one of the most intriguing entries to the latest Mixology Monday was Feu de Vie's Wind Whisperer I figured the cocktails gods were trying to tell me something: Get smoking

I settled on building something from bourbon, rum, Galliano, lemon, rose tincture and burning Earl Gray tea.

As a gear junkie my first impulse was to buy a smoke gun, but I took a cue from Kate's solution and my bank manager thanks you for that.

So method was mostly inspired by Kate and drink mostly from Jamie Boudreau and the name is thanks to expert marketing of the Galliano company.

First set up your cocktail ready to shake:

• 4 cl bourbon - I used Bulleit
• 4 cl rum - not too sweet I used Barbancourt 3 star
• 1,5 cl Galliano
• 1,5 cl lemon juice
• 5 drops rose tincture

Next find a way to burn some Early Gray tea leaves and collect the smoke. Not knowing what to expect smoking and smell wise I set it up on my little grill: A piece of aluminum foil shaped into a little tray, a broken wooden chopstick on two sides of a small pile of Earl Gray tea leaves, an upside down funnel to direct the smoke into an inverted glass bottle.

It worked well and once I had a bottle full of smoke, I corked it and brought it into my kitchen where I gave the cocktail a good shake with ice and strained it into the smoke bottle before pouring it into a coupe and garnishing with a pretty flower. I figured bongheads were into flowers back in the day, weren't they? I can't remember.
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