AlcoHOLidays | Peach Cobbler Day | Early Summer Peach

Sips

Early Summer Peach cocktail for Peach Cobbler Day, April 13On the south side of my town there’s a butcher shop cum lunch counter that features different entrees each day of the week. It is a haven to southern comfort foods and on Fridays we used to go there to pickup meatloaf and mashed potatoes with cornbread and okra (or greens) for lunch. Used to because it was very rich and easily enough for two meals if you could restrain yourself.

We weren’t very good at restraint.

You had to go early–if you waited too much past noon to swing by they might be out of meatloaf for the day and you’d have to settle for fried chicken or some such. And if you were really lucky they’d have some containers of peach cobbler still.

We used to say that it was so rich it might kill you, but at least you’d die with a smile on your face.

Let me just revel in the memory of it for a moment, okay?

Since peaches are naturally high in fructose (which makes them high-FODMAP) and the doughy topping is, of course, full of wheat (another high-FODMAP ingredient), the peach cobbler from Early’s Kitchen is not something I’m likely to be savoring again any time soon. But in the spirit of Peach Cobbler Day, April 13, I thought I’d concoct a spirited version of the delectable summertime dessert instead.

Early Summer Peach

1 oz Whipped Cream Vodka
1 oz Pineapple Juce
3/4 oz Peach Schnapps
1/2 oz Cranberry Juice
1/4 oz Butterscotch Schnapps

Combine all ingredients over ice and stir until combined. Not too vigorously, think of it like a lazy summer Sunday afternoon and you’ll get it juuust right. Serve over ice in a low-ball or old fashioned glass.

I could have used peach nectar, true, but the point wasn’t to emulate biting into a ripe peach, it was to inspire the flavor of dipping into a gooey, sticky-sweet bowl of peach cobbler, maybe with a little ice cream on top. That’s what this combination does, quite handily. True, I added the bit of cranberry juice primarily for color, but the little bit of tartness doesn’t go amiss, either.

Whether you celebrate with the real thing or a cocktail version, celebrate something this weekend, okay?

Cheers!

Cosmic Cocktails | Aries | Competitive Streak

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Welcome to April, Spring and–thankfully–the end of a rather hellacious Mercury Retrograde!

Today kicks off our new series: Cosmic Cocktails.

I’ll be spending the next 3 months creating a cocktail for each of the sun signs of the Western zodiac (what most folks thing of when they look up their horoscope in the back of a magazine or newspaper), starting with Aries and ending with Pisces towards the end of June.

Now I know that not everyone is down with the idea of horoscopes or the notion that the planets and stars dictating our lives. That’s not how I look it, though. I once read something very profound (probably over on MysticMedusa.com, a great source for astrological info) that went something like this:

You are not who you are because of when and where you were born, 
you were born when and where you were because of who you are.

Isn’t that a fabulous way of looking at it?  Taking this position makes it a more introspective, reflective, meditative outlook, I think, making the information divined from the stars, etc. work for me instead of the other way around.

But enough about that, how about a cocktail?

Competitive Streak

Since the astrological calendar restarts at the Spring Equinox, we are just in the beginning of the time of Aries, the go-getting, competitive, and easily-bored ram. Though they’d probably never cop to boredom, per se, they’d just act out and find something far more interesting to do, the rest of the office/class/community be damned.

 The Competitive Streak

1 1/2 oz Absolut Peppar
1/2 oz Pomegranate Liqueur
2-3 oz Coca-Cola (or your preferred brand)

In a mixing glass half-filled with ice, combine the pepper vodka and pomegranate liqueur and stir to thoroughly chill. Place a handful of ice cubes into a lowball or rocks glass and strain the chilled alcohol over the fresh ice. Top with cola and stir once or twice around to combine. Garnish, if desired, with a dried red pepper.

Of course, the garnish might be a bit too fussy for their taste, but I’m a Taurus, sometimes I like the fussy.

This is a bold, yet uncomplicated, cocktail, quite appropriate for our first fire-sign. They may have tried it on a bet, the first time, but the peppery flavor speaks to them and now they dare others to be man enough to give it a try. No fussy martini glass, either, a simple presentation is best.  But make sure your ingredients are of recognizable brands–it’s a sign of achievement and competition that generic or bargain brands just can’t meet.