LUPEC Boston

We've moved!

2009-01-07T09:22:00.001-05:00

Hey Herald readers - thanks for stopping by! Our real website is lupecboston.com. Please check us out over there.

Cin cin!

The LUPEC Boston "USO SHOW"

2008-11-18T15:37:00.001-05:00

The LUPEC Boston “USO SHOW”

Friday, November 21, 7-11 p.m.

at the Jorge Hernandez Cultural Center

On November 21 the Boston chapter of LUPEC (Ladies United for the Preservation of Endangered Cocktails) will transform the Jorge Hernandez Cultural Center into a swinging 1940's-themed cocktail party featuring retro-libations, live entertainment, dancing, delicious canapés, a prize raffle, and a USO-style variety show. It's a coed event, and all are welcome. This is our second annual large-scale fundraising event and was created to benefit women at The New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans (NESHV). Tickets are $35 in advance/ $45 at the door, and can be purchased at Toro and Tremont 647 in the South End, Grand in Somerville, or online at grandthestore.com.

The LUPEC BOSTON USO SHOW is one component of our annual fall fundraising program, which raised over $10,000 for Jane Doe Inc. last year. Starting November 1, LUPEC Boston will partner with local bars and restaurants to offer a month-long “THIS ONE’S FOR THE LADIES” drink promotion, where participants donate proceeds from one LUPEC Boston-approved beverage to women at NESHV. Restaurant partners include Toro, Tremont 647, La Verdad, Eastern Standard, Rendezvous, Highland Kitchen, Flora, The Milky Way, and more. (For a full list, click here.) Proceeds from sales our recently reprinted cocktail book, THE LITTLE BLACK BOOK OF COCKTAILS, will also benefit the NESHV this fall.

The New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans is a private, non-profit organization with a mission to extend a helping hand to homeless men and women veterans who are addressing the

: Bob Hope entertains the troops

challenges of addiction, trauma, severe and persistent mental illness, and/or unemployment, and who will commit themselves to sobriety, non-violence, and working for personal change. They are recognized as one of the most effective private veteran's transition programs in the country. Learn more at www.neshv.org.

The LUPEC BOSTON USO SHOW will pay tribute to the 1940’s theme with of-the-era cocktails, a complimentary swing dance lesson, and a USO-style variety show emceed by Cathleen Carr and Daiva Deupree of the critically acclaimed New York-based sketch comedy burlesque Two Girls for Five Bucks. The show will feature acts by Thru the Keyhole Burlesque, Boston-based actor, improviser and stand-up comedian Harry Gordon as Bob Hope, and DJ Brother Cleve, a Boston institution, will spin ‘40s-era swing music throughout the evening. Vintage dress and creative cocktail attire is encouraged.

This event will take place at the Jorge Hernandez Cultural Center [85 W. Newton St., South End, Boston], with generous support from sponsors St-Germain, Hendricks, Cruzan, Milagro, Sazerac, Chartreuse, Mathilde Liqueurs, Harpoon, and SmartWater.

DETAILS:

The LUPEC BOSTON USO SHOW will begin at 7 p.m. on Friday, November 21. Tickets are one sale now. Ticket price is $35 in advance/ $45 at the door and will include cocktail party fare, a variety show, dancing, and four drink tickets, with additional beverages available for purchase.

Light cocktail party fare will be provided for the evening by Toro, Tremont 647, and Lionette's Market, Island Creek Oysters will be on hand shucking their acclaimed “Duxbury Pearls”, and The Boston Derby Dames will skate around with sweets provided by Taza Chocolates.

The USO-style variety show will be emceed by Cathleen Carr and Daiva Deupree of Two Girls for Five Bucks and feature Boston-based actor, improviser and stand-up comedian Harry Gordon, and Thru the Keyhole Burlesque. DJ Brother Cleve will spin ‘40s-era swing music between live acts. Vintage dress and creative cocktail attire is encouraged.

A prize raffle will feature gift certificates donated from Toro, Tremont 647, Myers + Chang, La Verdad, East Coast Grill, Taza Chocolates, Polka Dog Bakery, Vee Vee, Flour Bakery + Cafe, ZipCar, Hollywood Express, A Brix Six Gift Pack from Brix Wine Shop, tickets to the Improv Asylum and Swing City a St-Germain gift basket, a one-year subscription to Imbibe magazine and more.

All proceeds from the LUPEC BOSTON USO SHOW will benefit women at The New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans.

Ticket price is $35 in advance/ $45 at the door including cocktail party fare and four drink tickets, with additional beverages available for purchase.
Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased at:
- Toro, 1704 Washington St., Boston, MA
- Tremont 647, 647 Tremont St. Boston, MA
- Grand, 374 Somerville Ave., Somerville, MA
- Online at grandthestore.com [service charges will apply]

About NESHV

The New England Shelter for Homeless Veterans is a private, non-profit organization with a mission to extend a helping hand to homeless men and women veterans who are addressing the challenges of addiction, trauma, severe and persistent mental illness, and/or unemployment, and who will commit themselves to sobriety, non-violence, and working for personal change. They are recognized as one of the most effective private veteran's transition programs in the country. Learn more at www.neshv.org.

We've moved!

2008-11-08T16:15:00.003-05:00

The LUPEC Boston blog has moved! We have a swanky new online home and a new look.

Please visit lupecboston.com for updates on what we're shaking up around town!

And please note: in a few short weeks LUPEC Boston will no longer be updating this ol' thang. Come see us at our new spot. 'Til then, cin-cin!

Ferneducation

2008-10-16T13:30:00.003-04:00

...get one here, at the LUPEC Boston's new online home! And update your blog settings, guys and dolls! This ol' blogspot address is about to become totally defunct.

Cin-cin!

sock it to 'em, ladies!

2008-10-09T00:05:00.001-04:00

Click here for our new website and a formal introduction to punch!

Stocking Your Bar with the Basics - One Cocktail at a Time

2008-09-25T00:22:00.002-04:00

Check out lupecboston.com to read on!

Fabulous Fall Cocktails

2008-09-19T15:57:00.002-04:00

Check out our latest post on Fabulous Fall Cocktails at our new online home.

We're Moving...

2008-09-14T10:23:00.004-04:00

Guess what, LUPEC Boston blog fans? We’re moving!

We’ve got our own domain now, and a snazzy new design. Starting today, you can go directly to lupecboston.com to read about what we’re mixing up around town and sign up for our mailing list!

Many thanks for your readership and your continued support of our events. We’ve got some exciting stuff in the works for fall, so stay tuned!

Cin-cin!

LUPEC Boston

Reasons to Love Chartreuse

2008-09-10T08:41:00.006-04:00

Chartreuse is an enchanting liqueur if there ever was one. As we covered in this week's Dig, the Chartreuse we drink today is based on a recipe for an "Elixir of Long Life" that was handed down to the Order of Carthusian monks in the 17th century. Reputed since their founding in 1084 as the Catholic Church's strictest order, the monks "dedicate themselves entirely to the service of God and to spiritual life, in permanent silence." Sales of chartreuse liqueur, which is most commonly found in green (its original form) and yellow, support the contemplative order.

Though the Carthusian monks were handed the manuscript for the "Elixir of Long Life" in 1605, it took over a century for them to decode it into something drinkable, the Elixir Vegetal de la Grande-Chartreuse which was first distilled in 1737. 130 different botanicals and plant extracts are used as ingredients, and the drink takes is signature color from the chlorophyll therein. The original stuff was a 71% alcohol, 147 proof, but recognizing the popularity of chartreuse as more than just a medicine, the monks created a more palatable 55% alcohol, 110 proof version which is what we know and love as green chartreuse today. In 1838 the Carthusians introduced the even milder, sweeter yellow chartreuse, which weighs in at 40% alcohol, 80 proof. A kinder, gentler version of the stuff and where you might want to start if you're new to drinking/mixing with it. White chartreuse was also produced once upon a time (1860-1900), as was a special V.E.P. in the (1960s.)

The complexity of the recipe is part of what has kept it secret for centuries. When the Carthusians were expelled from the France (along with members of all other religious orders) the recipe was nearly lost. According to the lore, the monk entrusted with the original manuscript was arrested and jailed during this time. He managed to smuggle it out of prison to another Carthusian who was also on the lam, but the recipient could make no sense of the recipe. Befuddled by the complicated instructions and believing the Chartreuse Order shuttered forever, he sold the manuscript to a Grenoblois pharmacist named Monsieur Liotard, who also didn’t “get it”. He was unable to do anything with the recipe, and his heirs returned it to the Carthusian monks after his death in 1816.

Similarly, the French government was unable reproduce the stuff after they "nationalized" the chartreuse distillery in 1903 causing the monks to flee to Tarragona, Spain. The government’s, Chartreuse-branded product failed in the marketplace within a decade (see right.)

Who wouldn't want to sip on a liqueur that's...

1. Made by an order of contemplative monks in the French Alps?
2. Based on an ancient recipe for an Elixir of Long Life?
3. Such a highly guarded secret that only two monks are entrusted with the recipe, and never known to any one person at a time?
4. Made from 130 different herbs and botanicals, secretly processed and mixed?
5. Has its own color scheme named after it?
6. So deliciously complex that its behavior in cocktails can be a total surprise?

Mix up any one of these and you'll know what we mean:

Gypsy
*Adapted by Contessa from a recipe she originally sampled at Bourbon & Branch

2 oz Plymouth Gin
1 oz lime
3/4 oz yellow Chartreuse
3/4 oz St-Germain

Shake in a cocktail shaker, strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Cloister

1.5 oz gin
.5 oz Yellow chartreuse
.5 oz fresh grapefruit juice
.25 oz lemon juice
.25 oz simple syrup

Shake in a cocktail shaker, strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Cin-cin!

Genever - its a Dutch thing

2008-09-03T15:00:00.001-04:00

by Pink Lady

When I studied abroad in Ireland my junior year, I was shocked to learn that my Irish roommates preferred Budweiser to Guinness. The American import was pissier and more expensive than their native stout, yet none of the lads would be caught in the pub with a Guinness in hand. I chalked this up to the tendency to always want what you haven't got, and related to their impulse to eschew the familiar for the exotic.

This is not necessarily so, however, in Holland, where every fourth bottle of spirits sold is a bottle of genever. I learned this fun little fact from Bols brand ambassador Simon Duff at the Juniperlooza seminar at Tales of the Cocktail, and decided to put this theory to the test by contacting up my good friend Alexander, who hails from Amsterdam.

"Do you drink genever at all? Is it popular at home in Holland?" I texted him quite out of the blue last week while working on this week's Weekly Dig column about different types of gin.

"Yes I do! I have a bottle in my freezer! It's running low. Reminds me of my dad. I only drink it on special occasions..." he responded immediately.

So, there you have it folks, straight from the tall Dutchman's mouth. The stuff is indeed popular in Holland, if impossible to come by in the US.

We had a chance to try a small sip of both jonge and oude genever while in New Orleans for Tales of the Cocktail, and sampled it again at a recent meeting chez Bourbon Belle. President Hanky Panky managed to smuggle several bottles back to the states with her on a trip to Amsterdam last spring.

The strong juniper flavor inherent in genever makes no bones about being a great-great-great grandparent to the modern dry styles of gin we know and love today. That said, its fuller and gads maltier than the stuff you put in a modern gin and tonic, a totally different gin-drinking experience. It is indeed special stuff, and though the real Dutch spirit is hard to come by in the United States, Genevieve by the San Francisco-based Anchor Distilllery stands in as a delicious take on the product.

So here's the ultimate challenge: get your friends who live in London to smuggle you back some Old Tom Gin and your very own tall Dutchman to return from Holland with a suitcase full of Hollands. Then mix them up in alternating batches of the following cocktail, as Seamus Harris of Bunnyhugs did and reported on here this past June.

Martinez
Recipe adapted from Imbibe! by David Wondrich

1 dash of aromatic bitters
2 dashes of maraschino
1 oz Old Tom Gin or Genever
2 oz Italian vermouth

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

This drink is believed to be a predecessor to the modern martini, and was originally concocted with Old Tom Gin. The genever version is delicious as well. I wonder -- what would happen if I served this to the next person who requested "a martini" at the restaurant where I work...hmmm...

Cin-cin, or as the Dutch say, Proost!

Dead or Alive: The Sour Apple Martini

2008-08-28T11:04:00.008-04:00

On August 15, the DeKuyper(R) brand announced the bottling of its five millionth case of DeKuyper Pucker(R) Sour Apple, the neon green key ingredient in that “iconic” cocktail, the Appletini. Little did they know that to leading mixologists and cocktail aficionados , the Sour Apple Martini is officially dead.

The Sour Apple Martini was declared officially deceased on July 19th at the Tales of the Cocktail Festival in New Orleans, nearly a month prior to the DeKuyper(R) brand’s announcement. A traditional New Orleans style Jazz Funeral was held in the drink’s honor. Covering the event for the Tales of the Cocktail blog, Cocktailnerd Gabriel Szaszko writes:

There was brilliant and uplifting music played in a classic jazz funeral style and a well-attended processional of the casket with Robert Hess in the vanguard...After the processional attendees were invited to enjoy drinks and scantily clad ladies in Cafe Giovanni where a “Bartender’s Breakfast” was held. Unfortunately, the talented ladies likely couldn’t be seen due to the number of celebrants trying to get a real, true, non-floor polish-infused, drink from the veteran and highly regarded bartenders. There was also dancing in the street; it was very Martha and the Vandellas.

Complete coverage of the funeral event can be found here and here. DeKuper’s release can be read here.

Now, why don’t you hunker down with a bottle of applejack and celebrate the great Sour Apple Martini debate with a drink? The blended stuff you’re most likely to find on local shelves is delicious in the following drink. If you have friends or family in Jersey, ask them to help you procure a bottle of Laird’s Old Apple Brandy, which it bills as the “original historic Applejack”, or the older still 12 Year Old Rare Apple Brandy (which you can read up on here.) My mother is traveling in the region as we speak, and was perfectly happy to be my mule. As we all know, a family that drinks together stays together.

The Jack Rose

2 oz Laird’s Applejack
3/4 oz fresh grenadine
1/2 oz fresh-squeezed lemon juice

Shake with ice, strain into a cocktail glass, garnish with a lemon twist.

DRINK up!

2008-08-25T10:17:00.003-04:00

What would the perfect cocktail bar look like? When posed with such a question, a LUPEC broad's mind wanders...

"Vintage glassware would be a must," responds one broad. "Glasses like the ones I can't stop buying on Ebay."

"And corners...lots of corners. No one likes to crane their necks to talk to each other, like they're sitting on some bench, waiting for the bus," posits another.

"I dream of massive blocks of ice like they used to use before there were ice-makers," says the third. "Imagine walking into a bar and seeing a huge chunk of ice sitting back there, waiting to be hand chipped into my drink."

The LUPEC broads grow quiet, dreaming of the day they might walk into such a place.

According to this preview of Barbara Lynch's new cocktail spot, such a place will open in Fort Point Channel on Sept 15th.

We are counting the days.

Total Pimm’s-sanity: Variations on a Pimm’s Cup Theme

2008-08-20T00:00:00.001-04:00

by Pink Lady

If you checked out this week’s LUPEC Boston column in the Weekly Dig you’re aware that creator James Pimm began to commercially produce his No. 1 Cup in 1851. The next century-plus saw the brand grow to include a total of six variations on the liqueur’s original theme – and a franchised chain of Pimm’s Oyster Houses. One can guess that the debut of each product was a sign of the times and indicative of en vogue spirits:

• In 1851 whisky-based Pimm’s No. 2 and cognac-based Pimm’s No. 3 were introduced, along with the premiere commercial version of Pimm’s No. 1
• Rum-based Pimm’s No. 4 came after the end of World War II
• Rye-based Pimm’s No. 5 and vodka-based Pimm’s No. 6 were born in the ‘60s

Pimm’s No. 2 – 5 were phased out in 1970s and around that time the oyster houses closed, too. Vodka-based No. 6 is allegedly available, if only in England, and a revamped version of brandy-based No. 3 was introduced in 2005 and dubbed the Pimm’s Winter Cup. The original Pimm’s No. 1 remains the easiest to find.

As a cocktail, the Pimm’s Cup has a home on each side of the Atlantic, both in Southern England and in New Orleans, coincidentally also in “the South”. The English-style quaff is made a little differently from the Napoleon House recipe we included in the Dig:

• First of all, the Pimm’s Cup is a high-class drink favored by Southern England’s upper crust. While New Orleans’ Napoleon House exudes an inimitable brand of faded-glory charm, it is also decidedly casual (see photos, right.)
• James Pimm poured his original in a small tankard, so if you’re a classicist, use a mug.
• “Lemonade” means lemon-lime soda in the King’s English, and British recipes are usually made with a U.K. version of Sprite or 7-Up, the exact likes of which may be tough to find here.
• Brits garnish their Pimm’s Cups extravagantly with fruits/herbs in season, such as borage, mint, orange, lemon, line, and strawberries. How common our lonely stateside cucumber must feel.

Either way you choose to enjoy your Pimm’s Cup is fine with us.

Tally ho, y’all – bottom’s up!

Clearly, Ice

2008-08-14T13:50:00.008-04:00

by Pinky Gonzales

A world without ice implies no cold drinks - and that would be a terrible, terrible world. There of course was a time not too long ago when the world did not have chilled drinks. How did we get 'em? Boston's own Frederic Tudor, a Beacon Hill ice trade maverick dubbed "The Ice King" was Beginning in the early nineteenth century he shipped out blocks harvested from local ponds (such as Walden) and created a worldwide demand. Thanks, Fred!

Ice and ice melt, a.k.a. water, make our cocktails more drinkable. A martini needs to have a little melt, otherwise you're crazy hammered in a minute (unless your name is John Myers.) Ice gadgets for the home make it all more fun. Not everyone can have a Kold Draft machine at their house (let alone their bar), but we can stock up on a few tools & gadgets to enhance cocktail hour. (I mention these in this week's Weekly Dig):

Silicone trays. A company called Tovolo makes soft trays which render perfect, roughly 1" cubes, non-messy, and which look swell stacked high in a Collins glass. $11.95 set of 2, Kitchen Arts, Newbury St. Note: You can find elsewhere all sorts of novelty shapes too, if you must, ranging from dog bones to Playboy bunnies. I have found some of these shapes exceedingly tricky to remove, however, so be wary.

The Lewis Bag & Ice Crush Kit. A great way to get your frustration out, make your guests chuckle, and have lovely cocktails. Sturdy canvas bag with a wooden mallet. $15, BeverageFactory.com.

Manual crushers. Vintage or retro-new, hand-crank, choppers, tappers, all good. Some nice ones are made by Ice-O-Mat, Dazey, and look for the neat-o Tap-Icer gadget. And speaking of the latter, which is an old tool, the back of a good bar spoon cracks ice held in the hand just as well. Check Buckaroo's Mercantile, Cambridge, for the occasional vintage nugget.

Electric crushers. Less charm, less work. Bought mine at Goodwill for five bucks - same one I used in 1975.

Ice pick and block. Freeze water in a pan, dislodge with spot of hot water, chip away with an old pick. Drop piece into rocks glass. Fill with rye, stir with finger. Satisfyingly toast to Mr. Tudor.

For more on ice, check out what local (welcome back!!) bartender Josey Packard has to say about it here:
http://www.alcademics.com/2008/08/on-ice.html

LUPEC Boston’s own takes home First Place at Hendrick’s Gin Beantown Bartender Battle

2008-08-06T21:52:00.007-04:00

by Pink Lady

We are pleased to announce that LUPEC Boston’s own Bourbon Belle took home first place at the Hendrick’s Gin Beantown Bartender Battle held at Green Street last night.

Just five talented finalists were selected from the vast contestant pool to mix their cocktails at the event. The challenge? To wow the judges with a Hendrick’s based cocktail showcasing one of the signature Hendrick’s botanicals, presented with no more chatter than a witty, five-lined limerick.

“I took one sip of her cocktail and I knew instantly that Bourbon Belle was going to win,” said one Green Street staffer affiliated with the event (but not on the judging panel), who asked to remain anonymous.

The competition was fierce and the judges were tough. Other contestants included Justin Falcone, a Boston-area freelance bartender, Jeff Grdinich, bartender at the White Mountain Cider Co. restaurant in Glen, NH, Claudia Mastrobuono, bartender at Highland Kitchen in Somerville, and Chris O’Neil, bartender at Upstairs on the Square in Cambridge. The tasting panel included chef Barbara Lynch, Boston Globe writer Liza Weisstuch, bartender and cocktail historian John Myers of Portland, Maine, and Hendrick’s brand ambassador Charlotte Voisey.

Bourbon Belle was the third contestant to compete and seemed un-phased as she measured, shook, and strained, despite the high stakes of the competition. Fans and LUPEC members crowded around the bar to cheer BB on as she mixed and garnished; her screwdriver Seth remained close at hand, ready to assist or mop sweat from her brow as required.

First prize is a complimentary trip anywhere in the U.S. courteous of Hendrick’s gin. When asked where she’d like to celebrate her victory, Bourbon Belle responded without hesitation: "San Francisco. Drinking.”

We’ll drink to that.

Here’s the recipe for the 1st Place libation:

Nobody's Darling

In a cocktail shaker filled with ice, add:

2 oz Hendrick's Gin
.5 oz Yellow Chartreuse
1 oz Angelica Root infused Honey
.75 oz fresh celery juice
.5 oz fresh lemon juice

Shake and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Limerick

An elixir of cucumber and rose
With a scent that amuses the nose
Angelica-honey we’ll pair
Then some celery sounds fair
Yellow Chartreuse, lemon juice and there goes!

The return of rye

2008-08-04T21:49:00.009-04:00

A bar without rye whiskey is like a story without action.

As I explain in this week's LUPEC Boston cocktail column in the Weekly Dig, rye has evolved from a nearly defunct, old-man drink to a much sought-after spirit by men and broads alike, thanks to the revival of classic cocktails. The "old fashioned" Old Fashioned (which I mention in the column), the Scoff Law, the Saratoga, the Old Pal and, of course, the original Manhattan -- all get their personality from rye whiskey, the drier, spicier counterpart to bourbon. The Ladies of LUPEC Boston are known to knock back a rye drink or two at our monthly meetings and our favorite local bars.

Wanna know more about rye? Here are a few fun facts:

U.S. law mandates that rye whiskey be made with at least 51 percent rye (though most are made with 65 percent or more). The rest of the grain bill usually consists of corn and malted barley.
Rye whiskey is America's oldest whiskey. George Washington distilled it.
Rye whiskey, in its early days, was produced in the Northeast, particularly Pennsylvania and Maryland. Most of the Northeast distilleries closed during Prohibition, and today rye is primarily produced by the Kentucky distilleries that make bourbon.
The "whiskey" in the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794 refers to rye. Western Pennsylvania farmers who distilled rye protested an excise tax on their product so fervently that President George Washington had to deploy a militia to quell the uprising.
Rock and Rye is a rye-based liqueur flavored with rock candy and citrus fruits.

Check out these two articles on rye whiskey: All but lost, rye is revived as the next boutique find (NYT) and Rye, resurrected (SF Chronicle).

Some classy cocktails to get the party started this summer...

2008-07-30T11:04:00.004-04:00

Get your hands on a bottle of sloe gin, turn up Rumors by Fleetwood Mac, and let the games begin!

Sloe Comfortable Screw
from Dale DeGroff's Craft of the Cocktail

1 oz sloe gin
1 oz Southern Comfort
4 oz fresh orange juice
Orange slice for garnish

This drink has sloe gin, southern comfort, and OJ -- get it? A sloe, comfortable screw. Build in a highball glass. Garnish with an orange slice.

Alabama Slammer
from Dale DeGroff's Craft of the Cocktail

3/4 oz Southern Comfort
1 oz vodka
3/4 oz sloe gin
4 oz fresh orange juice
6 dashes grenadine, for garnish

Shake all ingredients hard with ice, strain into six 1-oz shot glasses, and dash the top of each with grenadine. Bottoms up!

Trader Vic's Bartender's Guide Revised Edition has a whole section devoted to Sloe Gin (and Pisco!) so pick up a copy and get inspired. I tried this cocktail and loved it -- it's surprisingly well balanced, sweet but not cloying, and utterly imbibeable.

San Francisco Cocktail

3/4 oz sloe gin
3/4 oz Italian vermouth
3/4 oz French vermouth
1 dash Angostura bitters
1 dash orange bitters

Shake with ice cubes. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Add a cherry.

Cin-cin!

Grenadine is NOT from grenada & simple syrup is NOT simple

2008-07-23T15:06:00.005-04:00

by Pink Lady

While putting together this week's Weekly Dig column on syrups I became intrigued about the origins of grenadine. This delicious pomegranate syrup is a key ingredient in both my namesake cocktail AND my favorite kiddie cocktail (the Shirley Temple). But when, exactly, did this delicious syrup become a fashionable mixer?

While writing about the Daisy in Imbibe, David Wondrich refers to the cocktail circa the 1870s as "something of a dude's drink, a little bit of fanciness that came empinkened with grenadine." Maybe it started then-ish?

Who knows. The I could find little data on who innovated the use of grenadine in cocktails, but a few of the following, totally unrelated facts popped up repeatedly as I searched:

There is a chain of Islands located in the Caribbean that share the same name as the delicious syrup. Nary a pomegranate grows on these islands, though. Nor to they grow on the adjacent island of Grenada.
The French word for pomegranate? La grenade. The Spanish word? La Granada. There is some speculation that these islands got their name from early settlers who thought the island’s shape resembled that of the fruit. I mean, maybe that happened…
There is an odd/fascinating legal situation a-brew wherein Grenada and/or the Grenadine islands are looking to claim rights to the name of the ruby red syrup, thus profiting from the sales of Grenadine with a capital "G". Read more about it here.

Irrelevant facts aside, some more recipes for the stuff can be found at the end of this post.

I also learned that "Simple Syrup" is pretty much anything but, thanks to an illuminating article chemist-turned-mixologist Darcy O'Neil contributed to the first edition of Mixologist: The Journal of the American Cocktail.

The task at hand will always involve dissolving sugar in water, of course. But the method by which you do so -- over heat, or hot process, vs. cold process -- will have a dramatic effect on the flavor & consistency of your syrup. Heated syrup will be thinner, due to a higher presence of fructose, whereas syrup dissolved at room temperature will be nice and thick, and 100% sucrose. Rather than butchering Mr. O'Neil's eloquent explanation, I suggest you purchase a copy of the book and check out his excellent blog. In the interim, here are simple syrup recipes for you to play around with.

As with all things cocktail, make a few batches, try 'em in a few cocktails, and use whichever suits you best.

Simple Syrup:

A cold-process shakey-shakey method from King Cocktail, Dale Degroff
from the Craft of the Cocktail

Fill a cork bottle halfway with superfine sugar, the other half with water. Shake vigorously until most of the sugar dissolves, about 1 minute. It will remain cloudy for 5 minutes; after it clears, shake again briefly and it is ready to use. Stored in the refrigerator between uses, Simple Syrup will last for several weeks.

Darcy O'Neil's Simple Syrup
from Mixologist: the Journal of the American Cocktail

Ingredients: 2 cups sugar 2 cups water, 1/4- cup corn syrup, 1000 ML bottle (with milliliters marks on the side)

Add 2 - cups of water to a pan and bring it to a simmer, 122 - 140 degrees Fahrenheit, or 'til it's just slightly too hot to put your finger in for more than a few seconds. Add 2 cups of table sugar and 1/4 cup of corn syrup and leave on heat for 30 seconds. Remove pan from heat, stir until all is dissolved. Let solution cool then add to a bottle. Fill the bottle up to 1000 ML and shake.

NOTE: To try this recipe cold process, add sugar, water, and corn syrup to a 1000 ML bottle and shake 'til all is dissolved. Top off with water.

Grenadine:

A cold process shakey-shakey method from David Wondrich's Killer Cocktails
borrowed from Paul Clarke's Cocktail Chronicles

Take one cup of pomegranate juice, and place it in a jar with one cup of granulated sugar. Seal tightly and shake like hell until all of the sugar is dissolved. Add another ounce or two of sugar and repeat.

Clarke suggests: Adding an ounce of high-proof vodka or grain alcohol as a preservative, and storing in a plastic container in the freezer: "the high volume of sugar keeps it from freezing, and you can just tip out a little frigid syrup each time you need it." Thanks, Paul!

Cin-cin!

LUPEC makes it's small screen debut

2008-07-21T12:42:00.002-04:00

Check us out in this short webisode recorded with the Liquid Muse at Tales of the Cocktail on the Small Screen Network!

Cin cin!

scenes from Tales of the Cocktail: Day #1

2008-07-20T11:52:00.008-04:00

Mimi at the Napoleon House, looking like a '70s Album cover

A pair of perfect Pimm's Cups...

Napoleon House's big as your head Muffelatta. This is the "quarter" size.

Chad Solomon of Cuff & Buttons pours sample Pisco Sours at the Emerging Spirits panel. This conference was tough, tough work.

Rebirth...the Remix.

Dancing 'til dawn...

scenes from Tales of the Cocktail: Pre Tales...

2008-07-16T11:22:00.010-04:00

Barbara West is presenting at the conference and had to make sure she had all her materials on hand. Don't expect to get on a plane with a portable bar and a bottle of Picon without raising some eyebrows...

Babs' Contraband

Lunch by the pool with MiMi and longtime LUPEC friend, Em...

Mimi, Pink Lady & Em, at dinner at Jacques-Imo's.

Pink Gin + Fried Roast Beef Po' Boy = Heaven

Hanky Panky & Pink Gin + bubbly = heaven. What else does one drink with a Fried Po' Boy?

Last night we drank these. Try one and live vicariously through us:

Vieux Carre

1 ounce rye whiskey
1 ounce Cognac
1 ounce sweet vermouth
1 teaspoon Bénédictine D.O.M.
2 dashes Peychaud's Bitters2 dashes Angostura Bitters

Mix all ingredients in a double Old Fashioned glass over ice; stir.

Cin-cin!

The Storied Sazerac

2008-07-16T00:00:00.001-04:00

With half of LUPEC Boston in NOLA for the Tales of the Cocktail festival this week, it only seemed right to raise a glass to the Sazerac, the city's official cocktail. It's not just a tag line you know: last month the Louisiana House of Representatives proclaimed the Sazerac New Orleans' official cocktail in a 62-33 vote. (Did those 33 other legislators vote for the Ramos Gin Fizz?)

But you can't write casually about the Sazerac. The history of the cocktail is complex and much debated, "so intricate and entangled in myth," writes David Wondrich in Imbibe!, "it requires a monograph of its own." Wondrich reached page sixteen of his Sazerac treatise before his editor made him stop, and if this historian-come-cocktail authority won't try for encyclopedic in his coverage of Sazerac, neither will we. However, we can guide you to a few fun sources that sketch the lore of the Sazerac. Below are a few facets of the Sazerac myth which may or may not be true, but should absolutely be embellished to provide the most exciting story possible.

The Sazerac is the original cocktail. That's likely false, as Wondrich argues rather compellingly in Imbibe!:

"There is in fact no written record of [the Sazerac] before the first decade of the twentieth century, which is perfectly understandable: When all is said and done, the Sazerac is merely a plain Whiskey (or Brandy)...Cocktail made with Peychaud's bitters and finished with a dash of absinthe. A generation earlier, you could have ordered the same thing in any bar in America that served mixed drinks."

As Wondrich's research reveals, written record of that elusive noun, "cocktail" appears as early as 1803 in a tiny little newspaper produced in a tiny little town called Amherst, New Hampshire (which is coincidentally, where I grew up.) The debate goes on and on, but the nomenclature and the execution of such a drink with such a name likely predate Peychaud's home tippling.

The Sazerac was originally served in an egg cup. On The Gumbo Pages, Chuck Taggart provides an excellent overview of the history of the Sazerac. Here we learn that Creole apothecary Antoine Amadie Peychaud moved to NOLA in the early 1800s, set up shop in the French Quarter, and began selling his signature tincture to "relieve the ails of all his clients." After hours Peychaud mixed that magic tincture with a little cognac, water, and sugar for his friends. He served the drink in the large end of an egg cup -- a coquetier en Francais -- and the improper American pronunciation of this term led to the eventual appellation “cocktail”. In that version of the myth, the Sazerac is thus the original cocktail, Peychaud its father, and New Orleans its cradle. It’s as likely as landing a dinner meeting with the Easter bunny, but a good tale nonetheless.

The Sazerac became the Sazerac at the Sazerac Coffee House on Royal Street. Sewell Taylor christened the "Sazerac Cocktail" as the signature drink of his Sazerac Coffee House on Exchange alley in 1853 . The drink was to be made only with Sazerac de Forge et Fils brandy, a popular brand of cognac of which he was the sole importer. Or was it John Schiller who opened the Sazerac Coffee House in 1859, and christened the Sazerac Cocktail its signature drink to be made with Sazerac brand cognac, for which he was the sole importer?

In any case, it was at the Sazerac Coffee House that an innovative barkeep introduced the step of rinsing a glass with absinthe, and it was here, under new owner Thomas H. Handy (or was it John Handy, as cited in The Craft of the Cocktail?) that the principal spirit was changed from cognac to rye whiskey, circa 1870. Reasons for that switch are clear, at least: the phylloxera epidemic in France made cognac hard to come by...or was it simply that the American palate favored rye? Maybe it was a little of both.

Sazerac de Forge et Fils perished in the 1880s, but as one brand dies, another is born: a decade later the Sazerac bar had grown into a Sazerac company who began to bottle and sell the rye-based version of the drink. That same company sells a six-year-old Sazerac brand rye today, as well as many other spirits.

Oh, what a tangled web history becomes when its scribes hit the bottlet! The beauty of these modern times is that all of these ingredients (save the Sazerac de Forge et Fils cognac) are available today -- event absinthe! We suggest experimenting with the ingredients, ratios, and recipes you like the best, and matching it to your favorite foggy detailed story while mixing one up to impress your friends. Here are a few variations to get you started.

Exhibit A: Original(ish) Sazerac
from Imbibe! by David Wondrich

This recipe is the first one in print for the whiskey-based version. Reprinted in David Wonderich's Imbibe!, it was first published by William Boothby as the late Tom Handy's recipe in an undated supplement to THE WORLD'S DRINKS AND HOW TO MIX THEM:

Frappe [chill] an old-fashioned flat bar-glass; then take a mixing glass and muddle half a cube of sugar with a little water; add some ice, a jigger of good whiskey, two dashes of Peychaud bitters, and a piece of twisted lemon peel; stir well until cold, then throw the ice out of the bar-glass, dash several drops of Absinthe into the same, and rinse well with the Absinthe. Now strain the Cocktail into frozen glass, and serve with ice water on the side.

A free copy of the LITTLE BLACK BOOK OF COCKTAILS goes to the first reader to try this with a good cognac and an egg cup and report back with pictures!

Exhibit B: King Cocktail's Sazerac Cocktail
from The Craft of the Cocktail by Dale DeGroff

Dale DeGroff's version calls for a little bit of everything. The plot thickens...

Splash of Ricard or Herbsaint
1 oz. VS cognac
1 oz. rye whiskey
1/2 oz. simple syrup
2 dashes Peychaud's bitters
2 dashes Angostura bitters
lemon peel for garnish

Chill one rocks glass while preparing the drink in another. Splash the Ricard into another glass and swirl it, then pour it out. Add the cognac, rye, simple syrup, and the two kinds of bitters. Stir with ice cubes to chill. Strain into the chilled rocks glass and garnish with lemon peel.

Exhibit C: NOLA Gals Weigh In
from In the Land of Cocktails by Ti Adelaide Martin and Lally Brennan

This modern recipe calls for both Peychaud's & Angostura bitters in uneven ratios, Herbsaint, the local pastis that served as absinthe's understudy during the ban, and shaking, not stirring, the ingredients.

Makes 1 cocktail

1 tablespoon Herbsaint
1 1/2 ounces rye whiskey, preferably Old Overholt or Sazerac rye
1/2 teaspoon simple syrup
4 to 5 dashes Peychaud's bitters
2 dashes Angostura bitters
1 lemon twist with the white pith removed, for garnish

Pour the Herbsaint into a rocks glass and swirl to coat the inside. Discard any excess Herbsaint. Fill the glass with ice to chill.

Combine the rye, simple syrup and Peychaud's and Angostura bitters in a cocktail shaker with ice. Cover and shake vigorously.

Discard the ice from the glass and strain the shaker mixture into the glass. Rub the rim of the glass with the lemon twist, add to the drink and serve immediately.

Enjoy your Sazeracs, and Happy Tales to you!

More fun and easy ways to create your own cocktail

2008-07-09T00:05:00.006-04:00

by Bourbon Belle

Wishing for a drink that you just haven’t been able to find at your beloved watering hole? Or dreaming about making the perfect cocktail to suit a specific taste? It’s surprisingly easy to concoct a well-balanced cocktail in the classic style, so long as you keep a few basic rules of thumb in mind.

One of the earliest known definitions of the term “cocktail” comes from the May 1806 issue of The Balance, and Columbian Repository, a Hudson, N.Y.-based weekly newspaper of yore: “Cocktail is a stimulating liquor, composed of spirits of any kind, sugar, water and bitters ...”

So let’s start with the spirit of your choice—Bourbon's as good as any. Next, you’ll want to sweeten it up for balance. Let’s go traditional and throw in some sweet vermouth. Following the cocktail "definition," we’re going to add some bitters; Angostura bitters make for a traditional Manhattan. Now, let’s make an original by including a flavor you’d like to impart into your drink. What goes well with Bourbon? How about … peaches! Let’s add a touch of peach liqueur—Mathilde Peches is my personal choice. And now you have your own twist on a traditional cocktail, made to suit your own flavor preferences.

Just remember: a spirit, a sweetener, a bitter (fresh citrus juice is also great for balancing out the sweetness) and water (in most cases, just consider the melting ice sufficient).
Cin-cin!

BOURBON BELLE

3 ounces Jim Beam Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey
1/2 ounce Mathilde Peches Liqueur
1/2 ounce sweet vermouth (Martini & Rossi or Cinzano preferred)
2 dashes Angostura bitters

Fill a shaker with ice and add all ingredients. Stir and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

More fun and easy ways to create your own cocktail follows this same concept. Take a drink you like, and just put a little spin on it!

Maybe you LOVE a classic Negroni, but sometimes prefer something a touch more smooth. Try another original created by one of our LUPEC ladies called the Contessa. Change up the Campari for Aperol (Campari’s less bitter cousin-as quoted from Hanky Panky the Weekly Dig 7.2.08-7.9.08) and even out the portions of all three ingredients.

Contessa

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice and add:
1.5 oz Beefeater Gin
1.5 oz Aperol
1.5 oz Cinzano sweet vermouth

Stir and strain in a chilled cocktail glass
Garnish with an orange twist

How about a classic Sidecar variation? Swap out the traditional brandy for Belle de Brillet, a pear flavored Cognac, for a smooth and delicious Pear flavored Sidecar.

Belle de Brillet Sidecar

In a cocktail shaker filled with ice, add:
2 oz Belle de Brillet
.5 oz Cointreau
.5 oz fresh lemon juice

Shake gently and strain into a chilled cocktail glass that has been rimmed with raw sugar.
Garnish with an orange wheel

The sky's the limit. After all, as Imbibe! author David Wondrich writes, "the small, idiomatic differences...are the mixographer's delight!"

Cin-cin!

Oh When the Saints...

2008-07-03T12:46:00.002-04:00

The ladies of LUPEC Boston are gearing up for our annual excursion to New Orleans for Tales of the Cocktail. For five days we will be learning about everything from Shochu to sensory perception. And for five nights we will be eating, drinking and dancing at our favorite haunts. Sounds like something real close to heaven. So to get us in the mood let's pour out a tasty, low alcohol cocktail from one of NOLA's finest restaurants, Herbsaint.

Half Sinner, Half Saint
2 oz French Vermouth
2 oz Dry Vermouth
.5 oz Herbsaint
Lemon Twist
In a rocks glass combine the vermouths over ice. Float the Herbsaint. Garnish with the lemon twist.

Cheers!

Go Tiki Yourself

2008-06-24T14:32:00.021-04:00

When The Weekly Dig's Christine Liu asked the LUPEC ladies to advise her readers on summertime drinks, we enthusiastically obliged by studying up and drinking our way through the books of Beachbum Berry and Trader Vic. Check out our story in this week's Dig! But could it additionally be possible to get one's tiki on in Boston?

Because of the Puritanical background of Massachusetts one may assume that our fine state was never a part of Tiki Nation. Not so, my dear friends. In fact the Boston area was a hotbed of tiki torch amusements. Those of you who have been in the Boston area for a while will remember Aku Aku, the Polynesian delight that used to occupy the space that now holds Jasper White's Summer Shack near Alewife Station. Boasting sister locations in Worcester and Newton, Aku Aku offered up Polynesian fare and stand up comedy that one could wash down with delicious tiki libations. Heading back to mid-century, Boston hosted Kon-Tiki Ports in the Sheraton at the Prudential Center, Trader Vic's in the Park Plaza Hotel, the Polynesian Village in the Somerset Hotel, Bob Lee's Islander in Chinatown, and the Hawaiian on Boylston St.

And let us not forget the Aloha Lounge!

Talking about tiki of yore can make one thirsty. Fear not! We may not be able to sit in the Kona Hut of the Polynesian Village, but there are still options for those of us longing to have our engines revved by a Jet Pilot. On Beacon St in Newton we find South Pacific. This unassuming store front in a strip mall hides a secret tiki enclave featuring bamboo, tiki fixtures and murals.

Want to head someplace more accessible by T? Head on over to East Coast Grill in Inman Square and limbo on in to the Lava Lounge. This Cambridge institution is known for quality seafood and BBQ, but we heart East Coast Grill for it's tribute to Polynesia. Order up a Pu Pu Platter, sip on your Erupting, Flaming Volcano (serves 2, limit two per couple) and enjoy the sites!

Next on our field trip of all things tiki we find ourselves in Medford at Tiki Island. Although it's not as elaborately decorated as it's tiki predecessors, Tiki Island happily boasts "Exotic Polynesian Tropical Drinks." Who are we to say no?

On Route 1 in Saugus, we find the Kowloon. Established in 1950 by the Wong Family, the Kowloon is a New England Polynesian institution. After passing through the entrance guarded by a 15 foot tiki you have the choice of sitting in the Volcano Bay Room, the Thai Grill Room, the Luau Room, the Hong Kong Lounge or the Tiki Lagoon while you sample an eclectic menu of Szechuan, Cantonese and Thai food.

Heading to the Cape for a long weekend? Don't forget to stop by Tiki Port in Hyannis! Since 1977 the Tiki Port has been serving a blend of Cantonese, Szechuan and Mandarin cuisine along with an extensive menu of Polynesian drinks.

Back from your long weekend and in need of something refreshing to erase the memories of bumper to bumper Cape traffic? Park your car, grab your friends, hop on the T and bang the gong at Pho Republique. Their Scorpion Bowl boasts mango, pineapple, passion fruit and an assortment of rums. Yum!

The post-war Golden Era of Tiki may have passed, but that doesn't mean a new generation can't live it up Island-style. Also, when's the last time you went to Saugus? Put a little rum in your summer by taking a pilgrimage to any of these Tiki spots. Or mix up one of these bad boys in the comfort of your own home/Island Oasis.

Jungle Bird

.75 oz Campari

.5 oz fresh lime juice

.5 oz simple syrup

4 oz fresh unsweetened pineapple juice

1.5 oz dark Jamaican rum

Shake well with plenty of ice cubes and pour into a double old fashioned glass or a tiki mug. Garnish with an orchid, plus a maraschino cherry speared to lemon and orange wheels. Place a lei around your neck and enjoy.

From the Aviary Bar of the Kuala Lumpur Hilton, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, circa 1978.

The Measure of Success

2008-06-18T12:12:00.005-04:00

I never thought I would become attached to a kitchen tool. That is, until I met the Oxo angled measuring cup. The 2 oz measuring cup, shown on the right, allows one to accurately measure amounts as small as one quarter ounce. In addition to ounces, their are interior markings for tablespoons and the more traditional exterior markings for milliliters and cups. Mr. Jigger you have served me well, but from now on this detail oriented cocktail lover will be angling for Oxo. Let's put that quarter ounce line to use.

The Hoskins Cocktail
2 oz Plymouth Gin
.75 oz Torani Amer (or Amer Picon)
.5 oz Maraschino Liqueur
.25 oz Cointreau
1 dash orange bitters

Combine ingredients in a mixing glass with ice. Stir. Strain into a cocktail glass and garnish with a flamed orange peel.

Cheers!

Shaken or Stirred?

2008-06-10T16:48:00.005-04:00

Which cocktails should be shaken and which ones should be stirred? If you're a student of classic mixology, you might answer, "That's easy. Drinks with eggs, dairy or fruit juices should be shaken, and 'clear' drinks made with only spirits, vermouth, etc. should be stirred." OK, the first of those mandates is seldom disputed. Stirring an egg drink? Not gonna work. But shaking a Martini? James Bond has some surprising company here.

Take the respected Savoy Cocktail Book: its mixing instructions for clear drinks are all over the map; some recipes say "stir," some say "shake." New York Times restaurant critic William Grimes' much-consulted Straight Up or on the Rocks: the Story of the American Cocktail instructs you to shake a Martini. Even the "Professor," Jerry Thomas, "couldn't make up his mind whether the Cocktail is shaken or stirred," writes David Wondrich in Imbibe! "His brandy Cocktail calls for the spoon, his gin and whiskey ones the shaker. Nor are his professional colleagues much help ... Judging by the numerous depictions of 'tossing the foaming cocktail' back and forth in a huge arc, in the 1860s and 1870s consensus favored this method -- or perhaps it was just the more picturesque one and hence was noticed more often."

That consensus still holds in, like, 99 percent of modern bars. Most drinkers like the theatricality of a shaken drink, and most bartenders are happy to oblige, especially since it's easier for them to employ only one mixing technique. Sure, your Grey Goose with olives will be cloudy with air bubbles, but it'll be drinkable.

Is "drinkable" good enough when you're paying $10-$15 for a cocktail? If you gravitate toward clear mixtures, as the Ladies often do, the answer is probably "no." There's something about a Martini, a Manhattan, a Saratoga or a Gin and It that has been deftly swirled over ice for a good minute, then strained into a chilled cocktail glass without a trace of agitation. What you get is a shimmeringly transparent drink that looks and tastes that much more elegant than its shaken sibling. And consider this: a bartender who takes the time to stir a cocktail is likely going to get its proportions and temperature right, too. Time to re-think your drink, Bond.

The Joys of Vintage Glassware, PT. 1

2008-06-04T00:00:00.002-04:00

by Pinky Gonzales
with Pink Gin

From the collection of Pinky Gonzales and uh... John Collins, we'll call him

So much can be said about old glassware and drinking habits that this will be the first of hopefully a few more posts on the subject. We can probably all agree that the pleasure of drinking is only enhanced (or lessened) by the vessel from which it is drunk, whether that be a Julep, shot of whiskey, glass of champagne, pint of Guinness. All of these have their corresponding, appropriate glassware and for good reasons relating to sensory pleasure. But all that aside, what fun would it be to sip a Scorpion Bowl from say, a beer stein? This is not to say that drinking anything out of a beer stein or smelly old shoe for that matter is not okay either - it's your perogative. You're talking to someone who once drank a vintage Montrachet out of a Poland Springs bottle and loved it. In essence, what I and the ladies of LUPEC would like to say is: have some fun, and get yourself some vintage cocktailware.

Who knows who or what the Spatas were? Who cares! Let's make Zombies.
at Buckaroo's Mercantile, Cambridge

Restaurant economics and today's bigger-is-better consumer culture dictate our glass choices in the public sphere. The ubiquitous, sturdy, plain "martini" glass, for instance, in which anything from a Manhattan to a Margarita can be served is the standard in bars and retail today. The best of these stock tasteful, "smaller" glasses, some "modern vintage", roughly 5-8 oz., while the worst sell ginormous (12 oz.!) glasses on which you could prop a cheeseburger as a garnish.

Diminutive, more manageable-sized cocktails were the norm from the dawn of the cocktail in early nineteenth century America upwards through the sixties. Whether "taken" before a meal to stimulate the appetite or to simply loosen one up, a glass of chilled liquor needn't have been supersized to do the trick. Take a closer look at those aperitifs in the hands of James Bond in Dr. No or Powell & Loy in The Thin Man and see for yourself. And what did they do when they felt they hadn't had enough? Well duh, they had another.

David Embury, cocktail aficionado, back in 1948 wrote in his Fine Art of Mixing Drinks that when seeking glassware one should look for "the large ones - not less than 3 ounces." He also added that a glass "should never be filled to the brim," for overfilling places not only "too great a strain on the aplomb of the guest - especially with the second or third drink - but even the few drops of liquor which someone will inevitably spill will not improve either the guests' clothing or the top of your grand piano on which the glass may be placed."

Wouldn't this look good atop your piano?

The place to start is of course not Crate & Barrel but your local thrifts, flea markets, specialty shops and online sites for some vintage stems - or better yet, your Grandma's attic. You don't have to spend a fortune. Check out the great Buckaroo's Mercantile [link: www.buckmerc.com] for random and wonderfully weird tiki and party bits. The flea market Todd Farm [link: www.toddfarm.com] in Rowley on a Sunday for amazing finds, and sites like Rubylane.com for online thrift. Stir up an ice cold beverage and sip from what you found. Toast to your Grandpappy's Meemaw. Toast to Noni, my Midwestern Great-grandflapper, or why not to Jerry Thomas?

"John Collins" serving up a pair of beautiful old silver-mugged mint juleps for lunch. Life is hard.

Whoa - what's she?
Original Trader Vic's
Pinky Gonzales mug.
Me gusta.

Don't be a jackass. Not all the time, anyway.

The Green Hour

2008-05-28T12:57:00.008-04:00

After 95 years of being a big no no, absinthe is once again legal in the United States. Here in Boston we are fortunate to have wonderful liquor retailers such as Brix and Downtown Wine and Spirits so finding the two available absinthes, Lucid and Kubler, is a simple enough task. But what do you do once you've made that purchase?

Traditionally the consumption of absinthe was highly ritualized. At the end of a long, arduous day folks would meet for the green hour. With a glass of absinthe in hand, people would gather around an absinthe fountain. From multiple spigots ice water would slowly drip over sugar cube laden slotted absinthe spoons. As the glasses of absinthe slowly clouded over from the bottom up those waiting to imbibe would catch up on the day's news and local gossip. Once the liquid was a uniform, pearly color the absinthe was ready to drink. Obviously not many of us today have an absinthe fountain hanging around, but you can easily replicate this process at home with a small pitcher of ice water, spoons and your good friends.

Of course as lovers of all things cocktail, the ladies of LUPEC love to use our absinthe to mix up something tasty during our green hour! Here are a few recipes to get you started.

Chrysanthemum Cocktail

2 oz French Vermouth

1 oz Benedictine

3 dashes Absinthe

Stir ingredients with ice. Strain into your favorite chilled vintage cocktail glass. Squeeze orange peel on top.

Corpse Reviver (No. 2)*

.75 oz Dry Gin

.75 oz Lillet

.75 oz Cointreau

.75 oz Lemon Juice

1 dash Absinthe

Shake ingredients well with ice. Strain into your favorite chilled vintage cocktail glass.

* In The Savoy Cocktail Book author Harry Craddock noted "Four of these taken in quick succession will unrevive the corpse again."

Fascinator Cocktail

2 oz Dry Gin

1 oz French Vermouth

2 dashes Absinthe

1 mint sprig

Shake ingredients well with ice. Strain cocktail through a tea strainer into your favorite chilled vintage cocktail glass.

Are you still thirsty and feeling a bit adventurous? Pull out your favorite recipes that call for pastis and substitute absinthe. Remember that absinthe can be kind of a bully, so start by using small quantities and then adjust to taste.

Cheers!

Dispatches from the May meeting

2008-05-23T13:18:00.004-04:00

by Pink Gin

The theme of the May LUPEC Boston meeting was Travel.

We live in an amazing time when women have status and choices and when travel is cheap and easy. The ladies of LUPEC Boston celebrated the convergence of these 'movements' with food, drink, conversation, and authentic costumes from around the world. Featured readings came from Stuff at Night (on the topic of LUPEC's Little Black Book of Cocktails), the Complete Book for the Intelligent Woman Traveler by Frances Koltun, published in 1967 (on the lively topic of bidets), and Easy to Make Maidens and Cocktails: A Mixing, Swingers Bar Guide published by Enrol in 1965 (illustrated with a saucy dame for each base spirit).

Recipes were selected on the theme of travel, including the traveler's imperative to seek out local specialties - in this case, JP!

Monday-night Mug

2 bottles of Cantina Bostonia White Table Wine
~12 oz. Picon
~6 oz. St. Germain
10-12 dashes orange bitters
1 lemon

Mix the refrigerated wine and other liquid ingredients into a punch bowl. Slice the lemon and float on top.

This recipe was inspired by the French classic of mixing local white wine and Picon. Cantina Bostonia is the only Boston-based wine maker. They make sulfite-free wines just a few blocks away in the brewery complex. The wines have plenty of character and will definitely remind you of homemade. In this case the recipe testing and decision to create a punch came late the night before the LUPEC meeting. Thanks to k. montuori for recipe development and for saying, "In JP you don't get punched, you get mugged."

Pink Gin

Recipe as given in the Little Black Book. Inspired by thoughts of the high seas, of course!

Normandy

Recipe as given in the Little Black Book. Harpoon Cider is the featured Boston ingredient.

Irish Coffee with a secret

~1 tsp. sugar of any sort (I happened to have agave syrup last night and it was fine)
2 oz. Irish whiskey (Powers was the brand on hand)
8 oz. stovetop espresso brewed with a generous portion of red pepper flake (thanks to mcoffee for the brew)
Heavy cream (from a New England farm of course)

Assemble the sugar, whiskey, and coffee in a stemmed glass. Stir. Whip unsweetened cold cream to desired consistency (I like it just shy of soft peaks) and carefully spoon on top.

One story has it that the original Irish Coffee was invented in the Shannon International Airport Lounge. Truth or fiction? Who cares! The secret is in the spice.

Cheers!

gin and vermouth -- two tickets to paradise

2008-05-21T00:00:00.005-04:00

by Pink Lady

The LUPEC Boston column in this week's issue of the Weekly Dig stars two spirits that have become less and less vogue in the age of the extra extra dry, extra extra dirty vodka martini: gin and vermouth. I will save discussion of the "original" martini recipe (and modern bastardizations thereof) for a later date. For now, let's get to know these two glorious spirits a little better. They are key ingredients in a good many endangered cocktails, as LUPEC Boston member and Drinkboston founder Barbara West explains beautifully here. To coax these classics back from beyond the grave you will need to cozy up to both.

So, vermouth: qu'est-ce que c'est?

It's simply fortified wine aromatized with herbs and spices. As the story goes, vermouth was invented in Italy in the 1780s by Anthony Carpano -- allegedly it was grandma's recipe -- and the name is derived from the German term for key ingredient wormwood ("Wermuth"). Vermouth herb & spice blends are as protected and proprietary as recipes for gin botanicals, and can contain something on the order of 40 - 50 ingredients. Carpano's original vermouth was sweet and red; about a generation later, French herbalist Joseph Noilly invented a dry vermouth based on the delicate, dry white wines and local plants of his region, and also made with wormwood (which is also a key ingredient in Absinthe; more info on that in next week's column.)

Vermouth was originally referred to according to its country of origin, especially in old cocktail books. Italian vermouth references the sweet stuff and French vermouth references dry. Grazie, Antonio! Merci, Joseph!

Many Americans fear vermouth in this modern age of drinking, as The Spirit World's post on the topic articulates. Perhaps your first encounter was with vermouth that had gone stale for lack of use in your parent's liquor cabinet? Lesson learned, you shouldn't have been dipping into their stash while they were out of town, anyway. In any event, I implore you to give vermouth another try as a grown up. It's cheap enough to buy a few bottles, taste and compare, and discover on your own what you like best -- and what works best in different cocktail recipes. Married...with Dinner conducted a vermouth-by-vermouth in home taste test, the results of which are very enlightening.

My most recent vermouth "a-ha!" moment came with the purchase of a bottle each of Extra Dry and Sweet Vya at Brix in the South End. It's expensive for sure, retailing for $25 whereas other bottles in the category hover around $7 - $10, but Vya is a truly worth it investment, especially if you can find a way to write off alcohol purchases. Vya Extra Dry is light, herbaceous, and melon-y; Vya Sweet is warm, complex, citrus-y and spicy -- it reminds me of sipping my Swedish Pop-pop's glug by the fire on a snowy New Year's Eve in Vermont.

And for you gin-shy folks...

I actually did have a gin-cident circa my freshman year of college. I do not speak of what ensued that night and I didn't touch the juniper scented stuff for nearly a decade thereafter. Then I fell in love with classic cocktails and it was only a matter of time before my vodka days were numbered. If I can do it, you can too.

What really brought me back was the gin tasting we did at our very first LUPEC meeting in February 2007. It was an aggressive re-entry but it got me over the initial hump, and also taught me a very important lesson: not all gins are created equal. I found Hendrick's, with its crisp, clean flavors and fresh cucumber notes t be a great gateway gin. I also like the then locally unavailable Blue Coat Gin that a friend had smuggled across state lines for our hostess from the "City of Brotherly Love." I also learned as we tasted each gin side-by-side that it is the botanical blend of Tanqueray that my mind and palate equate with my gincident, not gin or it's juniper flavors. Et voila, I am now officially a gin girl.

I'm sure you've tried Absolut Citron or Grey Goose Orange; gin is just a few steps away from those flavored neutral grain spirits. Here are a few starter cocktails to get you going:

The Pegu Club
So refreshing & delicious, this is the one that REALLY brought me back to gin, at Taste of the South End last year. I had about seventeen of these.

1.5 oz Plymouth Gin
.5 oz Orange Curacao
.5 oz Fresh Lime Juice
1 dash Angostura Bitters
1 dash Orange Bitters

Blue Skies
Tried this again recently at our April '08 meeting at Barbara West's house -- so delicious!

1 oz Applejack
1 oz Gin
.5 oz Lemon Juice
.25 oz Simple Syrup
1 or dashes grenadine
Shake with cracked ice and strain into your favorite vintage cocktail glass!

The French 75
What better way to sneak gin into the glass of an unsuspecting gin-phobe? By adding lemon, sugar, and champagne...

2 oz Gin
1 oz fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons sugar or 1 tsp simple syrup
Champagne

Cin-cin!

The Pink Lady Cocktail

2008-05-14T01:00:00.004-04:00

by Pink Lady

Hopefully you all caught the debut of the LUPEC Boston column in this week's issue of The Weekly Dig. As promised, here's a little more info on our favorite recipe for the Pink Lady, and a few notes on why I thought it an appropriate choice as the very first cocktail for our very first Dig column.

At first glance The Pink Lady appears to bear all the trappings of a "girly" drink - a feminine name, an approachable frothiness, a pastel hue. But the Pink Lady is no drink for the faint of heart: its tart-dry flavor is a far cry from the cloyingly sweet "girly" cocktails we're wary of in this modern era of drinking. And its boozy gin & apple brandy base packs a whallop. As Eric Felten wrote in his Wall Street Journal column on the topic, "though a tasty drink worthy of inclusion in the cocktail canon, the Pink Lady has found its reputation dogged by association with a dubious aesthetic." It is a cocktail that is easily underestimated. After enjoying one or two of these, though, I'm sure you'll agree: ladylike as she is, the Pink Lady kicks ass and takes names. She's a LUPEC kind of gal. Our favorite recipe is below:

Pink Lady Cocktail

1-1/2 oz gin
1/2 oz applejack
1/2 oz fresh lemon juice
1/2 oz grenadine (preferably homemade)
1 egg white

Combine ingredients in a shaker and shake vigorously without ice.
Add ice; shake continue vigorous shaking.
Strain into your favorite vintage cocktail glass.

There are two classic cocktail lessons inherent in the making of a Pink Lady:

Lesson #1: Quality of ingredients: your drinks will only taste as good as the stuff you use to make them. Most of the cocktails the ladies of LUPEC Boston are intent on reviving were invented in the days before preservatives kept juices intact for weeks on end. When trying them out at home, you too should use the freshest ingredients you can find. For the Pink Lady you'll need fresh lemons and we highly recommend using homemade grenadine: the flavor is leaps and bounds beyond the stuff you can buy in a bottle, and it's really simple to make. Hanky Panky's recipe is below.

Grenadine

Combine equal parts pomegranate juice (Pom, par example) and sugar in a saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium high heat. Reduce the heat and simmer for 7 minutes. Remove from heat and add 1 tsp orange flower water for every 1/2 cup pomegranate juice used. Cool.

Lesson #2: Eggs in cocktails: We know, we know. The whole "egg thing" is a really weird concept for many classic cocktail novices, but I promise you, your trip down classic cocktail lane won't be nearly as fulfilling if you can't get over it. As you cozy up to the raw-egg-in-a-drink idea, ask yourself: when is the last time you ever heard of someone in America actually getting salmonella? And if I offered you a taste of delicious raw batter from the cookies I've just whipped up, would you decline? I thought not. If you're still having doubts, check out this recent article in the New York Times: see, eggs are HUGE in New York.

Once you're ready to take the egg plunge, get your biceps ready. For egg cocktails to reach the delicious, frothy state that is their hallmark, you've got to shake the bejesus out of them. First, however, the egg white must be emulsified, hence the instruction to combine all ingredients in your shaker and give 'em a good shake BEFORE adding ice. A very insightful post on the topic can be found on the Robert Huegel's Explore the Pour blog: the author advocates shaking ingredients ten times, then add just slightly more ice than the amount of standing liquid in your shaker.

After adding ice, shake...and shake...and shake...and shake your Pink Lady, remembering all the while that egg cocktails take time -- a LONG time -- but once they are perfect and complete in your cocktail glass, just seconds from slipping down your throat, they are oh so worth the labor and the wait.

Like anything worth doing, really.

Cin-cin!

Pink Lady photo borrowed from the Thinking of Drinking blog.

LUPEC Boston + the Weekly Dig

2008-05-09T00:40:00.005-04:00

by Pink Lady

Boston residents will soon be able to get their weekly dose of LUPEC in print as well as here online.

Starting next week The Weekly Dig will publish a weekly LUPEC Boston column filled with all manner of boozy material including cocktail history, tips for how to mix awesome classic drinks at home, introductions to new spirits, the story behind vintage spirits, news about our upcoming events, and more -- and a cocktail recipe each week, of course.

Pick up a copy of this week's Dig to read an introduction by our fabulous editor and fellow cocktail maven, Christine Liu.

Try one of these as you toast our new print home!

THE IRMA LA DOUCE | AN ORIGINAL, 2007

[from Little Black Blook of Cocktails: Namesake & Favorite Recipes by LUPEC Boston

Irma La Douce is a movie in which Shirley MacLaine plays a Parisian prostitute who wears bright green stockings.

1.5 ounces Hendrick's Gin

0.5 ounces Green Chartreuse

0.5 ounces cucumber purée (peel and blend fresh cucumber, then pass through a sieve)

0.5 ounces fresh lemon juice

0.5 ounces fresh grapefruit juice

0.25 ounces simple syrup

Combine ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Cin-cin!

Happy World Cocktail Week!

2008-05-08T14:58:00.004-04:00

by Pink Lady

Dear Boston Drinkers,

The ladies of LUPEC Boston would like to invite you all to raise a glass to our very favorite holiday week: World Cocktail Week.

The brainchild of the geniuses behind the Museum of the American Cocktail, World Cocktail Week was established to celebrate the rich history of the cocktail and recognize the craftsmanship and skill of the bartenders who have been mixing them for over 200 years. It starts today, May 8th and culminates on World Cocktail Day, Tuesday, May 13th.

We will be celebrating World Cocktail Day on May 13th at the Drinkboston party at Green Street (details to follow on that.) Hopefully some of you will join us there. In the event that you can't, why not start the celebration today with a Sazerac? Believed by some to be the "original" cocktail, and unarguably one of the oldest cocktails around, we couldn't think of a better way to kick off the celebration than kicking back with one of these.

The Sazerac
Recipe borrowed from Drinkboston
1 sugar cube (4-7 grams)
7 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters
1 oz water
3 oz Sazerac rye whiskey
A few drops of Herbsaint (pastis)

Muddle first three ingredients in mixing glass. “Rinse” a pre-chilled, old-fashioned glass with Herbsaint (pour drops of Herbsaint into glass, swirl and discard). Add rye to mixing glass and fill with ice. Stir well for 30 seconds and strain into Herbsaint-rinsed glass. Squeeze lemon twist over glass and rub around rim. Discard peel.

Cin-cin!

The Little Black Book of Cocktails by LUPEC Boston

2008-04-17T11:57:00.001-04:00

by Pink Lady

Whenever LUPEC throws a party I find myself gleefully overwhelmed: So many cocktails on offer, so little time...however will I sample all of the delicious drinks on this list in one evening? Perhaps I'd try if I were a guest, but since I'm there representing a ladies club devoted to sophisticated and responsible imbibing, I abstain, lest I end up dancing on a table with a lampshade on my head.

But what about all those cocktails I missed out on?

Now, thanks the the recently available Little Black Book of Cocktails by LUPEC Boston, many of those drinks can be made in the comfort of your own home. Handsomely designed by LUPEC Boston's own Pinky Gonzalez, this smart little book contains recipes for all ten of the "namesake cocktails" of the ladies of LUPEC Boston, plus recipes for some of our favorite classics and vintage-inspired originals -- approximately 40 favorites in all. We've designed it with readers like you in mind, so you may enjoy these fine drinks at home, on your own time -- lampshade chapeau-ed dance optional.

The book costs $15 and all proceeds from book sales benefit the Friends Boutique at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, which provides wigs, prosthetics, scarves and services for people dealing with the appearance side effects of cancer treatment.

LUPEC partnered with Cambridge-based photographer Matt Demers last fall to participate in his "Women in Pearls" series. Modeled after a striking black and white photograph of 1920s It-girl Louise Brooks (right), the "Pearls" project is Demers' study on body image and beauty for modern women. In the artists' own words,

"Thanks to the photographic magic of Eugene Robert Richee the starlet [Brooks] was stripped of culturally-defined trappings. No make-up, high-fashion or salon treatments. Black on black, her physical body shape disappeared into the abyss. Over-exposed skin tones erased any skin flaws. The authentic Louise Brooks emerged, bold and exquisite."

In Demers' mind, LUPEC + Pearls = a match made in heaven: "Passionate about their craft, bucking stereotypes with gusto, champions for social causes: the LUPEC ladies were a natural fit for my evolving project. Channeling the spirit of the Pandora’s Box muse, the ladies stepped in front of the camera with fearless zest to become the cornerstone of the series."

And his images, in turn, became the cornerstone of The Little Black Book of Cocktails by LUPEC Boston.

To order a copy of The Little Black Book of Cocktails email us at lupecboston@gmail.com. You can also pick up a copy at Magpie (617-623-3330) in Davis Square, Somerville, or Buckaroo’s Mercantile (617-492-4792) in Central Square, Cambridge.

And let us know what you think of the drinks by dropping us a note in the comments section. The first reader to respond letting us know they've tried all ten cocktails just might receive a special prize at our next event!

A sante!

Baseball & Beer for Broads

2008-04-15T10:22:00.005-04:00

The Advancement of Girls' Education is having a "dough raiser" at Uno's in Porter Square this Thursday the 17th. 15% of the evening's proceeds will be donated to the organization, which works to provide secondary school scholarships, mentoring, and leadership training so that girls in rural villages in Malawi can continue their education.

Come watch the game with us and support these young ladies!

A Good Cocktail Starts with Good Water

2008-04-12T10:55:00.000-04:00

by Pink Gin

The ladies of LUPEC Boston have focused their charitable energies on local women’s causes. But there are a lot of ways to give back, and here is one that helps women in developing countries.

Water For People (WFP), a non-profit organization, is a champion for people in developing countries - helping them help themselves by implementing simple, affordable water and sanitation solutions to meet the needs of their community.

Why is this a women’s issue? According to research cited by WFP:

--The average distance that women in developing countries walk to collect water per day is 6 kilometers (4 miles) and the average weight that women carry on their heads is approximately 20 kilograms (44 pounds), the same weight as airport luggage allowance. (WSSCC, 2004)

--Almost 70% of the world’s citizens living in poverty are women. (World Water Day, 2001)

Water For People projects impact entire communities—hundreds of people. Safe drinking water and adequate sanitation can change the economic climate because people are able to work and build businesses. Children are less likely to be ill and can attend school. Women are free from tedious water collection and are free to take care of their families and generate income. Entrepreneurs sprout up around the water project, finding creative ways to begin new businesses related to this new community asset.

So -- in the spirit of LUPEC Boston’s belief that having fun and making the world a better place are not contradictory – check out the Water For People Gala Celebration!

This event features:

--High-scoring dining
--Pre-Gala tours of Fenway Park
--Live jazz entertainment
--Live auction of Red Sox memorabilia
--Special MC - WCVB's Karen Holmes Ward

Proceeds from this event will go directly to WFP, so your contribution will have a significant impact on the lives of impoverished people worldwide.

Sponsorship opportunities and tickets are available now!

And if you can't make it to the event, we suggest raising a Croton Cocktail in one hand (as you make out a generous donation check with the other) in honor of this great cause.

A salut!

LADIES NIGHT at Toro: the numbers are in

2008-04-09T15:33:00.003-04:00

Between drink sales, book sales, and raffles tickets, LUPEC Boston raised $2230 for the Friends Boutique at LADIES NIGHT at Toro our March 30th event. Not bad for a three-hour long cocktail party.

Thanks again to all who came out to support the cause. We're thrilled!

Also check out this article about LUPEC and the Ladies Night event in the online women's magazine, Misstropolis.

Cin-cin!

A toast to those who can run 26.2 miles

2008-04-04T13:01:00.002-04:00

In two and a half weeks, 1,250 runners of the Boston Marathon will raise hundreds of thousands of dollars for charity. Let's support these athletic, ambitious ladies!

Casey is one woman who will be running, in honor of her grandmother, to improve the lives of those affected by Alzheimer's and promote research and effective treatments. If you'd like to donate to this cause, click here.

If you know of any other fabulous broads running the marathon in support of their causes, please post a comment with the link to their donation page so LUPEC readers can share their support!

May your feet fly, ladies. I'll be toasting you with an Aviation at Eastern Standard in Kenmore Square.

Aviation

1 1/2 ounces gin
3/4 ounce maraschino liqueur
3/4 ounce fresh lemon juice
Maraschino cherry (optional)

Shake the gin, maraschino liqueur, and lemon juice well with ice; then strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a maraschino cherry, if desired.

LADIES NIGHT at Toro: Now THAT was a night!

2008-03-31T18:26:00.006-04:00

Thanks to all of you who joined us last night for LADIES NIGHT at Toro, our St-Germain sponsored toast to Women's History Month!

The evening was, quite literally, a smashing success. From 9:30 on, Toro was packed with people there to raise a glass in honor of Women's History Month. Our guests rocked the raffle and we raised almost $800 in ticket sales. As for specialty cocktail sales we're still counting our change, but by 10:30 p.m. last night we'd raised about $1,000 on drinks alone!!! We'll pass along the final numbers once they're in. All of this paper will be donated to The Friends Boutique at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

There's still one more evening left of Women's History Month. If you'd like to raise a glass in honor of women in history -- and women making history -- this rainy Monday evening, why not raise one of these? They sure were a hit last night.

St-Germain Cocktail
Fill a tall glass (12oz or 16oz) with ice.
Add dry sparkling wine of your choice (about 3 oz)
Add StG (about 2 oz)
Top off with soda h2o.
Add a lemon twist, tres delice!

All ten ladies of LUPEC with staff photographer, Matt Demers in the middle. Cin-cin!

LUPEC Boston is throwing a party-fundraiser this Sunday so come on down!

2008-03-26T09:50:00.003-04:00

by Pinky Gonzales
March 30th, beginning at 9:00pm @:
Toro
1704 Washington St
South End, Boston, MA 02118
(617) 536-4300‎
toro-restaurant.com

Come down for a fashionably late-hour toast to Women's History Month
(March), some great sips from local sponsors, and to get your copy of
our brand-spanking new Little Black Book of Cocktails, featuring the
photography of Boston's Matt Demers. Did we mention a killer raffle,
too?

No cover charge, and ALL are welcome, so spread the word!! Cocktail
attire encouraged.

There will be complimentary hors d'oeuvres provided by Ken Oringer &
Toro, and the Ladies of LUPEC have created a specialty drinks list featuring liquids
donated by the good people of St Germain, Hendrick's Gin and Harpoon
Beer, to name a few.

If that's not enough you can jump aboard for the raffle - which includes dinners & goods from Oleana, Tremont 647, No. 9 Park, the Independent, Martignetti Fine Wine & Spirits and more.

ALL PROCEEDS from the sale of specialty cocktails, raffle tickets, and from the Little Black Book will be donated to The Friends Boutique at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, a unique shop designed for people undergoing treatments for cancer. http://www.friendsboutique.org/
This charity was chosen with our friends & relatives in mind who have themselves battled cancer.

Last fall LUPEC Boston partnered with Jane Doe Inc., the Massachusetts Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence and raised more than $10,000 in donations through fundraising initiatives such as a "This One's for the Ladies" drink promotion and the "LUPEC Boston Tea Party" benefit event. We hope to make LADIES NIGHT, as well, a success.

Looking forward to seeing all of you Sunday!

A different kind of Easter egg...

2008-03-22T12:22:00.013-04:00

...can be enjoyed at Green Street this Easter Sunday, where LUPEC President Hanky Panky has put together a special Egg Drink List in honor of the holiday.

This important ingredient of many, many classics like fizzes and flips has fallen out of misuse in the age of the Cosmo. Cocktail enthusiasts across the country are helping the mighty egg make a comeback by incorporating egg-based classics and modern vintage egg originals into their menus. The Egg Drink List offered at Green Street tomorrow evening will be a perfect opportunity to give eggs a shot. The menu will include original creations, like the Fort Washington Flip, The Brewster Sour, a variation on the Pisco Sour featuring St-Germain, and of course, the irrepressible Pink Lady.

The list is available all night long and the bar is open from 5:30 'til 1. If you aren't completely stuffed with ham or lamb, Green Street will be serving their full dinner menu from 5:30 to 10:30. There is no cover charge, and be sure to bring your patience, as egg-based drinks require time and lots and lots of shaking. A special guest shaker will accompany Hanky Panky from an undisclosed location in a very tony Boston neighborhood (can you guess who it is?)

So when you're all set with these...

You can move on to these!

Consider it a grown-up Easter Egg Hunt!

(Pink Lady photo courtesy of thinking of drinking.)

Hello, sucker!

2008-03-19T15:09:00.008-04:00

by Pinky Gonzales

...This was the standard greeting you'd likely receive from the jovial, peroxide blonde manning the house at one of several Manhattan speakeasies during Prohibition. Of course, this would foreshadow the spending of all your dough, on illegal hooch and tips for the showgirls. You'd happily fork over $25 (back then no chump change) for a fifth of Scotch, or $2 for a pitcher of water if you brought your own "booster", and whatever else followed. The place would probably be packed, open a few hours later than all the rest, and the wisecracking, witty pal of Mae West named Texas Guinan would be seeing to it you were having a darned good time.

(Ouch! Dancer Drena Beach, 1926.)

Before being seduced into the world of club ownership through bartending and guest emceeing, Texas started out in Vaudville, then in Westerns as an actress and producer. 1917's The Wildcat introduced America's first movie cowgirl.

Her nite club career included "the grandaddy of speakeasies," the El Fey Club, opened in 1924 with gangster Larry Fey. Later came Club Intime, a Dorothy Parker hangout and subterranean spot near Times Square where entry would involve a steep staircase, two bouncers and a peephole. There was also the Rendezvous, the 300 Club, the Argonaut, the Century, the Salon Royal, and Tex Guinan's.

Infamous for being hauled off to the pokey on a regular basis and having her joints shut down by Feds, Texas enjoyed having the band strikeup "The Prisoner's Song" on her way out the door. And always would she deny selling anything but "mixers" to at her clubs, noting "a man could get hurt falling off a bar stool!" Re-opening after raids, she would sometimes wear a necklace of gold padlocks just to show the cops there were no hard feelings.

She worked tirelessly until age 49, when she was stricken by illness and passed away. 12,000 attended her 1933 funeral procession in Manhattan, and a month later to the day of her death, Prohibition was repealed.

Looks like a Women's History Month toast is in store for this gal!

Scoff Law Cocktail (what else?)

1 oz rye whiskey
1 oz dry vermouth
.75 oz fresh lemon juice
.75 oz green Chartreuse (or pomegranate grenadine according to some recipes - also excellent)
2 dashes orange bitters

Shake all ingredients with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Cheers!

Charlotte Smith and the "Lady Edisons"

2008-03-10T19:55:00.007-04:00

by Barbara West

"Mary S." of St. Louis, Missouri (c. 1851-1880) was an inventor who led a life of genius and poverty. Lacking finances and confidence, she sold the rights to her mechanical inventions to various male agents, for as little as $5 each. These men received 53 patents, and a great deal of wealth. Mary S. herself died impoverished at roughly age 30.

The tragic story of Mary S. spurred one of her acquaintances, Charlotte Smith, to seek justice and recognition for women inventors. A businesswoman and former intelligence agent for the Union Army during the Civil War, Smith was known for empathizing with the struggles of self-supporting women. She wrote about Mary S. in The Woman Inventor, a magazine she founded in 1891. She also pushed for the publication of an official List of Women Patentees. Feminists used the list to argue for women’s suffrage. Today, the list remains the major source of information on 19th-century female inventors. These women were patronizingly dubbed “Lady Edisons.”

Thanks to the list, we know that nearly 4,000 women received U.S. patents between 1809 and 1895—more than 5,000 if design patents are counted. One of the era’s most prolific female inventors was Margaret Knight of Boston (1838-1914). She is credited with about 90 inventions and 22 patents, the most famous of which was the first machine to make the square-bottomed paper bags that are still used in grocery stores today.

In the late 1890s, Smith moved to Boston, where she founded a Women’s Rescue League to provide shelter, food, and training for poor working girls, homeless or battered women, and prostitutes wanting to leave the trade. In 1907, she organized a Woman’s Board of Trade. After spending thousands of dollars on projects to help women become self-supporting, and years of direct charity to homeless and desperate women, Smith died alone in Boston in 1917. She was seventy-seven.

Here’s a cocktail with which to toast our industrious forebroads known as “Lady Edisons.”

Edisonian Cocktail

2 ounces brandy
1 ounce Campari
1 ounce fresh lemon juice

Shake brandy, Campari and lemon juice with ice. Strain into a cocktail glass.

Sources:
http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/it/1992/1/1992_1_22.shtml
http://web.mit.edu/invent/iow/whm2.html

March is Women's History Month!

2008-03-03T16:25:00.004-05:00

March is Women's History Month and the ladies of LUPEC Boston could not be more thrilled!

Thru March 31st we'll be offering you as many reasons to raise a glass to unsung women in history as this group of ambitious, classic cocktail-obsessed broads can cobble together...while maintaining our full-time jobs and going about the general day-to-day business of dismantling the patriarchy one drink at a time, that is. Get your cocktail shakers primed!

We'll also be celebrating with a "Ladies Night" Party at Toro on Sunday, March 30th! Stay tuned for more details...

Let's start the month off with a Liberty Cocktail, in honor of each and every one of the women we'll celebrate in the month to come...and ambitious women everywhere!

Liberty Cocktail

1 dash simple syrup
1/3 rum
2/3 Applejack

Stir with ice and strain. Serve in a cocktail glass.

Salut!

Going to the Chapel!

2008-02-29T18:34:00.005-05:00

Today was a big day for the ladies of LUPEC Boston. No, it's not because we're so excited about Women's History Month starting tomorrow we can't even stand it! It's because one of LUPEC Boston's very own tied the knot today!

That's right, today Miss Contessa became a Mrs. She and her beloved just couldn't let Leap Day go by without doing something special...so they got hitched this morning at city hall! Then it was off to Harvard Square to get matching nuptial tattoos.

A very special wedding reception was held in their honor this afternoon at Silvertone. LUPEC Boston was very well represented. We were positively overjoyed when the bride & groom made their grand entrance , looking as picture perfect as the figurines atop a wedding cake.

Let's raise a glass of one of these to the nuptial couple this weekend!

Tin Wedding Cocktail

1 oz brandy

3/4 oz sweet vermouth

3/4 oz gin

2 dashes orange bitters

Stir in mixing glass with ice & strain. Serve in a cocktail glass.

Wedding Belles

3/4 oz gin

3/4 oz Red Dubonnet

1/2 oz orange juice

1/2 oz cherry flavored brandy

Shake in iced cocktail shaker & strain. Serve in a cocktail glass.

LUPEC president nominated as Boston's Best Bartender!

2008-02-27T14:48:00.004-05:00

We are SO thrilled that LUPEC's very own Misty Kalkofen has been nominated by the Phoenix for the title of Boston's best bartender!

At least we think they mean Misty...they nominated someone named Rusty Kalkofen from Green Street for the award. Unless Misty has an evil, equally competent bartending twin, we're going to go ahead and assume this is a typo.

Click thru here to vote for for Misty, our fearless LUPEC leader and the only woman on the list!

Chin-chin!

Nina Simone: The High Priestess of Song

2008-02-22T13:19:00.006-05:00

by MiMi

Protest singer, jazz vocalist, pianist, temperamental diva and American civil rights heroine, Nina Simone remains one of the most important musicians in American music history.

Born Eunice Kathleen Waymon on February 21 in 1933, Simone started playing the piano at the age of four, and made her concert debut when she was just ten years old. During her recital, her parents were moved to the back of the hall to make room for white people. She refused to play until they were brought back to the front.

She wanted to be the first black concert pianist and was one of the first black women to be classically trained at Julliard. She started playing jazz and pop music in clubs in the mid-1950’s while at Julliard to supplement her income, changing her name to Nina Simone, possibly to protect her classical standing. She never intended to sing, but started when a club manager told her she would lose her job if she didn’t. She became instantly popular, and was known for her inventive style that incorporated jazz, Bach, pop, soul, folk, gospel, and show tunes.

She had a majestic onstage presence, and was known for her love/hate relationship with the audience. She sang with such raw power and soul; if you didn’t like it, you could get out.
She paid great attention to the musical expression of emotions, and could range from intense highs to melancholy tragedy in a single concert or album. She was diagnosed with bi-polar disorder in the sixties, but it was kept secret until after she died.

Simone recorded over forty albums over the course of her life, each progressing in artistic control over the next one. She becomes more and more vocal about racial prejudice over the years; after 1964 the civil rights message became standard in her recording repertoire.
She recorded songs such “Mississippi Goddam” – her response to the bombing of a church that killed four black children and covered “Strange Fruit” – Billie Holiday’s anthem about lynchings of black men in the south. After Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered she sang “Why? The King of Love is Dead.” She turned Lorraine Hansberry’s play “To Be Young, Gifted and Black” into a civil rights song. This song became the “National Anthem of Black America.”

When you raise a glass to toast the weekend, let's toss one back for the late, great Nina Simone, whose birthday was yesterday and whose legacy lives on in song!

Chorus Lady
Juice of 1/4 orange
1/3 Gin
1/3 French Vermouth
1/3 Italian Vermouth

Shake well and strain into a medium glass, add slice of orange and a cherry.

LUPEC + Imbibe!

2008-02-20T11:47:00.002-05:00

Check out the Jan/Feb issue of IMBIBE! Magazine, where LUPEC gets a shout out in the "Uncorked" column on p.18!

Thanks for the shout-out, IMBIBE! Here's to bringing back classics for a whole new generation of drinkers, Hanky Panky style!

By Jove! Now That's The Real Hanky-Panky

2008-02-18T11:53:00.003-05:00

by Pinky Gonzales

Ada Coleman, American Bar, London

Hanky-Panky (n. slang)

Various definitions from the Oxford English to the American Heritage Dictionaries include "questionable or underhanded activity", "sexual dalliance", "trickery, double-dealings", shenanigans", "hocus-pocus".

I like the Hanky-Panky. It's got a great backstory, mysterious etymology, association with our president (LUPEC Boston's that is, not the doofball in D.C.), and is simply a fine cocktail, back from the brink of extinction.

First of all, our own "Hanky Panky" (her LUPEC alias) has turned another year older this week, so from all of us, HP: Happy Birthday! And while she may be down in NYC engaging in first-class shenanigans, here at the blog we're spinning old records, nibbling groovy party snacks, and meditating on the origins of the following drink (whip one up & join us):

Hanky-Panky (the original, from the Savoy Cocktail Book)

2 Dashes Fernet Branca

1/2 Italian Vermouth

1/2 Dry Gin

Shake well and strain into a cocktail glass. Squeeze orange peel on top.

or, two:

Hanky-Panky (recipe courtesy of John Gertsen)

1/4 oz. Fernet Branca

1 oz. Cinzano Rosso

2 oz. Beefeater Gin

Stir and strain into a cocktail glass. Squeeze the oil from an orange peel on top.

The drink, created in the 1920's, is a variation on the original (sweet) Martini. It nicely utilizes the herbalicious Italian liqueur Fernet Branca. In spirit, it reminds me of another punchy drink with a potentially-overwhelming-but-not herbal liqueur element, the Alaska, made with Chartreuse.

According to it's word origins at mindlesscrap.com , "About 150 years ago, British master magicians used to swing handkerchiefs with one hand to keep viewers from noticing what they were doing with the other. This practice was so common that the use of a hanky came to be associated with any clandestine or sneaky activity. It's thought that since magicians used the words hocus-pocus, a rhyming word was added to give it pizzazz."

Who created the Hanky Panky? The first head barman at the famed American Bar in London, who happened to be a broad named Ada Coleman. As the story goes, "Coley", a mixologist of reputable character who could trash-talk with the best of them, invented the drink for a colorful bar regular. Coleman spoke of it herself, to a London newspaper in 1925:

"The late Charles Hawtrey ... was one of the best judges of cocktails that I knew. Some years ago, when he was overworking, he used to come into the bar and say, 'Coley, I am tired. Give me something with a bit of punch in it.' It was for him that I spent hours experimenting until I had invented a new cocktail. The next time he came in, I told him I had a new drink for him. He sipped it, and, draining the glass, he said, 'By Jove! That is the real hanky-panky!' And Hanky-Panky it has been called ever since."

Coleman worked at the American Bar at the swank Savoy Hotel from 1903-1926, during the cocktail's coming-out era in Europe. Owners renamed their establishments "American Bars" as a selling point - a way of distinguishing them from mere pubs or gin-&-tonic joints. The American craft of mixing up Sazeracs, Martinis, Ramos Gin Fizzes and the like became all the rage. Coleman's barstools saw the likes of Charlie Chaplin, Marlene Dietrich, WC Fields, Prince of Wales, and Mark Twain. I wonder if Twain was sitting at Ada's bar when he wrote: “The cheapest and easiest way to become an influential man and be looked up to by the community at large was to stand behind a bar, wear a cluster diamond pin, and sell whiskey. I am not sure but that the saloon-keeper held a shade higher rank than any other member of society.”

Bartender Harry Craddock filled Ada's role managing the bar in 1924, after he had left dry America for work abroad. In 1930, he published "The Savoy Cocktail Book", an Art Deco gem & many a bartender's Bible. In it, for the first time is the printed recipe for the Hanky-Panky.

And speaking of Bibles, check out this theory on the origin of the term hanky-panky:

"It's been plausibly suggested that hocus-pocus is a corruption of the genuine Latin words hoc est enim corpus meum, "for this is my body," spoken during the consecration of the Roman Catholic Mass when the wine and wafer are said to be transformed into the body and blood of Christ. Some experts, presumably non-Catholic, think hocus-pocus itself was then corrupted into the word hoax." (Cecil Adams, from The Straight Dope)

The Catholic Church, hocus-pocus. Ada Coleman, Hanky Panky. Shenanigans. I'll drink to that.

Hanky Panky, a.k.a. Misty Kalkofen, Head Barman at Green Street, Cambridge MA
(Photo courteousy of Matt Demers)

Love and other stuff!

2008-02-14T09:00:00.002-05:00

It's the romantic day of the year...according to Hallmark, anyway.

Love it or hate it, Valentine's Day gives us all good reason to kick back a few. Here are some LUPEC approved vaguely pink concoctions to get you through:

Bourbon Belle suggests...

The French Velvet

In a champagne flute add equal parts

Guinness

Champagne or Sparkling Wine

.25 oz Chambord

Sounds like a delightfully butch take on V-Day, n'est-ce pas? Thanks, BB!

Moscow Mule didn't think Sex on the Beach sounded dreamy & romantic enough. Instead, try...

Bachelor's Bait

1 1/2 oz gin

1 egg white

1 dash orange bitters

1/4 grenadine

Shake in iced cocktail shaker & strain. Serve in a cocktail glass.

Is it bait for the bachelor or bait for the objet d'amour? Thanks, MM!

Now let's all raise a glass to love and the color pink!

MIT breakthrough: A woman president

2008-02-13T09:00:00.000-05:00

Famous MIT alumna Shirley Ann Jackson, who is now the president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, congratulates President Susan Hockfield on her inauguration

by Barbara West

May 6, 2005 was a milestone for broads in science and engineering.
That's the day Susan Hockfield, a noted neuroscientist, was inaugurated
as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's first female president.

Perhaps surprisingly, less has been made of the fact that Dr. Hockfield
is a woman than the fact that she is the first life scientist to lead
MIT. When she was named president, the New York Times noted drolly,
"there was talk that M.I.T. was breaking new ground. What would it
mean, many wondered, if one of the world's leading citadels of physics,
electrical engineering and other hard sciences were led for the first
time by - a biologist?"

Before coming to MIT, Dr. Hockfield was a professor of neurobiology and
provost of Yale University. Her research focused on the development of
the brain and on glioma, a deadly kind of brain cancer. Under her
leadership, MIT has launched major research initiatives focusing on two
of society's great challenges: cancer and energy.

Even as she downplayed her gender, Dr. Hockfield was compelled to
respond, shortly after her inauguration, to then-Harvard University
President Lawrence Summers' suggestion that one reason for the relative
scarcity of women at the upper ranks of science might be an innate
lesser ability.

"Marie Curie exploded that myth," Dr. Hockfield and two other
university presidents, Shirley Tilghman of Princeton and John Hennessy
of Stanford, wrote in an op-ed piece that appeared in the Boston Globe.
But women need "teachers who believe in them," they went on, and low
expectations of women "can be as destructive as overt discrimination."

It should be noted that Dr. Hockfield's arrival at MIT furthered a
shift that started at the Institute in 1999. That's the year when MIT
issued a report concluding that women there suffered from widespread if
unintentional discrimination, and it pledged to work toward gender
parity. The main force behind that report was MIT biologist Nancy
Hopkins, who literally took a tape measure to her and her female
colleagues' lab space to show the MIT administration that the women
were being allotted fewer resources than their male counterparts. So,
to toast the woman who jump-started MIT's new wave of broads, drink one
of these:

Lady Hopkins Cocktail

1 1/2 oz Southern Comfort
1/2 oz passion fruit
3/4 oz fresh lime juice

Shake in an iced cocktail shaker & strain into a cocktail glass. Add cherry, orange slice, mint sprig.

Raiders of the Lost Cocktail: The Mimi

2008-02-12T08:31:00.000-05:00

Raiders of the Lost Cocktail, anyone? This event, hosted by The Spirit World, was designed to:

"...re-examine some of the slightly more obscure products which might be gathering dust on the shelves of bars across America (if not the world), and to see if our intrepid little band of explorers can uncover some forgotten gems of recipes which might breathe new life into those products."

We'll drink to that!

This month's theme is Apricot Brandy, and it just so happens that the namesake cocktail of one of our founding broads features this nearly forgotten ingredient. On behalf of the ladies of LUPEC Boston, I present to you: The MiMi! It's most delicious.

MiMi
Courtesy, Hotel Georges V, Paris

1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 dashes grenadine
1/5 apricot brandy
3/5 gin
2 drops cognac
1 egg white

Rub rim of small wine glass with slice of lemon. Dip edge into powdered sugar. Shake ingredients with ice, and strain into glass.

From Ted Saucier's Bottom's Up, copyright 1951.

Cin-cin, all!

Atten-Hut!

2008-02-11T04:00:00.000-05:00

It's Mixology Monday again! This month we are, with our host Jimmy's Cocktail Hour, exploring Variations.

Here in Boston the ladies of LUPEC have been very excited with the recent availability of the Rothman and Winter Creme de Violette. It's always thrilling to have a new product available, but in this case this is a new old product which opens up yet another window into cocktail past. In honor of our new favorite spirit we are going to take a look at three cocktails featuring gin, creme de violette, absinthe and french vermouth.

Within my modest collection of cocktail tomes I found the first recipe for the Atty Cocktail in The Savoy Cocktail Book.
ATTY COCKTAIL
1/4 French Vermouth
3 dashes Absinthe
3/4 Dry Gin
3 dashes Creme de Violette
Shake well and strain into a cocktail glass.
Now we adore all of the ingredients in this cocktail and think it is delicious. However when looking for a cocktail to showcase the Creme de Violette this would not be our first choice so let's continue on to some other variations...

Thumbing through Patrick Gavin Duffy's Official Mixer's Manual we find the Attention Cocktail.
ATTENTION COCKTAIL
1/4 French Vermouth
1/4 Absinthe
1/4 Gin
1/4 Creme de Violette
2 Dashes Orange Bitters
Stir well with cracked ice and strain.
Once again, all things we love, but equal parts doesn't really work for us. The strength of the Absinthe overpowers the other ingredients.

Jones' Complete Bar Guide has the following recipe:
ATTENTION
1 oz gin
1/2 oz Pernod
1/2 oz dry vermouth
1/2 oz creme de violette
2 dashes orange bitters
Ah...we're getting closer. The increase in the base spirit created a nice platform for the other flavors. Truth be told, we used Ricard instead of Pernod...desperate times call for desperate measures. The Ricard still was a bit powerful, but seemed to complement the Creme de Violette rather than battle it as was the case with Absinthe.

Sticking with Mr Jones we find the Arsenic and Old Lace. From the name alone we have very high hopes!
ARSENIC AND OLD LACE
1-1/2 oz Gin
1/2 oz Absinthe or substitute
1/4 oz dry vermouth
1/2 oz creme de violette
Once again we used Ricard and it was good, but we miss the bitters.

So in conclusion, there is no conclusion. As women dedicated to our cause we will happily continue our research!

Cheers!

Oh my goodness! I almost forgot two very important things!

A huge shout out to Eric Seed, the man behind the availability of Creme de Violette. Besides having the cutest daughter in the world who claps when she eats head cheese, through Haus Alpenz he is making amazing products available to us! Please check out his website and encourage your local retailers and bars to carry his products.

For an updated variation on the Arsenic and Old Lace head over to this post on Cocktail Chronicles where Paul Clarke checks out Simon Difford's Flower Power Martini.

You're Not Alone

2008-02-09T13:53:00.000-05:00

Just a quick one here to fill you in on a fun, music-filled way in which to help Al "Carnival Time" Johnson! On Mardi Gras the New Orleans based brass funk outfit Bonerama released an EP in collaboration with OK Go entitled You're Not Alone. The EP is available on iTunes and will benefit Al "Carnival Time" Johnson (who joins in on one track) and Sweet Home New Orleans.

For a taste of the EP check out Bonerama and Damian Kulash of OK Go on Letterman this Monday, February 11th!

Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez!

2008-02-05T13:32:00.000-05:00

Today the streets of New Orleans are flooded with revelers for the culmination of Carnival, Mardi Gras. The city 's population has doubled as tourists have flooded in to scurry for beads and doubloons thrown from floats as krewes snake through the city. We, the ladies of LUPEC, would like to raise our glasses to the Krewe of Muses, the only all female krewe.

Formed in 2000, the Krewe of Muses has over 1100 members. The Krewe was created to celebrate the nine muses, the Greek goddesses who presided over the arts and sciences. The daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne, they are believed to inspire artists, especially poets, philosophers, and musicians.

Each year the Krewe of Muses selects one of the nine muses for the season. The Krewe then selects an honorary muse, a woman who embodies the spirit of that muse by having made a significant contribution to New Orleans in the area that muse represents. This year the Krewe celebrated Polymnia, the muse of sacred song, and honored Marva Wright, Louisiana's Blues Queen.

On January 31, the Krewe of Muses presented a 26 float procession entitled Muses Night Fever. Sporting their famous hand-deocrated glitter shoes, the ladies discoed their way through the garden district pleasing the crowd with unique throws, including Rubik's Cube beads and disco balls.

Let us raise our glasses to the Krewe of Muses!

New Orleans
1.5 oz Bourbon
1 dash Orange Bitters
2 dashes Angostura Bitters
.25 oz Anisette
.25 oz Pastis
Sugar to taste
Stir ingredients with ice. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist

Cheers!

doesn't anyone want to know how MY drink is?

2008-02-04T11:54:00.000-05:00

From Amazon.com's description of Eric Felten's How's Your Drink?

Based on the popular feature in the Saturday Wall Street Journal, How's Your Drink illuminates the culture of the cocktail. Cocktails are back after decades of decline, but the literature and lore of the classics has been missing. John F. Kennedy played nuclear brinksmanship with a gin and tonic in his hand. Teddy Roosevelt took the witness stand to testify that six mint juleps over the course of his presidency did not make him a drunk. Ernest Hemingway and Raymond Chandler both did their part to promote the gimlet. Fighting men mixed drinks with whatever liquor could be scavenged between barrages, raising glasses to celebrate victory and to ease the pain of defeat. Eric Felten tells all of these stories and many more, and also offers exhaustively researched cocktail recipes. How’s Your Drink is an essential addition to the literature of spirits and a fantastic holiday gift for husbands and fathers.

Husbands and fathers? What about sisters, mothers and wives? I'd have LOVED to have received a copy of this wonderful book in my Christmas stocking, (with any luck, my sweetie will read this post and consider getting it for me for Valentine's Day) but after reading this little blurb of copy, I'm not sure I'm allowed!

Eric Felten's How's Your Drink pubbed this fall and I had the good fortune to page through Contessa's copy shortly after it came out. It's a great little book, but I'm shocked to see how blatantly excluded I and my fellow drinking broads have been from the publishing company's marketing campaign.

I used to work in-house at a publishing house and I realize that Amazon uploads book description copy written impossibly early in the publishing process. I also know that Amazon is notoriously slow about making changes to said copy: so even if the publisher did want to broaden the scope of this marketing blurb, it might take them six to eight months to do it. But, come on, people! Last time I checked women aged 18-35 represented one of the most powerful purchasing demographics in the marketplace. Why so blatantly exclude us from your marketing campaign?

Fortunately, I know the book rocks, and plan to buy it anyway, thanks to the all-women's cocktail society to which I happily belong.

Cin-cin!

It's Carnival Time!

2008-02-03T12:32:00.000-05:00

It's that time of year when one of our favorite cities becomes a hot bed of fun! All over New Orleans tourists are swarming, costumes are being donned and krewes are lining up as Mardi Gras arrives! In honor of this annual celebration we want to introduce you to one of our favorite NOLA broads and a cause dear to her heart that will be instrumental in keeping the sounds of New Orleans alive.

Last summer during my annual New Orleans pilgrimage I had the pleasure of meeting Elisa Speranza. A native Bostonian, Elisa fell in love with NOLA during her annual trips to Jazz Fest. She describes the city as "not like anyplace else on earth." Approximately five and a half years ago she made the move and relocated.

For the last seven years Elisa has worked for CH2M Hill, a full-service engineering, consulting, construction and operations company. Working in both the governmental and industrial sectors, CH2M Hill handles everything from transportation and infrastructure projects to the construction of power generation facilities to disaster relief. Elisa, as a Vice President in the Water Business Group, is head of the management consulting team and does work for municipal water/wastewater facilities domestically and abroad.

Elisa is dedicated to community service both locally and globally. She serves as Vice President of Water for People, a non-profit organization that facilitates water, sanitation, and hygiene projects in developing countries and is active with Save the Wetlands and the Arabi Wrecking Krewe.

The Arabi Wrecking Krewe, Inc is a not for profit organization dedicated to preserving the music and culture of New Orleans. The Krewe is assisting musicians with all post-Katrina needs in order that they can return to New Orleans. Currently they are raising funds to build Al "Carnival Time" Johnson a new home.

Al "Carnival Time" Johnson penned one of New Orleans most popular anthems. "Carnival Time" became synonymous with Mardi Gras and the spirit of NOLA. Unfortunately, for the first thirty years of it's existence, Al received no royalties for his famous hit. After Katrina destroyed his home in the Lower Ninth Ward, Al left for Houston. The Arabi Wrecking Krewe, realizing the importance of music in the history and soul of New Orleans, is raising funds to build a new home for Al in the Musician's Village.

So during this Carnival we raise our glasses and hopefully some funds. Here's to you Elisa and Al!

Vieux Carre
1 oz Rye
1 oz Brandy
1 oz Italian Vermouth
1 tsp Benedictine
2 dashes Peychaud Bitters
2 dashes Angostura Bitters
Stir all ingredients with ice. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist.
Cheers!

The Beachbum loves the broads!

2008-01-23T14:32:00.000-05:00

Head over to Beachbum Berry's Grog Blog to see a nice post about the ladies of LUPEC Boston and our love of chartreuse.

Thanks Bum!

A New Year!

2008-01-23T14:18:00.000-05:00

Hello friends of LUPEC Boston! Happy 2008!

As you've probably noticed, the ladies of LUPEC Boston decided to take a little breather over the holidays to spend some extra time with our loved ones. We've had a lovely period of rejuvenation plus a little extra time for some hibernation. Now we are refreshed and excited to be looking forward to a spring filled with fabulous events where we drink for good causes!

So check back often to learn about sassy broads, tasty cocktails and fun times!

Cheers!

The Stork Club

2007-12-03T19:50:00.001-05:00

With the repeal of Prohibition the sound of clinking glasses once again filled Manhattan and the place to be was a former speakeasy. For over three decades the Stork Club, located at 3 East 53rd St, was both the playground of celebrities and millionaires and the center of Manhattan's cafe society.

The Stork Club was opened in 1929 by Sherman Billingsley. A native of Oklahoma, Billingsley moved from bootlegger to bar owner. Known to "rule with a velvet fist," Billingsley was at his glamorous club nightly catering to his clientele which had the children of old world money mingling with movie stars, gossip columnists, politicians and former bootleggers among others. With his golden rope Billingsley created exclusivity and with his house photographer leaking photos to the tabloids he had the whole country begging to be a part of it.

And now a toast to the grand beauty known as the Stork Club, the impending arrival of Repeal Day and Mixology Monday!

The Stork Club Cocktail
1 1/2 oz Gin
1/2 oz Cointreau
1 oz Fresh Orange Juice
1/4 oz Fresh Lime Juice
1 dash Angostura Bitters
Shake all ingredients with ice. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange twist.

Cheers!

Repeal Day!

2007-11-30T13:59:00.001-05:00

On December 5th, 1933, 5:32 EST Utah became the 36th state to ratify the 21st Amendment thus nullifying that pesky 18th Amendment which had sent us and our hooch underground. The anniversary of that date is right around the corner and to the ladies of LUPEC that sounds like a darn good reason to raise our glasses!

Join the ladies of LUPEC on Wednesday, December 5th at Green Street in Cambridge for a drink because...well, because we can! No pomp, no circumstance and no cover. Just a casual gathering of folks who like cocktails. The festivities begin at 5:32 PM. Pull out your 30's fashions and belly up to the cash bar which will feature a special menu highlighting cocktails of the era.

Do you have a favorite quote about imbibing? Or a favorite toast? Jot it down on a card and hand it off to a lady of LUPEC Boston as we will be featuring them here, on our blog, throughout the month of December. And please look for the brightly wrapped box as that is where we will be collecting donations for Christmas in the City, an all volunteer organization that hosts an annual Christmas extravaganza for children living in Boston-area homeless shelters.

We look forward to seeing you on Wednesday! Cheers!

Green Street is located at 280 Green Street in Cambridge, between Pearl and Magazine Streets.

Lauren Clark of LUPEC Boston on THE CHET CURTIS REPORT

2007-11-19T15:01:00.000-05:00

Did you miss LUPEC on 'CHET CURTIS' last Friday because you were out on the town? We thought so... Not to worry, you can check out the segment on the web by clicking here.

Chin-chin!

The Marconi Wireless

2007-11-16T19:30:00.000-05:00

The recipe is:
1.5 ounces applejack
.75 ounces sweet vermouth
2 dashes of orange bitters

Shake over ice and strain into cocktail glass

as featured on Chet Curtis...

Coffee and Doughnuts

2007-11-16T16:12:00.000-05:00

During World War II American Red Cross services were in high gear. By the wars end in 1945, over 7.5 million volunteers supported 40,000 paid Red Cross staff around the world. "Nearly every family in America contained a member who had either served as a Red Cross volunteer, made contributions of money or blood, or was a recipient of Red Cross services."

My family's Red Cross volunteer was my Great Aunt Kay.

On June 6, 1945, just about a month after VE Day, Kay Kehoe boarded the Queen Mary to Europe, where she spent the next 18 months traveling all over Great Britain and the Continent as a Clubmobiler. Red Cross Service Clubs offered meals, recreational activities, overnight accommodations and amenities like barbershops and laundries to American soldiers stationed all over the world; Clubmobiles were designed to be like service clubs on wheels.

These half-ton trucks and single-deck buses, acquired by the Red Cross from a former London bus company, were converted to literal welcome wagons. Each was operated by three American Red Cross women and a local driver, and were equipped for "making and serving coffee and doughnuts and for distributing newspapers, chewing gum, and other small items" to the troops. Some had phonographs and loudspeakers, and others were even outfitted with movie projectors.

Kay Kehoe disembarked from the Queen Mary in Scotland, and didn't stop traveling for the next 18 months. She and the girls of Clubmobile Group A boarded a train from Scotland to England, then took a boat across the chilly English channel to France, then boarded another train to Paris. From there, they traveled all over Europe in a truck the size of an ambulance, delivering coffee and doughnuts to troops through the truck's windows. Occasionally they'd stop in service clubs -- Kay remembers a particularly big one in Berlin -- where they'd work as 'club girls', acting as hostesses to the troops. But being on the road was the type of service Kay Kehoe liked best.

\

When it got too hot on the dusty French roads in the summer, the girls of Clubmobile A served lemonade in place of coffee. "Most of the boys were in a staging area, just waiting to go home," says Kehoe. "We'd serve them their lemonade and doughnuts and gab with them, and sometimes they'd invite you to come to the G.I. Club for a dance. There we'd dance and listen to records, and they had beer and soda and pretty much anything you wanted at the clubs."

As for cocktails, says Kay, "they didn't have the kinds of ingredients you'd need to make fancy drinks, like Martinis, Old Fashions, and Manhattans. But, since it was France, you could pretty much always get your hands on cognac, and all the G.I. Clubs had Coca Cola." So that's what they drank.

This weekend, let's raise a glass to Kay Kehoe and the girls of Clubmobile A!

Clubmobile Cocktail

1 1/2 oz Cognac

Fill glass with Coca Cola

Add lemon twist

Serve in a highball glass

A votre sante!

the Ladies of LUPEC on CHET CURTIS

2007-11-15T17:10:00.000-05:00

Don't miss LUPEC Boston's own Lauren Clark on THE CHET CURTIS REPORT

Tomorrow night Lauren Clark,
LUPEC Boston member and founder of Drinkboston.com,
will appear on the 'CHET CURTIS REPORT' on NECN!

Lauren will chat with Chet about all things LUPEC, and
teach viewers how to make a classic cocktail that's bound to wow the entire family this Thanksgiving.

Tune in Friday, November 16th @ 8 p.m. ET on NECN!

The Hello Girls

2007-11-12T14:55:00.000-05:00

In 1917 General "Black Jack" Pershing began his search for bilingual switchboard operators to improve communication between commanders and troops on the European front. The women needed to speak French, be college educated and single. Over 7000 women applied and 450 were selected. Upon completion of military and Signal Corps training at Camp Franklin Maryland the ladies were issued their Army regulation uniforms complete with US crests, Signal Corps crests and dog tags.

By the end of the war over 200 women had served oversees as part of the Hello Girls. The women had been sworn into service, were considered combatants and one of their own, Grace Banker, was awarded the Distinguished Medal of Service by Congress. However, upon returning to the States the Hello Girls were denied veteran status as all military regulations had been written in the male gender. One of the operators, Mearle Eagan Anderson, spent fifty years advocating on behalf of the Hello Girls. Her diligence was rewarded in 1978 when President Jimmy Carter signed a bill recognizing the service of the Hello Girls and awarding them veterans status.

And now a (Mixology Monday) toast to our bilingual fore-broads!

The French 75
2 oz Gin
1 oz fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons sugar or 1 tsp simple syrup
Champagne

Shake the gin, lemon juice, and sugar in an iced cocktail shaker. Strain into a champagne flute. Fill with Champagne. Garnish with a lemon twist.

Cheers!

Veterans Day

2007-11-11T13:02:00.000-05:00

On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918 World War I formally ended with the German signing of the Armistice. Today we recognize this day by remembering all who have generously served our country in the armed forces. Throughout this week the ladies of LUPEC Boston will be honoring Veterans Day by raising our glasses to all the women who have voluntarily served this country in the military. Check back often to join in our toasts!

For now...Navy Grog!
3/4 oz lime juice
3/4 oz grapefruit juice
3/4 oz honey
1 oz light Puerto Rican rum
1 oz dark Jamaican rum
1 oz Demerara rum
1 oz chilled club soda

Heat honey until liquid, then mix with juices in blender. Stir in rums and soda. Pour into double old-fashioned glass filled with crushed ice, or sip drink through ice cone.

Navy Grog Ice Cone
To prepare cone: pack ten ounce Pilsner glass with finely shaved ice. Run a hole through center with a chopstick to make a passage for straw. Gently remove cone from glass and freeze overnight.

This is an original Don the Beachcomber recipe as printed in Beachbum Berry 's Grog Log! If you like the Beachbum and his delicious cocktails be sure to join him, DJ Brother Cleve and Waitiki next Sunday, November 18th at Pho Republique for the Beantown Sippin' Safari!

Cheers!

Beantown Sippin' Safari!

2007-11-10T14:44:00.000-05:00

Come join the ladies of LUPEC as we tiki the night away with Beachbum Berry and DJ Brother Cleve! Grass skirts encouraged!

RSVP to sippinsafari@waitiki.com.

Cheers!

come on in & leave your wallet on the bar!

2007-10-10T18:26:00.000-04:00

A few shots from the scene of Sunday's crime...

Here's Barbara West & Pinky Gonzalez, two ladies looking foxy in fur...

Cigars? Cigarettes? Fancy Brandy selling fancy merchandise....

These two are smiling innocently, but someting tells me there's somethin' fishy goin' on with Contessa & Scott.

What a set of pipes on this broad! To listen & learn more, check out misstessmusic.com.

These two broads look like trouble with a capitol "T"...

More pictures to come...click here to see more photos!

what fun!!

2007-10-08T14:53:00.000-04:00

Last night was a smashing success -- we're thrilled! Photos and final tally coming soon. If you missed the LUPEC Tea Party, you can still support Jane Doe Inc. by volunteering or donating to the cause.

Space is limited, so buy your tickets now!!!

2007-10-04T15:06:00.000-04:00

the LUPEC BOSTON TEA PARTY

Sunday, October 7, 2007, 7-11 p.m.
on the Louisiana Riverboat at Lewis Wharf

The party starts at 7 p.m. on October 7th. Ticket price is $50/ person and will include stationary appetizers, cocktail party fare, and an open bar! All proceeds from the LUPEC BOSTON TEA PARTY will benefit Jane Doe Inc. in honor of National Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

• Sunday, October 7th from 7 – 11 p.m. on the Boston Sailing Center’s Louisiana Riverboat at the Lewis Wharf
• Ticket price is $50/person including stationary appetizers, cocktail party fare, and an open bar!
• Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased by visiting Green Street, 280 Green St., Cambridge, MA or Toro, 1704 Washington St., Boston, MA

Stop by Toro for "Industry Night" tonight and the chance to win 2 free tickets!

Flapper Jane and the LUPEC BOSTON TEA PARTY

2007-10-03T10:50:00.000-04:00

What better way to celebrate women & cocktails than with a Jazz Age Speakeasy cocktail party?

The Prohibition Era was the golden age of cocktail culture, and it was also a fascinating moment in women's history. Women had just won the right to vote, they were eschewing corsets, bobbing their hair, and shortening hemlines. But these flappers were more than just party girls! They ushered in a whole new modern era for American women...all to the shock & disgrace of older generations.

In this very pro-flapper article published in The New Republic on September 9, 1925, Bruce Bilven introduces us to "Flapper Jane":

...how wild is Jane?

Before we come to this exciting question, let us take a look at the young person as she strolls across the lawn of her parents' suburban home, having just put the car away after driving sixty miles in two hours. She is, for one thing, a very pretty girl. Beauty is the fashion in 1925. She is frankly, heavily made up, not to imitate nature, but for an altogether artificial effect--pallor mortis, poisonously scarlet lips, richly ringed eyes--the latter looking not so much debauched (which is the intention) as diabetic. Her walk duplicates the swagger supposed by innocent America to go with the female half of a Paris Apache dance. And there are, finally, her clothes.

These were estimated the other day by some statistician to weigh two pounds. Probably a libel; I doubt they come within half a pound of such bulk. Jane isn't wearing much, this summer. If you'd like to know exactly, it is: one dress, one step-in, two stockings, two shoes.

A step-in, if you are 99 and 44/1OOths percent ignorant, is underwear--one piece, light, exceedingly brief but roomy. Her dress...is also brief. It is cut low where it might be high, and vice versa. The skirt comes just an inch below her knees, overlapping by a faint fraction her rolled and twisted stockings. The idea is that when she walks in a bit of a breeze, you shall now and then observe the knee (which is not rouged--that's just newspaper talk) but always in an accidental, Venus-surprised-at-the-bath sort of way.

This is a bit of coyness which hardly fits in with Jane's general character. Jane's haircut is also abbreviated. She wears of course the very newest thing in bobs, even closer than last year's shingle. It leaves her just about no hair at all in the back, and 20 percent more than that in the front... Because of this new style, one can confirm a rumor heard last year: Jane has ears.

Flapper Jane created quite a stir with her clothes, but her ideas were what really threw the older generation for a loop. Says Jane,

"Somebody wrote in a magazine how the War had upset the balance of the sexes in Europe and the girls over there were wearing the new styles as part of the competition for husbands. Sounds like the bunk to me. If you wanted to nail a man for life I think you'd do better to go in for the old-fashioned line: 'March' me to the altar, esteemed sir, before you learn whether I have limbs or not.'

"Of course, not so many girls are looking for a life mealticket nowadays. Lots of them prefer to earn their own living and omit the home-and-baby act. Well, anyhow, postpone it years and years. They think a bachelor girl can and should do everything a bachelor man does."

What is that they say about history repeating itself?

The ladies of LUPEC Boston have invented the following cocktail, honor of Bruce Belvin's ubiquitous Flapper Jane:

The Flapper Jane

1.75 oz Plymouth Gin
.5 oz Fresh Lemon Juice
.75 oz Wu Wei infused Simple Syrup
dash of Peychaud Bitters

Shake in a cocktail shaker, strain into a cocktail glass, and toast your own fabulousness!

We'll be serving these in tea cups at the LUPEC Boston Tea Party this Sunday! Come raise a Flapper Jane in honor of Jane Doe Inc.!

As if open bar wasn't enough...

2007-09-30T10:17:00.000-04:00

...the food at the LUPEC BOSTON TEA PARTY is not to be missed!

Jamie Bissonette, Chef de Cuisine of KO Prime, Patrick Connolly, Chef de Cuisine of Radius, and Andres Grundy, Sous Chef of Clio will all be participating in the event, and will be preparing appetizers and light cocktail party fare for the evening. Lionette's Market will supply a plate of fine cheeses and Island Creek Oysters will offer a delicious raw bar.

Here are the details...

• Sunday, October 7th from 7 – 11 p.m. on the Boston Sailing Center's Louisiana Riverboat at the Lewis Wharf
• Ticket price is $50/person including stationary appetizers, cocktail party fare, and an open bar!
• Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased by visiting Green Street, 280 Green St., Cambridge, MA or Toro, 1704 Washington St., Boston, MA

Tickets on sale now!!!

2007-09-29T10:01:00.000-04:00

Come on in, but keep a lid on it…we don’t want to alert the FUZZ to the…

LUPEC BOSTON TEA PARTY

When: Sunday, October 7, 2007, 7-11 p.m.
Where: the Louisiana Riverboat at Lewis Wharf

On October 7th the lovely ladies of LUPEC Boston will transform the Boston Sailing Center’s permanently docked Louisiana Riverboat at Lewis Wharf into a Prohibition-era Speakeasy for an evening of vintage cocktails, live music, dancing, delicious nibbles, and a prize raffle!

The party starts at 7 p.m. on October 7th. Ticket price is $50/ person and will include stationary appetizers, cocktail party fare, and an open bar!

Local jazz/blues diva Miss Tess will perform Jazz standards as well as her own "Modern Vintage" originals from 7 – 9:30 p.m.

A prize raffle will feature tons of hot prizes, including gift certificates donated from Stella, the Milky Way Lounge & Lanes, ZipCar, Magpie, apparel from thereadseat.com , a "Brix Pix" gift bag compliments of Brix, and more!!!

All proceeds from the LUPEC BOSTON TEA PARTY will benefit Jane Doe Inc. in honor of National Domestic Violence Awareness Month .

• Sunday, October 7th from 7 – 11 p.m. on the Boston Sailing Center's Louisiana Riverboat at the Lewis Wharf
• Ticket price is $50/person including stationary appetizers, cocktail party fare, and an open bar!
• Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased by visiting Green Street, 280 Green St., Cambridge, MA or Toro, 1704 Washington St., Boston, MA

About Jane Doe Inc.

Jane Doe Inc., The Massachusetts Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence brings together organizations and people committed to creating social change that addresses the root causes of this violence and promotes dignity and liberty for survivors. Jane Doe Inc. plays a leading role in shaping public policy through legislative action and policy development that will support survivors, hold offenders accountable and ultimately, make our communities safer. They are guided by the voices of survivors.

Currently, over 60 community-based sexual assault and domestic violence service and advocacy programs in Massachusetts comprise the membership of Jane Doe Inc. These independent non-profit organizations deliver comprehensive services to over tens of thousands of women, men and children every year, in every community across the Commonwealth. Crisis hotlines, emergency shelter, safe homes, legal and medical advocacy, educational and support groups, counseling, advocacy, safety planning, children's advocacy, economic development programs and transitional housing are just some examples of services available. Community education is also offered on an array of topics including sexual assault, teen dating violence, and the role of men in ending violence.

The work of the Coalition complements these life-saving prevention and intervention services, resources and advocacy. With its sixty member organizations, Jane Doe Inc. engages law enforcement, the courts, health care, housing and service providers to develop and promote best practices because every victim should have access to a range of high quality services, responses and options, in every community regardless of where they are in the state. The creation of the Men's Initiative for Jane Doe exemplifies its belief that men and boys are essential allies in the movement to end violence against women, men and children. Jane Doe Inc. works with survivors and advocates to break the silence and to dispel the myths that deny victims the right to safety, justice, and healing.

About LUPEC Boston

The Boston chapter of LUPEC (Ladies United for the Preservation of Endangered Cocktails) is a classic cocktail society dedicated to breeding, raising, and releasing nearly extinct drinks into the wild ( a.k.a. Boston-area bars and restaurants.) Founded in February 2007 by Misty Kalkofen of Green Street and ten fellow cocktail enthusiasts, LUPEC Boston is the city's first and only female-oriented cocktail society. The ladies of LUPEC Boston meet once a month to sample delicious cocktail creations from a bygone era, and educate themselves about the important and nearly forgotten forebroads who sipped them.

In addition to preserving our own personal Joie de Vivre by guaranteeing members one good cocktail party every month, LUPEC Boston strives to enhance and improve the lives of Boston-area women through fundraising events for local women's charities. LUPEC Boston partners with local bars and liquor purveyors to offer co-ed classic cocktail parties and special events. For more information about what we're mixing up around town visit http://lupecboston.blogspot.com.

The LUPEC Boston Tea Party

2007-09-23T17:54:00.000-04:00

October 7, 7pm: Buy your tickets now for the first annual LUPEC Boston Tea Party! All proceeds benefit Jane Doe Inc. in honor of Domestic Violence Awareness Month.

The night aboard a Louisiana riverboat will invoke Prohibition-era Speakeasies with the croonings of the talented & lovely Miss Tess, Art Deco inspired décor, and vintage cocktails served “on the sly”, in tea-cups. Vintage dress and creative cocktail attire is encouraged.

Tickets are $50, cash only and available for purchase at Green Street Grill (Central Square, Cambridge) or Toro (South End). Get there!

Meanwhile, keep drinking up for This One's for the Ladies!

This One's for the Ladies

2007-09-01T13:19:00.000-04:00

Join the ladies of LUPEC Boston as we raise our glasses to raise awareness. Throughout the month of September LUPEC Boston is partnering with area bars and restaurants to raise money for Jane Doe Inc, the Massachusetts Coalition Against Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence. Participating establishments will be donating the proceeds from one broad-related beverage for the month of September to Jane Doe Inc. We will be keeping an updated list of links to participating restaurants here on our blog. So check back often to see where you can go to have one for the ladies!

If you work at a bar or restaurant and are interested in participating please e-mail us at lupecboston@gmail.com!

Cheers!

Surviving the Green Elixir

2007-08-22T11:26:00.000-04:00

A huge thank you to all who made their way to Green Street on Sunday night for an evening of Chatreuse cocktails co-sponsored by the lovely ladies of LUPEC Boston and our friends at drinkboston.com. From our humble monk (who some of us found out had a little something up his sleeve) to the beautiful images of Philip Groning's Into Great Silence to the saucy broads shakin' up the cocktails, the night was an overwhelming success!

We featured four cocktails on Sunday, two highlighting Green Chartreuse and two highlighting Yellow Chartreuse. Let's all grab our Boston shakers and raise our glasses to the fabulous folks who graciously supported our event: Frederick Wildman (importers of Chartreuse), Hendrick's Gin, Nino Franco Prosecco, the Museum of the American Cocktail, the fine owners and staff of Green Street, and all of you who made your way out on a Sunday night!

Scoff Law Cocktail
1 oz Old Overholt Rye
1 oz French Vermouth
.5 oz Green Chartreuse
.5 oz Fresh Lemon Juice
2 dashes Orange Bitters
Combine ingredients with ice in a shaker. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

The Champs-Elysees
1.5 oz Germain Fine Brandy
.75 oz Yellow Chartreuse
.75 oz Fresh Lemon Juice
1 dash Angostura Bitters
Combine ingredients with ice in a shaker. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

The Can Can (a LUPEC Boston original)
5 sour cherries
1 oz Yellow Chartreuse
.25 oz Fresh Grapefruit Juice
1 dash Angostura Bitters
Nino Franco Prosecco
Muddle the sour cherries in the bottom of a mixing glass. Add Chartreuse, grapefruit juice, bitters and ice. Shake and Strain into a flute. Top with chilled Nino Franco Prosecco. Kick up your skirts and enjoy!

The Irma La Douce (a LUPEC Boston original)
1.5 oz Hendrick's Gin
.5 oz Green Chartreuse
.5 oz Cucumber puree (peel and blend fresh cucumber, then pass through a sieve)
.5 oz Fresh Lemon Juice
.5 oz Fresh Grapefruit Juice
.25 oz Simple Syrup
Combine ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Raise your glass to Irma La Douce, a movie in which Shirley MacLaine plays a Parisian prostitute who wears bright green stockings!

LUPEC Boston and Drinkboston.com present Chartreuse Cocktails!

2007-08-07T17:01:00.001-04:00

LUPEC-Boston and Drinkboston.com
are proud to present…
CHARTREUSE COCKTAILS
at
Green Street
Sunday, August 19, 2007, 7:00 p.m.

LUPEC Boston is proud to invite you to our very first co-ed cocktail party!

On Sunday, August 19th Drinkboston.com and LUPEC Boston will join boozy forces with help from our friends at Hendrick’s Gin to host Chartreuse Cocktails at Green Street in Cambridge. Tickets for this event cost $35/person and include four Chartreuse cocktails, and complimentary passed appetizers. The event begins at 7 p.m., and yes, boys are invited!

LUPEC Boston members will be on hand to mix, pour, and talk about classic cocktails. The ladies of LUPEC will be accompanied by a special guest bartender from Boston dressed in the guise of a Carthusian Monk, who will educate guests about the rich, clandestine history and secret ingredients of this storied liqueur. An additional menu of Chartreuse cocktails will also be available for purchase at the bar.

Proceeds from Chartreuse Cocktails at Green Street will benefit LUPEC Boston, and the fundraising events that we’re ramping up for this fall.

- Tickets price is $35/person including 4 chartreuse cocktails and passed appetizers
- Advance tickets can be reserved by calling Green Street at 617-876-1655 or emailing LUPEC Boston at lupecboston@gmail.com
- Tickets can be purchased by visiting Green Street, 280 Green St., Cambridge, MA

Chin-chin! And we can’t wait to see you there!

Ladies of Mystery

2007-07-25T10:14:00.000-04:00

Kate Warne, (AKA: Kay Warne, Kay Waren, Kay Warren, Kate Warne, Kate Waren, Kate Warren, Kitty Warne, Kitty Waren, Kitty Warren, Kittie Warren, Kittie Warne, Kittie Warren) was the first female US spy and detective. Warne was hired by the Pinkerton Detective Agency when she applied for a secretarial position in 1856. Able to act as an undercover agent infiltrating social gatherings, collecting information no man was able to obtain. She was able to wear disguises, change her accent at will and became a huge asset to the success of Allen Pinkerton and Pinkerton National Detective Agency.

She eventually directed training of an all-female investigative staff for Pinkerton, during a time when there were no female police, female detectives and females did not have the right to vote.

Cloak and Dagger
- 1 part gold rum
- 1/2 part Dagger rum
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1 part lime juice
Mix with fine ice in electric mixer and serve in a champagne glass.

Eleanor Jarman, dubbed "The Blond Tigress" by the press, was tried and imprisoned for complicity in a murder that occurred during a clothing store robbery in Chicago's West Side in 1933.

In 1940 she heard that her son was about to run away, and concerned about her children, she escaped the prison August 8 1940. She apparently went to Sioux City, Iowa, confirmed that her children were all right and then went underground. She was put into FBI's Most Wanted list but was never found.

Midnight Alarm
- 1 1/2 oz light rum
- juice of 1/2 lemon
- 1 tsp sugar
- 2 oz pineapple juice
Shake vigorously with ice, and serve in a wine glass.

Etta Place was a companion of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Little is known about her; both her origins and her fate remain mysterious. Despite her companion's fame, by the mid-20th century it was the mysterious vanishing of Place that sparked the most interest, which continues to the present day.

The Shady Lady
- 1 oz tequila
- 1 oz melon liquor
- 4 oz grapefruit juice
Combine ingredients in a highball glass over ice. Garnish with a lime and a cherry.

Martha Washington's Rum Punch

2007-07-04T00:23:00.000-04:00

In honor of this, the anniversary of the birth of our nation, the ladies of LUPEC are raising a glass to our original First Lady.

It is well known that Martha Washington took her duties as First Lady very seriously and entertained in a formal style. Her wish was that our new country and government would be seen as equals to it's well established European counterparts. Most of Martha's events would begin with her signature cocktails being served before dinner at their Virginia home, Mount Vernon. The cocktails would utilize spirits from their distillery which was one of the largest and most profitable during the colonial era. And now a toast to our premiere First Lady using a recipe from her notes!

Martha Washington's Rum Punch

4 oz Lemon Juice
4 oz Orange Juice
4 oz Simple Syrup
3 Lemons quartered
1 Orange quartered
1/2 tsp grated Nutmeg
3 Cinnamon Sticks broken
6 Cloves
12 oz Boiling Water

In a container mash the lemons, orange, nutmeg, cinnamon sticks, and cloves. Add syrup, lemon and orange juice. Pour the boiling water over the mixture. Let it cool. Strain out the solids. Heat the juice mixture to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Let it cool and refrigerate over night.
In a punch bowl combine:

3 parts juice mixture
1 part Light Rum
1 part Dark Rum
1/2 part Orange Curacao

Serve the punch over ice. Top with grated nutmeg and cinnamon.

Cheers!

Pearl Rivers

2007-06-27T13:04:00.000-04:00

Born in 1849 in Pearlington along the Mississippi River, Eliza Jane Poitevent became the first woman owner and publisher of a major daily newspaper in the United States, the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

Eliza began her career as a poet under the pen name Pearl Rivers. In 1870 she was offered the position as literary editor at the Picayune. Against the wishes of her family she moved to New Orleans and joined the male work force as the first woman in Louisiana to make a living at a newspaper. Two years later Eliza married Col Alva Morris Holbrook, the owner and publisher of the Times Picayune.

In 1876 Holbrook died, leaving the paper $80,000 in debt. Eliza's family encouraged her to declare bankruptcy, but Eliza persevered and at the age of 27 she became the editor and publisher of the Times Picayune. Although some of the staff left, the majority remained at the paper showing their loyalty to Eliza. Under her management the Picayune evolved into a family paper which included departments for women, children, fashion and household hints. As a philanthropist, Eliza used the editorial page to speak out against cruelty to animals. Eliza incorporated elements of the modern syndicated newspaper, thereby tripling the circulation of the Times Picayune from 1880 to 1890.

And now a toast to Pearl Rivers!

Cocktail a la Louisiane
1 oz Rye
1 oz Sweet Vermouth
1 oz Benedictine
3-4 dashes Absinthe
3-4 dashes Peychaud Bitters
Stir in a glass with ice. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass in which has been placed a maraschino cherry.

Cheers!

The Cradle of the Cocktail and the Women Who Rocked It!

2007-06-20T12:55:00.000-04:00

Last night the lovely ladies of LUPEC Boston gathered at the home of Pinky Gonzalez to raise our glasses to the women of New Orleans. We nibbled on Shrimp "Arnaud," fried okra, fried oysters, jalapeno cornbread, and "Bananas in Jackets"/"Nuts in Sticks." And we washed it all down with the following delicious cocktails!

Pimm's Cup
Pimm's No 1
Lemon Juice
Simple Syrup
Ginger Ale
English Cucumber

Obituary Cocktail
2 parts Gin
1/4 part Dry Vermouth
1/4 part Absinthe
Stir and Strain

New Iberia Cocktail
2 parts Brandy
1 part French Vermouth
1 part Sherry
3 drops Tabasco
Shake and Strain

Sazerac
1 sugar cube
7 drops Peychaud Bitters
1/2 oz water
2 oz Rye
Splash of Herbsaint
Muddle the sugar cube, bitters and water in a mixing glass. Stir until the sugar is dissolved. Add rye. Stir with ic e for 30 seconds. Strain into a chilled old fashioned glass that has been rinsed with Herbsaint. Garnish with oil from a lemon peel.

(Shake Your Own) Ramos Gin Fizz
Egg White
2 parts Gin
1 part Simple Syrup
1/2 part Lemon Juice
1/2 part Lime Juice
3 drops Orange Blossom Water
1 1/2 part Cream
Club Soda
Put all of the ingredients except cream and ice into a shaker. Shake. Add the cream and ice. Shake hard for 10 minutes. Strain into a collins glass leaving 1/2 an inch for soda. Add soda and garnish with a long orange spiral.

Vieux Carre
(created by Walter Bergeron, Head Bartender, Hotel Monteleone c 1937)
1/2 tsp Benedictine
dash Peychaud's
dash Angostura
1/3 Rye
1/3 Cognac
1/3 Italian Vermouth
Stir and Strain

Keep checking back this week for posts about the great broads of New Orleans!

The Biograph Blonde

2007-06-18T13:29:00.000-04:00

Born in Chicago on June 18, 1895, Blanche Sweet was one of the great actresses of silent film. Although not as well known as her contemporaries, Mary Pickford and Lillian Gish, Sweet made over 120 films.

Born into a show business family, Sweet was first carried onto the stage when she was eighteen months. She spent her childhood dancing with the Gertrude Hoffman troupe and made her film debut at the age of 14. Sweet worked for several film houses during her long career, including American Biograph. At that time performers' names were not listed in the credits, so she became known as the Biograph Blonde. She gained a place in history in 1913 when she starred in America's first full length feature film, Judith of Bethulia. One of Sweet's most famous roles was the lead in the first film version of "Anna Christie," the first Eugene O'Neill play to reach the screen. Although she had a beautiful speaking and singing voice, Sweet's career plunged with the advent of "talkies" as movie executives began promoting new performers to draw attention to the new style of film.

Now a toast to Blanche Sweet, the Biograph Blonde.

Soft and Sweet
1 oz Gin
1 oz Orange Juice
.5 oz Amer Picon
.5 oz Curacao
Shake with ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

Cheers!

Call Sign Chayka

2007-06-16T13:59:00.000-04:00

On this day in 1963 Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman to fly in space. Out of more than four hundred applicants, Tereshkova was one of five women selected to join the female cosmonaut corp in February, 1962. Tereshkova was seen as a particularly worthy candidate because of her meager upbringing in a small village outside of Moscow and also because her father had died as a war hero during World War II.

The female cosmonaut corp went through rigorous training, including weightless flights, isolation tests, centrifuge training, spacecraft engineering and parachuting. However, despite extensive training the female cosmonaut corp was never fully integrated into the cosmonaut corp. The creation of the corp and the flights of women in space were primarily used for propaganda purposes by the Soviet leadership.

Khrushchev hand selected Tereshkova to be the first of the five women of the female cosmonaut corp to fly in space. On June 16, 1963 she flew on Vostok 6 under the call sign Chayka as the first female and the first civilian to fly in space. She orbited the earth 48 times and spent almost three days in space. That was more flying time than all American astronauts combined at that time. None of the other four members of the female cosmonaut corp ever flew and the next Russian woman to travel in space was Svetlana Savitskaya 19 years later.

And now a toast to Valentina!

Russian Cocktail (verbatim from The Savoy Cocktail Book)
1/3 Vodka
1/3 Gin
1/3 Creme de Cacao
Shake well, strain into cocktail glass, and tossitoff quickski.

Cheers!

Amendment XIX

2007-06-04T02:18:00.000-04:00

On this date in 1919 Congress proposed the 19th amendment which, upon ratification, would guarantee women the right to vote.

The history of the suffragist movement began in 1848 at the first Women's Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, NY. In 1840, Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Stanton had attended the World Anti-Slavery Convention in London. Unfortunately they were relegated to the balcony as mere observers because they were women. As a result they decided to hold their own convention "to discuss the social, civil and religious rights of women." At the Women's Rights Convention Stanton presented her Declaration of Principles, a document based on the Declaration of Independence which highlighted women's subordinate status. The Declaration of Principles included 12 resolutions, one of which states "That it is the duty of the women of this country to secure to themselves their sacred right to the elective franchise." This set in motion one of the most important eras in women's history.

As the Civil War began the convention continued on a regular basis. The emphasis, however, was turned toward the emancipation of slaves. The belief was that upon emancipation slaves and women would be afforded rights equal to white men. The war ended and the government perceived the issues as two separate causes. Abraham Lincoln declared, "This hour belongs to the negro."

In response Susan B Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Frederick Douglass created the American Equal Rights Association in 1866. The goal was to join the cause of sexual equality and racial equality towards the common goal of universal suffrage. Unfortunately the ratification of the fourteenth amendment in 1868, which defined "citizenship" and "voters" as male, and the ratification of the fifteenth amendment in 1870, which granted black men the right to vote, led to a temporary division in the suffragist movement. Stanton and Anthony created the more radical National Women's Suffrage Association in New York. In Boston, the more conservative American Women's Suffrage Association was created by Lucy Stone, Julia Ward Howe and Henry Blackwell.

With the proliferation of women's organizations such as the National Council of Jewish Women and the National Association of Colored Women the suffragist movement continued to gain steam throughout the 1880's and 1890's. During World War I the movement slowed as women focused their energies on the war effort. However, in 1919 years of dedication came to fruition as the Nineteenth Amendment was passed in both houses of Congress. In 1920 the Nineteenth Amendment, guaranteeing the right to vote to all citizens regardless of sex, was passed by President Woodrow Wilson.

And now, the Nineteen Pick Me Up!
1.75 oz Pastis
.75 oz Gin
dash Orange Bitters
dash Angostura Bitters
Sugar to taste
Shake and strain into a cocktail glass. (Splash of soda is optional)

Cheers!

M is for the many things you gave me...

2007-05-26T14:16:00.000-04:00

This week Mimi and Pink Lady hosted the lovely ladies of LUPEC Boston as we saluted mothers. We shared stories about the important ladies in our lives and discussed some famous mothers as we enjoyed the following delicious cocktails!

The Mother Cocktail
1.5 oz Gin
.5 oz Cherry Heering
.5 oz Orange Juice
Shake and strain into your favorite vintage drinking vessel.

The Daiquiri
(The favorite cocktail of the famous mother, Jacqueline Kennedy-Onassis)
2 oz White Rum
.5 oz Fresh Lime Juice
.5 oz Simple Syrup
Shake and strain into a coupe.

The Diana
(Served in honor of the famous mother, Princess Diana)
1.5 oz Gin
.75 oz Dry Vermouth
.25 oz Sweet Vermouth
.25 oz Pastis
Stir and strain into your favorite vintage cocktail glass.
Garnish with a lemon twist.

The Mimi
1.5 oz Gin
.5 oz Apricot Brandy
2 drops Cognac
1 tsp Lemon Juice
2 dashes Grenadine
1 Egg White
Shake vigorously. Strain into a powdered sugar rimmed cocktail glass.

The Pink Lady
1.5 oz Gin
.5 oz Applejack
.5 oz Lemon Juice
.5 oz Grenadine
1 Egg White
Shake vigorously. Strain into your favorite vintage cocktail glass.

Thank you Pink Lady and Mimi for being wonderful hostesses!

Cheers!

The Speed Queen

2007-05-18T13:30:00.000-04:00

On this day in 1953, Jacqueline Cochran became the first woman to break the sound barrier. Piloting a Canadair F-86 Sabre that she had borrowed from the Royal Canadian Air Force, Jacqueline took off from Rogers Dry Lake, California and flew at an average speed of 652.337 miles per hour.

Cochran's career in aviation began in the 1930's after a friend offered her a ride in an aircraft. While she ran a cosmetics business, Jacqueline began flying lessons at Roosevelt Airfield in Long Island and learned to fly in three weeks. A natural, she earned her commercial pilot's license in two years. Her husband, Floyd Bostwick Odium, was a savvy businessman and saw the commercial opportunities for her and her cosmetics company. Jacqueline named her company "Wings" and began flying around the country in her aircraft promoting her products.

Cochran flew in her first major race in 1934. From that point on she worked with Amelia Earhart in opening races and the field of aviation to women. In 1937 Cochran was the only woman to compete in the prestigious Bendix race. By 1938 she was the preeminent woman pilot in the United States having won the Bendix and set new altitude and transcontinental speed records.

After America entered WWII in 1942, Jacqueline became head of the women's flight training program for the States. As director of the Women's Airforce Service Pilots (WASP), Cochran trained over 1000 female pilots. For her efforts in WWII she received the Distinguished Service Medal and the Distinguished Flying Cross.

Jacqueline Cochran died in 1980 at her home in Indio, California. At the time of her death, Cochran held the most speed, distance and altitude records of any pilot, man or woman, in aviation history.

And now a toast to Jacqueline Cochran!

BLUE SKIES
1 oz Applejack
1 oz Gin
.5 oz Lemon Juice
.25 oz Simple Syrup
1 or dashes grenadine
Shake with cracked ice and strain into your favorite vintage cocktail glass!

Sky Girls

2007-05-15T15:14:00.000-04:00

On this day in 1930 Ellen (Marshall) Church became the world's first airline stewardess. In 1928 she approached Boeing Air Transport hoping to become their first female pilot. She was denied the job, but Boeing liked her idea of placing nurses on the planes to help ease the fear of flying among passengers. In 1930 they hired 8 nurses, known as the Sky Girls, for a three month trial. Church was chosen to be the world's first flight attendant serving passengers aboard a 12 hour flight from Chicago to Oakland, CA.
The presence of nurses on flights quelled the fear of flying in the public and air travel became more popular. Soon other airlines followed the lead of BAT and hired nurses as flight attendants. In addition to being a nurse, flight attendants had to be single and under the age of 25. Cabins were small so the flight attendants could be no taller than 5 feet 4 inches and no heavier than 115 pounds. In addition to attending to the needs of passengers, flight attendants hauled luggage, fueled planes and pushed planes into hangars.

After jump-starting the flight attendant profession, Church returned to clinical nursing. During World War II she returned to the air, this time as a captain in the army nurse corps. She was awarded the Air Medal for her wartime heroics. She returned to the states and continued her nursing career in Terre Haute, IN until the time of her death in 1965.

In honor of Ellen Church and all the Sky Girls past and present, cheers!

Aviation
1.5 oz Gin
.5 oz Maraschino Liqueur
.75 oz Fresh Lemon Juice
Shake with ice and strain into your favorite vintage cocktail glass!

World Cocktail Day!

2007-05-13T18:30:00.000-04:00

Ah, the most refreshingly delicious day of the year! World Cocktail Day!

World Cocktail Day occurs annually on the day the Balance and Columbian Repository, a Hudson, New York newspaper, printed a wonderful exchange in which the editors defined the word cocktail. During the previous week, the loser of a political race had created a witty account of their gains and losses during the race. One of the losses listed was "25 do. cock-tail." A confused reader wrote in asking what a cock-tail was. Here is the letter to the editor and the editor's response:

To the Editor of the Balance.
Sir,
I observe in your paper of the 6th instant, in the account of a democratic candidate for a seat in the legislature, marked under the head of Loss, 25 do. cock-tail. Will you be so obliging as to inform me what is meant by this species of refreshment? Though a stranger to you, I believe, from your general character, you will not suppose this request to be impertinent.
I have heard of a forum, of phlegm-cutter and fog driver, of wetting the whistle, of moistening the clay, of a fillip, a spur in the head, quenching a spark in the throat, of flip & c, but never in my life, though have lived a good many years, did I hear of cock tail before. Is it peculiar to a part of this country? Or is it a late invention? Is the name expressive of the effect which the drink has on a particular part of the body? Or does it signify that the democrats who take the potion are turned topsycurvy, and have their heads where their tails should be? I should think the latter to be the real solution; but am unwilling to determine finally until I receive all the information in my power.
At the beginning of the revolution, a physician publicly recommended the moss which grew on a tree as a substitute for tea. He found on experiment, that it had more of a stimulating quality then he approved; and therefore, he afterward as publicly denounced it. Whatever cock tail is, it may be properly administered only at certain times and to certain constitutions. A few years ago, when the democrats were bawling for Jefferson and Clinton, one of the polls was held in the city of New York at a place where ice cream was sold. Their temperament then was remarkably adust and bilious. Something was necessary to cool them. Now when they are sunk into rigidity, it might be equally necessary, by cock-tail to warm and rouse them.
I hope you will construe nothing that I have said as disrespectful. I read your paper with great pleasure and wish it the most extensive circulation. Whether you answer my inquiry or not, I shall still remain,
Yours,
A SUBSCRIBER

[As I make it a point, never to publish anything (under my editorial head) but which I can explain, I shall not hesitate to gratify the curiosity of my inquisitive correspondent: Cock tail, then is a stimulating liquor, composed of spirits of any kind, sugar, water and bitters it is vulgarly called a bittered sling, and is supposed to be an excellent electioneering potion inasmuch as it renders the heart stout and bold, at the same time that it fuddles the head. It is said also, to be of great use to a democratic candidate: because, a person having swallowed a glass of it, is ready to swallow any thing else.
Edit. Bal.]

To us it sounds like it's time for a good Old Fashioned Whiskey Cocktail!

In an Old-Fashioned glass place a sugar cube.
Saturate the sugar cube with 2 or 3 dashes of bitters and a splash of water.
Crush the cube with a muddler.
Rotate the glass so the sugar and bitters line the glass.
Add ice and 2.5 oz rye or bourbon.
Squeeze a lemon twist over it, decorate with your favorite stirring rod and serve!

Cheers!

Mother's Day Proclamation

2007-05-13T13:13:00.000-04:00

From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe out dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace...

- Julia Ward Howe
1870

Mother Cocktail
1.5 oz Dry Gin
.5 oz Cherry Heering
.5 oz Orange Juice
Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

LUPEC Boston

We've moved!

The LUPEC Boston "USO SHOW"

The LUPEC Boston “USO SHOW”

Friday, November 21, 7-11 p.m.

at the Jorge Hernandez Cultural Center

We've moved!

Ferneducation

sock it to 'em, ladies!

Stocking Your Bar with the Basics - One Cocktail at a Time

Fabulous Fall Cocktails

We're Moving...

Reasons to Love Chartreuse

Genever - its a Dutch thing

Dead or Alive: The Sour Apple Martini

DRINK up!

Total Pimm’s-sanity: Variations on a Pimm’s Cup Theme

Clearly, Ice

LUPEC Boston’s own takes home First Place at Hendrick’s Gin Beantown Bartender Battle

The return of rye

Some classy cocktails to get the party started this summer...

Grenadine is NOT from grenada & simple syrup is NOT simple

LUPEC makes it's small screen debut

scenes from Tales of the Cocktail: Day #1

scenes from Tales of the Cocktail: Pre Tales...

The Storied Sazerac

More fun and easy ways to create your own cocktail

Oh When the Saints...

Go Tiki Yourself

The Measure of Success

Shaken or Stirred?

suggested reading for our significant others...

The Joys of Vintage Glassware, PT. 1

The Green Hour

Dispatches from the May meeting

gin and vermouth -- two tickets to paradise

The Pink Lady Cocktail

LUPEC Boston + the Weekly Dig

Happy World Cocktail Week!

The Little Black Book of Cocktails by LUPEC Boston

Baseball & Beer for Broads

A Good Cocktail Starts with Good Water

LADIES NIGHT at Toro: the numbers are in

A toast to those who can run 26.2 miles

LADIES NIGHT at Toro: Now THAT was a night!

LUPEC Boston is throwing a party-fundraiser this Sunday so come on down!

A different kind of Easter egg...

Hello, sucker!

Charlotte Smith and the "Lady Edisons"

March is Women's History Month!

Going to the Chapel!

LUPEC president nominated as Boston's Best Bartender!

Nina Simone: The High Priestess of Song

LUPEC + Imbibe!

By Jove! Now That's The Real Hanky-Panky

Love and other stuff!

MIT breakthrough: A woman president

Raiders of the Lost Cocktail: The Mimi

Atten-Hut!

You're Not Alone

Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez!

doesn't anyone want to know how MY drink is?

It's Carnival Time!

The Beachbum loves the broads!

A New Year!

The Stork Club

Repeal Day!

Lauren Clark of LUPEC Boston on THE CHET CURTIS REPORT

The Marconi Wireless

Coffee and Doughnuts

the Ladies of LUPEC on CHET CURTIS

The Hello Girls

Veterans Day

Beantown Sippin' Safari!

come on in & leave your wallet on the bar!

what fun!!

Space is limited, so buy your tickets now!!!

Flapper Jane and the LUPEC BOSTON TEA PARTY

As if open bar wasn't enough...

Tickets on sale now!!!