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All About Absinthe!

So, what is the deal with Absinthe? The notorious spirit is known for its tumultuous history and its fluctuations in legality throughout the years, its associations among some of the most famous artists and writers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries (particularly those who called Paris home), and of its supposed hallucinogenic qualities, especially of ‘la fée verte‘ – or ‘the green fairy.’

1-absinthe

Find Absinthe in the cordials section of our shop—we even carry traditional Absinthe spoons, sugar cubes, and the perfect glass!

History and Definition

Absinthe originated in the canton of Neuchâtel in Switzerland in the late 18th century and is historically described as a distilled, highly alcoholic (45–74% ABV / 90–148 proof) beverage. True absinthes are carefully distilled from a variety of all natural herbs. Some of these herbs are regional and can include: sweet flag, angelica, dittany, marjoram, peppermint, tansy, melissa, sage, coriander, veronica, angelica, and hyssop, but will always include: green anise, fennel and the most important being, grande wormwood or Artemisia absinthium.

Absinthe traditionally has a natural green color but may also be clear. All absinthes are clear until they are soaked in natural herbs to color them after the initial distillation process. Although it is sometimes mistakenly referred to as a liqueur, absinthe is not traditionally bottled with added sugar; it is therefore classified as a spirit. Due to its high level of ABV, Absinthe is typically served diluted with water and sugar if served in the traditional fashion.

Owing in part to its association with bohemian culture, the consumption of absinthe was opposed by social conservatives and prohibitionists. By 1915, absinthe had been banned in the United States and in much of Europe, including France, the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and Austria-Hungary.

Although absinthe was vilified, it has not been demonstrated to be any more dangerous than ordinary spirits. Recent studies have shown that the absinthe’s psychoactive properties (apart from that of the alcohol) have been exaggerated.

What does Absinthe taste like?

The core of absinthe lies with anise, fennel and grande wormwood. These 3 herbs combine to give what is usually explained as an herbal and anise taste and smell, and NOT that of black licorice, as many inaccurately describe. Originally used as a digestive to settle one’s stomach, absinthe is a refreshing drink, especially when prepared correctly!

Preparation

absinthe4

What is perhaps the oldest, and thought of as the purest method of Absinthe preparation is often referred to as the ‘French Method.

The preparation involves placing a sugar cube on top of a specially designed slotted spoon on top of a glass filled with a measure of absinthe. Iced water is poured or dripped over the sugar cube to slowly and evenly distribute the water into the absinthe. The final preparation contains 1 part absinthe and 3-5 parts water.

As water dilutes the spirit, those components with poor water solubility (mainly those from anisefennel, and star anise) come out of solution and cloud the drink. The resulting milky opalescence is called the louche (French for opaque or shady). The release of these dissolved essences coincides with a perfuming of herbal aromas and flavors that “blossom” or “bloom,” and brings out subtleties that are otherwise muted within the neat spirit.

absinthe

So though you may not see the green fairy, this delicious historic drink is most definitely worth a try, come check out our great selection in store!

Cheers!

 

 

How to Pair Wine with Your Pizza!

winesDon’t want to drink beer with your pizza? Or that pesky water stuff?? Gross! Well, here is our handy dandy guide to pairing wines with different varieties of our, (and hopefully your) favorite pizzas!

-Margharita, pepperoni, white, vegetable, Greek, and Hawaiian-

All pizza in this video is from the delicious Nice Slice in Providence.

pizza-2

Cheers, 

The Bottles Team

Learn How to Taste Wine Like a Pro!

How to Taste Wine

We all know how to drink wine, but do you know how the wine experts at Bottles taste a wine? Here’s a short video tutorial with the Bottles Wine Director, Nick Shugrue, that shows you how he does it.

The steps are simple, and they can help you quickly assess the aroma, color, flavors, and mouthfeel of a wine. Cheers and enjoy!

Want to learn more about wine? Subscribe to the Bottles YouTube channel>

How to Open a Bottle of Wine – Once and For All!

wine bottle, open wine bottle, wine, corkscrew, shoe

Let’s be real…that ‘opening a wine bottle with a shoe‘ thing does not work. You’re just going to end up in the hospital with a hand full of broken glass and drippy Merlot everywhere. It’s time to get serious and open these bottles like the badass wine drinkers we are!

We’re using a corkscrew wine key. They’re inexpensive, durable, portable, easy to use, and won’t break the cork. Plus all the bartenders use them. Check out our quick 30-second tutorial video below and enjoy that bottle!

[su_youtube url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bvIHxrL9TO8&list=PLDAD77F5118BC8465″]

Subscribe to our Youtube channel for more wine tips, tutorials, and guides!

 

 

How to Make a Pineapple Cup for Tiki Drinks!

how to make a pineapple cup instructions

With Tiki drinks in revival, you’ll probably need a great tiki cup to go with your concoctions. What better way to celebrate summer than with a real pineapple cup in hand? Watch our instructional video tutorial showing an easy way to core a pineapple. All you need is a pineapple corer tool, a little technique, and a Tiki party to celebrate! You’ll be pleasantly surprised at how easy it is.

pineapple corer slicer
Pineapple Corer

How to Make a Pineapple Cup

Directions:

  1. Slice off the pineapple top
  2. Center the pineapple corer
  3. Twist. Go almost to the bottom of the pineapple
  4. Lift out pineapple slices with corer
  5. Fill with your favorite tiki cocktail
Use the pineapple slices as garnishes or for a tasty snack.
and pick up your pineapple corer!
Pineapple cups are perfect for Tiki drinks!
Need some Tiki drink recipes?
Click below to download & print this classic tiki recipe card!
 
 

Tiki is Back! Basic Bar & Drink Ideas for Summer Parties

vintage tiki drinks party idea

What’s old is new again…and tiki is back! There’s really no better way to enjoy summer outdoors and in the backyard than relaxing with a deliciously smooth tiki drink to sip. All you need are some funky tiki decorations like leis, mugs, and tiki torches, and of course, great tiki cocktails. Keep reading to learn how to create a basic home tiki bar that will last all summer long.

tiki cocktail ideas

A Basic Tiki Bar – Rum is essential! Since rums age very quickly in heat and humidity, even a 3 year old rum is comparable to a whiskey aged 6 years, resulting in a more mellow taste at an affordable price (pictured above are El Dorado rums).Beside a dark, gold, and white rum, you’ll also need some syrups. Below are 5 that make up many classic tiki recipes. Stock up on these for a solid start onto making your own delicious drinks at home!

*”Way back when, grenadine was made from freshly crushed pomegranate seeds…But over the years, this bold concoction has devolved into a cloying, artificial taste. Naturally, our version is the exception. Our Authentic Grenadine uses only pomegranate and pure cane sugar – no high fructose corn syrup – to produce the originally intended result: a pleasantly sweet pomegranate flavor as bold and potent as its distinctive red color.” – Stirrings 

Why All the Syrups? Well, in tiki drinks you are using several types of rum to create a cocktail with many dimensions of flavor. The syrups bind the sometimes disparate tastes in tiki drinks together, to create a smooth and sometimes deceptively strong cocktail. Yes, you will have to invest in a few new ingredients for your bar to recreate these vintage concoctions, yet the magic and fanfare you create by serving a Mai Tai in a festive tiki mug make a little bar stockage worth the while.

Basic Bartender Tools – Having a few basic bar tools will not only make you look like a pro, but help you construct great cocktails with ease. We first recommend investing in a cocktail shaker. Good cocktails are cold cocktails! Another great investment are ounce measuring cups, like these pictured in the photo below, to the right of the tiki statue.

vintage tiki party bar
Tiki statues add to the tropical party atmosphere!
Pineapple Corer
Easy, quick, and does all the hard work for you! Make an amazing edible punch bowl, create garnishes from the perfectly round pineapple slices, and add some extra fun to your Tiki party! What better way to celebrate the return of sunny, summer days than a glass of grog served in a pineapple?
pineapple corer edible punch bowl

Handheld Citrus Reamer

Nothing better in a cocktail than freshly squeezed juice! This handheld reamer gets every last drop out of your limes for a perfect Mai Tai. 

citrus reamer for tiki bar
 

Tiki Party Decor

Having a tiki party is pretty easy! Now that you have a basic bar, you’ll just need fun decorations to match the cocktails. Pick up variety of tiki mugs in which to serve your fabulous drinks, and choose colorful garnishes or straws. Leis can be party favors and an accessory for guests to wear.

making a tiki bar at home

Whether your tiki party is in the backyard, patio, or porch, luau themed decorations will set the celebratory atmosphere. Add grass luau skirts to the tables, get tiki torches for lighting, and sprinkle in fun accents like wooden tiki statues, hula girls, tropical flowers, and foliage.

summer tiki bar party

Classic Tiki Recipes

Have the recipe for a Mai Tai, Zombie, and Iuka Grogg on hand! We’ve made a free printable tiki drink recipe card to make home bar-tending a little easier. Click below to download the PDF file, and then print it on your home printer. For extra vintage flair, print it on ivory card-stock!

If you are having trouble opening the recipe card, make sure you have a PDF reader such as Adobe Reader, available here for free.

DOWNLOAD >
A free printable tiki recipe card! 

Tiki Cocktail Recipes

A World of Tiki Drinks

The Tiki + App

Though we’ve helped you out by picking classic tiki drinks to start out with, Jeff “Beachbum” Berry also has a extensive library of recipes. Download Jeff’s app, Tiki +, if you’re looking to expand your tiki drink repertoire. Take a simple backyard cocktail hour to the next level with over 150 recipes in the palm of your hand!

Visit Our Store
Pay us a visit at our Providence, Rhode Island store and stock up on your grenadine, orgeat, demerara rum, and tiki bar essentials. Once you have these basic building blocks for a quality tiki bar, the possibilities for different tiki drinks are deliciously endless. Just look for the large tiki display, we’ll have everything you need! Cheers!
    
(401) 372-2030
info@blog.bottlesfinewine.com

 

Easter Beer Hunt Party Idea & Photo Contest

What’s an Easter Beer Hunt? Well, Easter fun doesn’t have to be just for kids with this party idea. Simply replace the eggs with beer, and bring back the joy and excitement of Easter for those over 21!

How to Hold an Easter Beer Hunt
  1. Buy beer. Variety is the spice of life, so try mixing up your beer choices. This will be especially pleasing for avid beer enthusiasts. If you know some of their favorite beers, get those to heighten the competition. You’ll probably see some trading after the hunt is over.
  2. Hide the beer in your yard. Be creative, but don’t choose impossible places. Lost beer is no fun.
  3. Let the beer hunt begin! Use six-pack beer holders filled with some pink plastic grass.

We highly recommend hiding the beers after the kids have their Easter egg hunt. And as always, please be responsible.

An Easter Beer Hunt Photo Contest
WIN a FREE BEER TASTING!!!
  1. Get the Bottles 6-pack holders & plastic shred (for free, and as seen in the above photo) at our store at 141 Pitman St., Providence, RI. Don’t forget some delicious beer!
  2. Hold an Easter Beer Hunt (directions are above).
  3. Take an awesome photo that has the Bottles 6-pack holder in it somewhere. Be creative! Let the champion show off, take a photo of the hunt in progress, etc.
  4. Post ONLY ONE photo on our Facebook pagehttps://www.facebook.com/bottlesprovidence
  5. If your photo has the most likes, you WIN a FREE BEER TASTING for you and 15 of your friends!

The Easter Beer Hunt Photo Contest ends April 10th at 1:00pm. That’s right, you only have a little over a week to share your photo on our Facebook page and get as many likes as you can. At 1:00pm on Wednesday, April 10th, 2013 we will start counting the likes and announce the winner shortly.

IMPORTANT:
Your photo must have the Bottles 6-pack holder in it somewhere.

FACEBOOK POSTING TIPS:

  • We have to manually approve your photo for it to appear prominently on our timeline and not just in the ‘Recent Posts by Others’ area on our timeline. When you first share and upload your photo on our Facebook page, it should show up in the ‘Recent Posts by Others’ area automatically. We will try to manually approve contest photos several times a day.
  • Make sure you set your photo privacy settings to ‘Public’, so that everyone can see it & vote.
  • Make sure you are going to our Facebook page, selecting ‘share a photo,’ and uploading it.
  • Still having trouble? Make sure you and your friends ‘like’ our page, so that they can ‘like’ your photo.
Our Facebook Page
 
GOOD LUCK & HAPPY EASTER!!!
 
Cheers,
The folks at Bottles