Results tagged “drinking”

When life gives you beer cartons, make beer carton libraries.

Bostonist had heard all sorts of things blamed for the shortage of this cocktail staple: bottling mishaps, distribution issues, politics, and, shaking a fist in the direction of Brooklyn, the recent fad of formulating beverages that contain whole ounces of bitters per serving.

The Archdiocese of Boston urges Catholics to hold off on the consecrated wine, lest they catch transubstantiated swine flu.

A British study says kids should learn to drink with their parents, because moderate alcohol consumption in a family setting involves less "regretted sex." [BBC]

              

Gin distiller Desmond Payne is responsible for Beefeater and its fancy new offspring Beefeater 24. How told us how tea got in his gin, confesses a love of the Negroni, and makes us want "Monday Gin."

The first time this Bostonist saw Joe Sent Me it was winter. It looked like just another bar from the outside, pubby and cave-like in the winter snow. At the time we were worried about being cold and were doing much of our drinking inside our own house to avoid having to interact too heavily with outside’s frigid temperatures and piles of snow. However, a couple of weeks ago Joe Sent Me located on Main Street in Waltham got another look. Always on the lookout for any restaurant with outdoor seating to take advantage of the brief months of lovely Boston weather, we noticed a chalk board outside of Joe Sent Me proclaiming in bright red letters Patio Open. Immediately intrigued we vowed to try it before the climate turned south again. Well, we did just that last week with a friend for a late lunch.

Legal Sea Foods, the Boston-based chain restaurant, never gets much love in the snobby circles of Boston's food cognoscenti, so this might come as terrible news to them. Patrick Sullivan, the mastermind behind the B-Side Lounge and one of the prime movers behind Boston's classic cocktail revival, has been hired to oversee Legal's cocktail menu. He's starting at the new Legal Harborside, but we hope that his cocktail menu will filter down to Legal's Test Kitchen, our favorite guilty pleasure during the inevitable flight delays at Logan Airport. [Grub Street]

            

At the dawn of mixology, genever wasn’t just “Holland gin,” un-dried and un-Londoned, but simply “gin.” Its resurgence is, thus, a boon to the cocktail history nerd, the moustache-rocking bartender, and the lay drinker who enjoys the fruits of the former’s labors.

"And I'm proooud to be a Red Sox fan, where at least I know people will cheer me on for doing something absolutely foul..." Sung to the tune of "Proud to Be an American." You might have to run that last part together a little bit. Sock-drinking is optional. [via Red Sox Monster]

Last night, the mixologists at Drink (348 Congress St., in Fort Point) composed an ode to the late Michael Jackson in the form of a punch. Lemon Hart 151, Batavia arrack, Coke (they didn't have Pepsi on hand, John Gertsen told us), lime, and sugar* were combined and set on fire to make the Jackson 5. The name of the beverage played on the etymology of the word "punch," allegedly the half-English bastard of the Hindi word for "five."

   

On May 17, 2004, marriage licenses were granted to same-sex couples in Massachusetts for the first time. Though a few johnny-come-latelys have followed suit, civilization has yet to collapse (global financial crises notwithstanding). Bostonist would like to propose a toast. Or several.

Hey there Upper East Siders (and the rest of you): need an excuse to dress in prep school gear and get liquored up to the sweet strains of Blair Waldorf screeching at Deroda? What a coincidence--we have just the event for you!

    

The bartenders at Drink, in South Boston, are friendly enough that they have indulged, on several occasions, Bostonist and our entourage when we posed a series of "garnish challenges," wholly unreasonable demands to match a cocktail to something outlandish or much less classy than their usual Luxardo cherries or Cynar ice cubes. Circus Peanuts or beef jerky, for example.

Free!

In Boston on Saturday the 14th unless otherwise noted:

7pm

Daniel Lanigan, owner of Amherst beer haven the Moan and Dove, announced yesterday that he has bought the B-Side Lounge in Cambridge and will be reopening it soon. He adds that "the bar will continue to have a fantastic cocktail list [and] I will also try to add a world class beer list." The B-Side announced its bankruptcy in December after closing in November. The B-Side is widely considered to be Patient Zero in the epidemic of expensive, classic cocktails in the Boston drinking scene.

Last weekend at the ever-popular South Boston watering hole Drink, Bostonist had a cocktail that made us feel like we could see Marlon Brando. And he was our dad.

To go with your $100 sandwich, the robots with tits at Svedka present the 700 Billion Dollar Martini:

Bostonist doesn't have the clearest idea of our readership, but we do imagine that there are a few of you who wait for the last minute to make important decisions. And, if you are like us, you have one more important decision to make before the year ends: which sparkling wine to uncork at midnight tonight.

In 1918, William Jennings Bryan predicted that "ten years from now, hundreds of thousands of men who voted against us and struggled to keep the saloon, will go down on their knees and thank God they were overwhelmed at the ballot-box and this temptation far removed from them."

Friday, November 21, 7-11 pm, $45

This is the weekend of "The Game," which guarantees that the bars of Cambridge will be clogged with "Teh Douche." Bostonist is researching the thematically-correct home-drinking alternatives:

7pm, 21+, $10 (no advance tickets, and there's always a line)

       

This Bostonist owns many a compact, black and white volume of cocktail recipes, with small type and bare diagrams. Mixologist, booze consultant, and Museum of the American Cocktail founder Dale DeGroff's new book is, by contrast, a large, typographically lush (and generally lush) book of cocktail recipes with near-pornographic photography of perfect drinks, shivering in their garnishes. The Essential Cocktail is lovely, and, if we learned anything from its launch party at Drink on Monday night, you should take its commands seriously, including its injunction to flame those orange peels.

In the annals of mixology, one of Boston's best-known contributions to the recipe books is our very own traditional beverage of traditional election fraud: the Ward Eight. Created by some clever bartender at Locke-Ober, it was used to toast the victory of Martin Lomasney, a Democrat known as the "Boston Mahatma," in his 1898 state senate run, the night before the election.

LUPEC Boston, the local chapter of that august sisterhood Ladies United for the Preservation of Endangered Cocktails, celebrates the second edition of their Little Black Book of Cocktails tonight at Grand. (Further details here—there will be punch!) The book features Matt Demers's photography, which makes Boston's most attractive bartenders and cocktail enthusiasts look like Louise Brooks, pearls and all. The book's proceeds will benefit the New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans’ Women’s Unit.

$40-$50 (tickets for session two sold out)

Apparently Absolut is too expensive--folks in Sandwich have been stocking up on vanilla extract in efforts to get drunk, and even chugging it in the store. In response, Stop and Shop has pulled vanilla extract from its shelves and put it behind the counter. We never thought we'd see the day. What's next, locking up Listerine?