Tag: Cranberry

The Red Signal Cocktail

The Red Signal Cocktail came about by a bit of an accident.   I recently tried to make a cocktail called the Seamist.  Except, I could not get some of the ingredients so I had to improvise.  The finished version looked beautiful and tasted lovely.  It is the exact sweet/sour fruity taste that I love in a cocktail plus a tinge of dryness from the cranberry and a touch of bitterness from the grapefruit.

But there was something about it that was not right.  And it bugged me for days on end.  It tasted great, it looked beautiful.  So what was wrong with it?

Seamist 1

She Comes in Colours Everywhere

Let’s digress for a moment.  As a child, I was OBSESSED with paint charts.  I have already mentioned that I was a weird only child.  But I don’t think I have mentioned that my parents would quite often spend their weekends going to display homes and DIY stores and inevitably during these excursions, I would pick up a paint chart (or two).  I would then try to memorise all the names and the matching colours. And then get them to test me on the way home.  Or during the week.  Yes.  School wasn’t enough.  I wanted to be tested on random things outside of school as well.

For a while there I wanted to be the person who named those colours.  Actually, you know what?  I still do want that job!  So, believe me when I say that I know my Paris Creek (pale slate green grey) from my Camisole Quarter (pale pink) to my Shampoo (mid Blue).

I. Know. My. Colours.

And the colour of this cocktail is not a Seamist.  No wonder I felt in my deepest soul that there was something wrong with it!

Seamist is a pale grey green with a tiny touch of blue.

And I think we can all agree that this cocktail is possibly the very opposite colour of a greeny-grey.

Seamist 2

So, the name of Seamist had to go.  Life is hard enough at the moment without having additional cognitive dissonance caused by the colour of a cocktail!  And because I had played around with the ingredients, it wasn’t a true Seamist anyway.

So, then the dilemma became what to call it.

The Red Signal

Luckily, for all of us, I happen to be reading The Hounds of Death.  This is a book of short stories by Agatha Christie where each story has a spooky or supernatural twist.  I am still undecided on what to do with the volumes of Agatha Christie’s short stories.  When I started the Dining With The Dame series, I only ever considered her novels.  And believe me, it’s hard enough to find food references to blog in some of the novels, let alone something a tenth of the size!

But,  lo and behold, in that collection,  there is a story called The Red Signal.

Is a tale of

  • Premonitions and intuitions
  • Seances
  • Falling  in love with the wrong person
  • Madness and murder
  • And a weird sixth sense called The Red Signal!

Now…you tell me Isn’t The Red Signal a much better name for this cocktail?

Seamist 3

Seamist 4

The Recipe

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The Red Signal Cocktail

A sweet sour cocktail inspired by the Agatha Christie short story – The Red Signal.

  • Author: Taryn Nicole
  • Prep Time: 3 minutes
  • Total Time: 3 minutes
  • Yield: 1 1x
  • Category: Cocktails
  • Method: Shake

Ingredients

Scale

3 parts cranberry juice

3 parts pink grapefruit juice

2 parts vodka

Lemon and lime quarters

Ice cubes

Mixed berries for garnish

Instructions

Shake the juices and vodka in a cocktail shaker over ice.

Gently muddle the lemon and lime quarters in a highball glass to release some of their citrus oils and some juice.  Add ice cubes to the glass.

Strain the cocktail into the glass and give a light stir.

Garnish with mixed berries of your choice.

 

Other food mentioned in The Red Signal

Welsh Rarebit

Have a great week friends and remember if you feel “the red signal” pay it some heed!

Or make this cocktail!

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Cranberry Party Salad

If Christmas has an official fruit, to my mind it would have to be the cranberry.  We smother our turkey in it, serve it up with some brie for an oh so yummy canapé and knock it back by the bucketful in Christmas inspired cocktails. 

If retro cooking had an official dish, it would have to be the jellied salad.

And if these two met at a party and got a little tipsy on a few too many festive sherries and had their very own love child?  It would look  a little like this:

Cranberry Party Salad
Cranberry Party Salad

 And you know what?  If there’s any rationale for hiding your love children in the attic?  The Cranberry Party Salad from Salads For All Seasons could well be it. 

I wasn’t the worst thing I made this year.  Oh, no, that is a dead heat tie between the Paleo Muesli and the Paleo bread…

Sprouted Seed Bread
Sprouted Seed Bread

 It wasn’t awful like these, it was just way too sweet for my taste to have as a savoury dish.  It’s a problem I have in general with Cranberry sauce.  Sometimes it feels as if someone snuck up whilst I wasn’t looking and smeared my turkey with jam. To me, the thing, the whole raison d’etre of the cran is the tang.

Cranberry Party Salad2
Cranberry Party Salad2

 I was also a little disappointed that the fruit and nuts and…yep ok…spoilers ahead…celery…floated to the top which became the bottom once I turned it out.  Then I looked at the picture in the book and it looks like her fruit is all chunked at the bottom too.

Original Cranberry Party Salad
Original Cranberry Party Salad

 Also, look at her terracotta water cooler in the background.  And look at my Kris Kringle present this year…we do the one where you can steal gifts and believe me, there was nothing coming between me and this baby.  Sadly, I stole it off one of the nicest people in the world.  And she really wanted it because she had stolen it from one of the boys.  Caitlin, if you read this, I’m sorrynotsorry. 

Kris Kringle 2014
Kris Kringle 2014

 I am seriously a couple of oddly placed copper moulds away from having that retro kitchen!!!  That woman also has weirdly large man hands like me too.  And that blue salad?  Will be made. I promise.  I have to see how that particular combination of ingredients becomes blue…we will find out together in 2015.   I may even wear a badly fitting blue dress and have my water cooler in the background for some happysnaps.

Cranberry Party Salad Crackers
Cranberry Party Salad Crackers

Rosemary says this is to be served with light meats and poultry.  But how?  You have to remember that this type of dish is most definitely not in any kind of ancestral memory I have.  Well, having said that, I did ask my mother WEEKS ago to give me the recipe for a salmon and jello type thing she used to make.  Which, I have STILL not got.  Someone’s game needs to be lifted….

Given the spread between chunky at the bottom and clear at the top, it seemed sensible to slice it.  To my mind that just looked way too weird on the plate.  In the end, I treated it like a cranberry sauce and ate it on crackers with ham and cheese.

Cranberry Party Salad and Cheese
Cranberry Party Salad and Cheese

 

Cranberry Party Salad and Ham
Cranberry Party Salad and Ham

 Huh…it doesn’t look too bad in the photos and, in all honesty, this wasn’t awful….just waaaaaayyyy to sweet for my taste.  And I tarted it up by adding fresh cranberries into the mix….

Leave this one with me.  I’m going to ponder it over the next 12 months and next year, I’m going to bring you the best cranberry party salad ever!!!

Cranberry Party Salad Recipe
Cranberry Party Salad Recipe

Any suggestions, you know where to send ’em.

Merry Christmas everyone!!!

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