Faye Dunaway Cocktail

categories: Celebrity Cookbooks, Chilli, Cocktail, Mango, Vodka

Back in my school days, we had an annual music competition where each House had to arrange and sing a song of their choice to assorted judges, family, staff and fellow schoolmates.

One year the song selected by my House Music Captain for all of us to sing started like this:

Bonnie and Clyde were pretty lookin’ people,
But I can tell you people,
They were the devil’s children.

I had no idea who Bonnie and Clyde before then but wow! Believe me, just those opening lines were enough to send me racing to the Encyclopedia Britannica for more! Pretty people? Of course I wanted to know more. Pretty people who were also evil? My 14-year-old mind was blown. Who knew such a thing even existed!

Why am I telling you all this?

Because a little while ago the lovely Jenny from Silver Screen Suppers asked if I would test out a cocktail recipe for her upcoming cookbook. The cocktail was the Faye Dunaway cocktail, and Faye played Bonnie Parker in the 1967 film Bonnie and Clyde.

And oh boy, you want to talk about pretty looking people?

Oh, the glamour!!!!

The Faye Dunaway Cocktail is also pretty glam! It was invented in 2011 by Jonathan Humphrey of the Drake Hotel in Toronto and was inspired by the film Chinatown, which stars Faye Dunaway and Jack Nicholson.

The recipe for the Faye Dunaway cocktail calls for mango juice which I was unable to find. I also do not have a juicer so I puréed a fresh mango. I was a little worried because the mango purée was quite thick but it worked out perfectly. So do not despair if you also cannot find juice. If fresh mango is unavailable frozen would also work perfectly!

The Faye cocktail perfectly balances sweet, spicy and sour flavours in a glorious mix of mango, lime and chilli. It’s sooooo good! I loved it – it reminded me of sunshine and holidays and tropical climes! I made this exactly as per the recipe (which you can find here) because I was testing the recipe for Jenny. However, even though this is divine as is, I can’t help wondering what it might be like if you also brought in a salty element by edging the glass? Salty, sweet hot and sour being the four elements Thai cooks try to bring into balance. Because that is really what the flavours of this cocktail reminded me of…cocktails on a beach in Thailand.

Faye’s birthday is coming up on January 14. I was going to hold off posting this until the day itself. Then I thought it would be much more fun to give you all a chance to buy the ingredients so we could all celebrate her gorgeousness and iconic fashion sense by donning a beret and drinking one of these in her honour!

I will be trying the Salty Faye myself but if anyone makes either version, please let me know what you think!

And speaking of iconic fashion…I had so much fun trying to find the Dinah Shore look a few weeks ago that I thought I would give it another go.

Here is my take on Faye’s Bonnie and Clyde look fashion via my very first post on Polyvore. Because don’t we all need a little bad girl glam every now and again?

Oh, and for anyone who is wondering how our music competition turned out?

The judges said that our singing and arrangement were spot on but that the content was inappropriate for both us to be singing and our audience to be listening to!

If you would like to hear the scurrilous lyrics not fit for the mouths of good God-fearin’ girls (and see some photos of the real Bonnie and Clyde) here’s a YouTube of that song:

Many thanks to Jenny for the opportunity to help with her book (I will let you all know when it is ready to be purchased, it’s going to be awesome!) and for selecting such a fabulous recipe for me to try!

And don’t forget, Faye Day on the 14th!

Cheers!

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27
Dec
2017

History Happy Hour – The Flamingo

categories: Apricot Brandy, Cocktail, Gin, History Happy Hour

So, I made this Flamingo cocktail today with the idea that I would post it in the usual time it takes me to post anything – a month, six weeks, some time in the yet to be disclosed future. But then I opened my email and discovered that today, December 26 in the way back of 1946 was the day that Bugsy Siegel opened the Pink Flamingo Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas Nevada.

I’m not a big fan of posting too quickly because I like to ~~procrastinate~~ carefully curate what goes into these pages.

It’s why the quality is usually so high…😂

But some opportunities are too good to miss.

And how pretty is this? It’s a gorgeous, glorious, fabulous pink! Perfect for drinking at the most fabulous, magnificent , luxurious resort in the world….or just, you know, at home…

Siegel, called “the mobster with the beautiful blue eyes” by Cesar Romero named the resort the Flamingo after his girlfriend Virginia Hill who was a leggy redhead.

The opening of the Pink Flamingo Casino was a total clusterf**k. Bad weather kept many of the Hollywood celebrities who had been invited to the opening away. The rooms weren’t finished so gamblers took their winnings elsewhere. By the end of the first week, the Pink Flamingo had lost $300,000 in revenue. By the end of its first year of operation it had earned nothing!

Siegel was shot to death in 1947.

A memorial to him still exists in the current Flamingo complex.

Far from being a clusterf**k, the Flamingo cocktail is a total delight!

Gin, Apricot Brandy, lime juice and Grenadine make it delicious!

A maraschino cherry gives it some vintage glamour. It’s not in the recipe but it does make it gorgeous!

Here’s the recipe – Enjoy!!!!

https://mixthatdrink.com/flamingo-cocktail/

22
Sep
2017

The Sherry Cobbler – A Crazy Gold Rush Cocktail

categories: Cocktail

The Sherry Cobbler is an American cocktail probably first made in the 1830’s. It was hugely popular in its native land but was, also incredibly popular in Melbourne during the Gold rush years, between 1851 and through to the end of the 1860’s . Gold brought both a vast increase in the population and in the wealth of the population. And where there are miners and money? There will be booze.

Nowadays, sherry is seen as an old lady’s drink. However, this was not always the case. Back in the 1960’s all the cool kids were drinking it.

And 100 years before them it was the turn of these boys.

Dry Sack sounds more like a painful affliction than something I would want to drink so I used a Fino Sherry for my Cobbler but you can use but you can use whatever you have. The Sherry Cobbler consists of Sherry, sugar, fruit and a little sprinkle of nutmeg.

Now, I can quite easily imagine our 1960’s poolside pleasure seekers enjoying a Sherry Cobbler or two. But the miners? Surely not. Least of all because you would think all the fruit would get stuck in their beards. But apparently back in the 1850’s it was the most popular mixed drink in the world.

However, those miners were pretty wily. Is it a pure coincidence that the Sherry Cobbler, according to this article, was the drink that popularised the use of the straw. Or was it just a solution to fruit in beard syndrome?

But right from the start I promised you crazy and miners sipping sherry through straws is not crazy. It’s adorable but not crazy.

So let’s get crazy. The Sherry Cobbler is poured over crushed ice. Except back in the day there was no ice in Melbourne. We are a temperate climate and Melbourne’s first iceplant didn’t open until 1860. But dammit if those miners didn’t want their Sherry Cobblers served as the Good Lord intended them. So, ice was imported from America. Specifically, huge ice cubes were cut from the frozen lakes in Massachusetts, packed in sawdust and shipped to Melbourne to satisfy the Sherry Cobbler yearnings of the miners.

Not crazy enough? In a land where there was no ice, how common do you think those new fangled devices called straws were? Pretty damn non-existent apparently. So how did those quick witted miners get around that little dilemma?

They used pieces of macaroni as straws.

Yep. For real.

For serious.

Macaroni.

Can you imagine anything more delightful than the five gentlemen above out on a night on the tiles sipping their Sherry Cobblers through macaroni straws?

The Sherry Cobbler is a lovely tipple too. It would be a great day drink as it’s not too boozy. And certainly not a drink just for your maiden aunt

Ditch the macaroni straw though. It was useless.

Sherry Party (2)

[yumprint-recipe id=’101′]Unless otherwise indicated, all the facts in the above about Melbourne, ice, straws and macaroni come from a wonderful book called Flavours of Melbourne by Charmaine O’Brien (Wakefield Press, 2008). This book is awesome. There will be more recipes from it for sure.

Any errors or omissions and all the hyperbole are mine alone.

The weekend’s coming – what are you up to?

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05
Feb
2017

REPOST – Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Podcasts + A Giveaway

categories: Cocktail, Podcasts, Vodka

Hey people of the internet..I know, it’s been a while… it’s been a pretty shitty start to the year.

My step father passed away a couple of weeks ago and it’s been a horrible, weird, grief filled couple of weeks. Maybe I’ll talk about it more in time but at the moment….it’s still all a bit too raw. I had written most of this post on the Peter Piper cocktail before all the shit got real. So, here it is, pretty much unedited because I just want to get something out to resume some semblance of normality….

Don’tcha just love it when ~~two~~ three of your favorite things come together in a perfect storm of awesomeness? Of course you do! Which is how I came to find the Peter Piper cocktail.

The original Peter Piper Cocktail comes from a recipe by Georgia Hardstark and Alie Ward. So, here are some things you need to know about Georgia Hardstark.

She can make a mean cocktail
She loves vintage clothes
Along with Karen Kilgariff she is the host of one of my favorite new podcasts, My Favourite Murder

One of which would be reason enough to like her. All three combined? OMG….massive girl crush!

Also, here are some things you need to know about the Peter Piper cocktail. Actually, no just one.

The original recipe requires dry vermouth. Do not assume that just because you had dry vermouth the last time you made a cocktail, that you will still have dry vermouth. More specifically, do not wait until you have your vodka on ice in the damn cocktail shaker to realise that the dry vermouth has either disappeared into some Bermuda Trianglesque worm hole surrounding your bar cart or you drank a damn sight more of those Lord Suffolk cocktails on NYE than your memory has so far allowed you to admit. My money’s on the worm hole. Because you know, a lot of things go missing from that area of the dining room. And the stuff that is left? The levels also mysteriously change. Spooky..

Also, the girls used pepper vodka, I made my own chilli infused vodka and used that. That is super easy to make – I just chopped up a Bird’s Eye Chilli and put it into a 100ml jar filled with vodka and left it for about a week. And there you have it. Spicy vodka, perfect for mixing with pickle juice, and because you have no dry vermouth, a splash of Fino sherry. With a kick of heat from the vodka, briny sour from the pickle juice, a hint of sweet and nuttiness from the sherry….the Peter Piper is truly a thing of beauty! Perfect to drink with some salty chips whilst listening to your favourite podcast!

As far as I am concerned one of the best things to come out of 2016 for me was a new found love for the podcast. I have always been a big pod listener but l feel that last year raised the bar. So, whilst we sip our Peter Piper’s I’m going to take you through my Top 5 of the pods I discovered and loved in 2016.

These are vaguely in order of my discovery of them and not necessarily my love of them. Except the first three are probably also my top three in terms of love too.

1. The Black Tapes

It’s kinda X Files with loads of creepy children, music that will make you die within a year of hearing it, missing wives, and villain who looks like a Sexy James Bond. Not to mention evil monasteries and people having their faces ripped off.

Start with: You really need to listen to these in order. Start with S1, Episode1.

Standout Episode: The creepy knocking on Alex’s sleep tape gave me chills

2. Tanis

What have I not already said about my love for Tanis. (Brought to you by Pacific North West Stories who also produce The Black Tapes?).

Oh yeah – Both The Black Tapes and Tanis have been on hiatus for a while but The Sandy Island episodes which are for Patreon subscribers only? Totally amazing and made me fall in love with Tanis all over again. Also see my Tanis inspired cocktail posts:

Here for the Eld Fen Martini

Here for the Navigator

Here for the Sex on The Breach

Start With: As with The Black Tapes you need to listen to this in order

Standout Episode: I really liked S1 E3, The Girl in The High Tower which touched on the death of Elisa Lam. And anything with Geoff Van Sant. Or MK. So all of them.

3 My Favourite Murder

Who thought a podcast about murder could be hilarious? Well, let Georgia Hardstark and Karen Kilgariff change your mind. And just in case you are wondering, never disrespectful about the victims. They may not be the best researched of all the true crime pods that I will list but they are by far my favourite. I love these gals!

And OMG, the memes that have come out of this. From the catch cry “Stay sexy, don’t get murdered” to “You’re in a cult, call your dad” to “Here’s the thing, fuck everyone”

Don’t Start With: The Canadian Greyhound Bus Cannibal. This one scared the crap out of me. I was almost too scared to go on public transport for weeks after listening to this one!

Start With:The Alphabet Killer. This is absolutely what fascinates me about these things. No spoilers but how did that thing become his thing? Also the one on Israel Keyes. He looks like a guy you would see at a beachside pub wearing a polo shirt and boat shoes and talking too loudly to his bros. Not a serial killer, rapist, bank robber and arsonist. The Israel Keyes episode also spawned the now famous rules of hiking:

Go in packs of five
With knives
With fucking Rottweilers
With knives taped to your hands
And knives taped to your Rottweilers
And then just tons of guns
And just start shooting at any sound you hear
Anyone who fucking approaches you – shoot them

Other: They also have the best fan made merch. I just ordered one of these “Stay sexy, don’t get murdered rings” off Etsy. I feel it’s my version of the WWJD bangle.

4. Casefile

This is also true crime but from Australia. And if MFM is entirely personality driven, Casefile is the facts ma’am just the facts. The host is even anonymous. This is not exclusively Australian content but there is a lot of it on here, proving that when it comes to nutters and psychopaths, we can certainly hold our own with the rest of the world!

Start With: Peter Falconio. I remember this case so well. I also remember how they demonised his poor girlfriend in the media.

Standout Episode: Snowtown. OMG. Find out what happens when a group of people who individually were only ever going to be losers and fuck ups meet up. Spoiler – it ends with bodies in barrels.

In Adelaide.

Of course.

5. The Sofa King Podcast

These guys started following me on Insta so I gave their pod a listen and have not stopped. It’s a mix of true crime, cults, conspiracies, mysteries, and things that go bump in the night.

Start with: Their take on Dahmer. Because no one else will tell you that they found a painted preserved penis in his work locker. For real.

Standout Episode: The 411. This is about people going missing in National Parks. I laughed so hard whilst listening to this that I had to pull my car over to the side of the road because I was no longer capable of driving. Believe me, you will never see Gary Coleman in the same light!

Print

Peter Piper Cocktail

Print Recipe

A delicious savoury cocktail

Author: Taryn Fryer

Ingredients

Scale

125ml chilli / pepper vodka
60ml pickle brine
Splash fino sherry or dry vermouth
Cornichons, pickled jalapenos, green olive to garnish

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

Instructions

Add the vodka, pickle brine and sherry to a shaker filled with ice.
Shake it like a polaroid picture.
Pour into 2 glasses and garnish with a sliced cornichon, a green olive and a pickled jalapeno.
Enjoy!

Okay, so I have a couple of 1990’s magazines and a 1990’s cookbook on pasta and risotto, all from my personal collection to share with readers. Point me in the way of your favourite podcasts or let me know if you share my faves and these can be yours! Leave a comment here, on Facebook or Instagram or tweet me.

Have a wonderful week! And give someone you love a big hug….

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06
Jan
2017

Lord Suffolk Cocktail – (Repost from 2017)

categories: Cocktail, Cointreau, Gin

Top of the list of my New Year’s Eve libations this year was a cheeky little cocktail called the Lord Suffolk.

Featured in the classic Savoy Cocktail Book from 1930, the Lord Suffolk is a gin based cocktail and believe me, it is deeelicious!!!! It’s so good!

On top of the gin you have herby notes from vermouth, citrus from Cointreau and a nutty flavour from Maraschino liqueur.

This will however knock you flat if you have more than one though so go easy!

I’ve included a cautionary tale via some dating tips from the 1930’s to guide you in the correct etiquette of dealing with the Lord Suffolk so why not make yourself one, sit back, sip up an enjoy!

First Impressions

Him: Is that a nip I see before me? Mummy warned me about loose non-brassièred women like you. Must. Avert. Eyes. OMG, you’ve also got cankles!

Her: Calm down, that’s just my wrinkled stockings.

Pre – Date Chit Chat

Her: I wish I could just tug my girdle around a little bit. I feel it’s making me sit awkwardly. Good thing I have a jawful of Stay Calm Chewing gum or I’d be ready to bury an axe in your boring AF head.

Him: If you snap your gum at me one more time, I’m going to strangle you with my pristine white handkerchief. And BTW you sit like a truck driver with elephantiasis of the testicles. It’s making me weirdly horny.

Out and About

Him: Mummy gave me that hankie. She washed and ironed it specially for me, and now it’s RUINED, you harlot!

Her: If only this was the 21st century where the object I am holding would be a mobile phone and not a compact. I could

a) send a selfie to my bestie asking her if she thinks I should have worn a brassière tonight and,

b) ask her to call me to say she’s had a girdle tugging emergency and needs me to come immediately.

One Lord Suffolk Later

Her: This is the best drink I’ve ever had. Let’s go dance one of those new-fangled jitterbugs!

Him: You know, you’re not so bad after all. Waiter, another round of these delightful Lord Suffolk cocktails!

The Dance Floor

Her: You put the boom-boom into my heart, You send my soul sky high when your lovin’ starts
Jitterbug into my brain, Goes a bang-bang-bang ’til my feet do the same. (RIP George Michael!)

Him: STFU! How do you expect me to concentrate on perfecting my moves like Jagger when your incessant idiotic ramblings prevent me from hearing the beat? And whose hat is that?

Two Lord Suffolk’s Later

Her: I love you Lord Suffolk, you’re my best friend.

Him: I hate you. And whose fucking hat is that?

Three Lord Suffolk’s Later

Her: Zzzzzzzz

Him: Dear Mummy, you were right, all women are drunken sluts…

Random Double Breasted Suit Wearing Stranger: My hat! Mamma Mia!! What has she done to my hat?

Print

Lord Suffolk Cocktail

Print Recipe

Author: Taryn Fryer

Ingredients

Scale

5/8 Gin – I used Beefeater
1/8 Italian Dry Vermouth*
1/8 Cointreau
1/8 Luxardo Maraschino
Lemon Peel to garnish

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

Instructions

Shake well and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
Garnish with a strip of lemon peel.

Notes

*The original recipe used sweet vermouth. I tried with both sweet and dry and preferred the dry. Use your preference.

Have a great week and whatever you do, keep your dignity. And don’t tug your girdle.
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Retro Food For Modern Times

Category: Cocktail

Faye Dunaway Cocktail

History Happy Hour – The Flamingo

The Sherry Cobbler – A Crazy Gold Rush Cocktail

REPOST – Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Podcasts + A Giveaway

1. The Black Tapes

2. Tanis

3 My Favourite Murder

4. Casefile

5. The Sofa King Podcast

Peter Piper Cocktail

Ingredients

Instructions

Lord Suffolk Cocktail – (Repost from 2017)

First Impressions

Pre – Date Chit Chat

Out and About

One Lord Suffolk Later

The Dance Floor

Two Lord Suffolk’s Later

Three Lord Suffolk’s Later

Lord Suffolk Cocktail

Ingredients

Instructions

Notes