Bourbon Blood Orange Mini Bundts - Gluten-Free (and regular, too)

It's not often that I bake, I don't really have much of a sweet tooth. Well, that and the gluten free stuff makes it more trouble than its worth...most of the time. Occasionally, I do get a craving that just won't stop. Usually chocolate is the culprit, but this time it was blood orange. 

Gluten free baking can be tricky, unless you start with a mix. Why reinvent the wheel and the delicate balance of just the right amount of ingredients when a good mix starts it off just right? If you're gluten free and haven't picked up a copy of The Cake  Mix Doctor Bakes Gluten-Free by Anne Byrn, DO IT NOW!!!!! I usually use Anne's recipes as a base for what I want to make and create from there. As I did this time.

Tart, sweet, richly decadent with demerara sugar, bourbon and sliced blood oranges that look like jewels and taste like candied oranges these cakes are simple to make. Even though I used a yellow cake base this time, I'm sure a deep, dark chocolate batter would be fantastic. Who doesn't like luscious chocolate and orange together?!

Depending on which variety of blood orange is in your market (I like Whole Foods for blood oranges), the season is either smack dab in the middle (Tarocco variety) or at the tail end (Moro variety). It's not always easy to find them, so when you spot a display of blood oranges, buy them. And make these!

Bourbon Blood Orange Mini Bundts

Makes 8 mini bundt cakes or large cupcakes

(These instructions use a gluten-free yellow cake mix which makes just one layer. If you use a regular cake mix which makes 2 layers, double all the ingredients except for the cake mix itself. It should make approximately 16 cakes instead of 8.) 

Sugar Mixture for bottoms of cakes:

• 5 T butter
• 3/4 C Demerara sugar
• 2 T bourbon (I used Woodford Reserve)
• 1 T Woodford Reserve Sassafras & Sorghum Bitters (or Angostura)

In a small saucepan, melt the butter. Then stir in the demerara sugar until everything is wet and well combined. Stir in bourbon and bitters and set aside.

Cakes:

• 2-3 large blood oranges (if you can't find blood oranges, use navel oranges...they won't give quite as dramatic a look, but will be delicious nontheless) - cut 1 in half across the equator of the orange, then in half the other way. Cut very thin slices across the grain. Juice the second orange, reserving 1/4 C of juice. Set aside. (The extra orange is just in case you need more orange slices.)
• 1 yellow gluten-free cake mix (15 oz) (I used Betty Crocker)
• 1/2 a box of instant vanilla pudding (1/4 C)
• 1/2 C sour cream or Greek yogurt (I used half of each)
• 1 stick (1/2 C) melted butter
• 1 t finely grated orange zest (blood orange)
• 2 t vanilla extract
• 1 T bourbon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a mixer bowl with an electric mixer, add the cake mix, 1/4 C instant vanilla pudding, 1/2 C sour cream or Greek yogurt (or half of each like I did), orange juice, orange zest, vanilla and bourbon. Mix on low until just incorporated, scrape down sides and mix again at medium for about 2 minutes. Batter will be thick.

Spray the mini bundt pans  (or large size muffin tins) with Pam. Divide the sugar mixture evenly among the tins, then arrange the orange slices around the bottoms. When all the bottoms are covered, evenly spoon the cake batter into the mini bundt pans or tins.

Bake for 23-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean when inserted into the center of the cakes.

Remove from oven. Take a rimmed cookie sheet and cover it with parchment paper. Turn them upside down over the mini bundt cakes and carefully flip the sheet over. Let them sit for a minute, then gently lift the edge of the mini bundt pan up. The cakes should come out easily.

NOTE:
You notice I used Woodford Reserve bourbon. Why? Because Kimber just won the Pittsburgh Woodford Reserve Manhattan Experience! Now she moves on to a fun and informative few days in Kentucky and the Woodford Reserve Distillery where she and the other regional champions will find out which six go on to compete in NYC for the national championship. Exciting!

A Smoked Fig Rum Old Fashioned and A Simple Mai Tai With Appleton Estate Rum

Rare would be an afternoon more convivial than one spent in the good company of rum afficianados, especially when the rum is Appleton Estate, "Crafted in the Heart of Jamaica." The gathering consisted of bartenders, rum fans, food and drink journalists, and David Morrison, Appleton Estate's Senior Blender (the fine gentleman straight from Jamaica!) to guide us in the afternoon's rum education. 

Both David and Willy Shine (Total Beverage Solutions Agency) led us through the provenance, history and the blending of fine Jamaican rum....Appleton Estate rum!  As Senior Blender, David schooled us in what it takes to blend some of the finest rums available: growing the best types of sugarcane in the fertile fields in the heart of Jamaica, distilling the precious liquid, Appleton's dedication to protecting the environment in the Nassau Valley of Jamaica, and the blending of the fruits of their efforts. Speaking of blending....

Each participant was provided with four bottles of various rums from the Estate and asked to create our own individual blend. The object was to create a "mixable" rum. We all set to work with bottles labeled "A" - "D" for our own take on what we'd enjoy making into a fine cocktail. 

The Appleton blending challenge lineup.

We each added our own selected portions into a bottle that would eventually contain our own private blended, mixable rum. Once that was done, we were instructed to write our name on the bottom of a clean glass, pour a bit of our individual blend into it, and present it to David and Willy who then selected the three top mixing blends of the session.

Lynn, of Acacia in the Southside, quite deservedly won the top prize! Stunningly, I won third and a bottle of Appleton Estate Reserve Blend. Honestly, I couldn't have been more shocked. 

David Morrison, Appleton Estate Senior Blender, awarding my prize bottle of rum!

Okay, now that we have a "mixable" rum, what do we mix with it? I came up with twists on two classics, the first using the bottle I got for third place in a Smoked Fig Rum Old Fashioned, and the 2nd cocktail using my custom blend and Appleton Signature Blend. I hope you make one (or both!) of them to enjoy soon.

Smoked Fig Rum Old Fashioned

• 2 small sugar cubes (Domino calls them "dots")
• 1/2 oz smoked fig syrup (see recipe below)
• 1/2 t. Fee Brothers Aztec Chocolate Bitters
• 2 oz. Appleton Estate Reserve Blend rum
• a strip of orange peel for garnish
• a fresh Black Mission fig half for garnish

In an old fashioned glass, muddle the sugar cubes, smoked fig syrup and the bitters. Add the rum and stir well until the sugar is completely dissolved. Add a large ice cube, twist the orange peel over the top of the glass and garnish the drink with the peel and a fresh fig half. 

Smoked Fig Syrup: Smoke 10 fresh Black Mission figs, cut in half, in a smoker for half an hour until the figs are soft and syrupy juices are running. I used a combo of apple and pecan wood and threw the figs on the top shelf while I was smoking meatloaf on Sunday. Cool the figs.

In a small pot, combine a cup of sugar and a cup of water. Add the smoked figs and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer and simmer the figs in the syrup for 20 minutes. Mash the figs a few times while cooking. Turn off the heat and let cool. 

Pour the mixture into a strainer over a bowl and let the syrup drain. Press the solids with a spoon against the sides of the strainer until ALL the liquid is released into the bowl. Pour the fig syrup into a jar and cap tightly. Don't throw out the solids! Use the remains to make cookies or fig bread. Yum. Now go make you Smoked Fig Rum Old Fashioned. You've earned it!

A Simple Mai Tai

• 1 oz light rum (Appleton, of course!), I used my very own blend
• 1 oz. Appleton Estate Reserve Rum Blend
• 1/2 oz. orgeat (I used Beach Bum Berry's own from Latitude 29, you can make your own or buy one online)
• 1/2 oz Grand Marnier
• juice of 1/2 a lime

Fill a cocktail tin 3/4 of the way of up ice. Add all ingredients and shake until the tin is frosted. Pour over ice and garnish. Told you it was simple!

Gin Class at Tender Bar & Kitchen

The sun shone, it was almost noon. A queue of strangers was forming outside Tender Bar & Kitchen in Lawrenceville waiting patiently for the doors to open. 

Passersby may have thought the worst of us. We may have appeared to be overly thirsty for our first drink of the day, but that wasn't the case at all. We were there for a class on gin. We were thirsty for knowledge.

You can study gin?! Yes, you can. Our instructor for the day was Marie Perriello, the Education Director at Tender, assisted by Jeff Catalina, the owner of both Tender and Verde Mexican Kitchen & Cantina in Garfield. I don't know about you, but I LOVE a bar with an Education Director! The more I know about what I drink, the better I like it.

The long bar in the narrow, former-bank-turned-bar, was lined with 18 students awaiting Marie's cocktail enlightenment. Each of us had our own station and equipment - tins, both a cocktail AND a julep strainer, barspoon, glasses, etc. everything we needed to make our own drinks.  
  
It was a real treat to start off with an old-fashioned, non-alcoholic vanilla phosphate. I hadn't had one of those since I was a kid on a spinning stool at the drugstore counter! Plates of the kitchen's fresh-made potato chips with aioli and bowls of piping hot hush puppies kept up our energy throughout the class.

Marie and Jeff conducted a gin tasting before we started mixing cocktails.  We tasted and learned the differences in taste and the suitability for types of cocktails by sampling Beefeater, Plymouth, Old Tom and Bols Ginever. I couldn't decide if I like the Plymouth or the Bols best - all four were excellent.

The cocktail making began with a Martinez, a stirred gin cocktail. Here's where we used the Haymans Old Tom Gin we had tasted earlier along with Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur, Sweet Vermouth and Boker's Bitters. Stirred gently with ice in a circular motion, strained with a julep strainer into a coupe glass and garnished with lemon peel, it was delicious. And beautiful, don't you think?

The Martinez

 
Next we moved to a shaken cocktail called The Last Word - the perfect name for the last cocktail of the day. I chose Plymouth gin...the smooth sweetness would complement the other components of the cocktail. Luxardo was used again, Green Chartreuse (another fave of mine) and fresh-squeezed lime juice. 

The Last Word

After shaking and double straining the liquid into a cocktail (martini) glass, we were ready to raise a toast to the education in gin that we'd gotten in a short, but sweet, two hours. Not a bad way to spend a Saturday at all.

One of the things Marie stressed was the adaptability of a cocktail...how you can swap out one spirit for another, a modifying agent or spirit for another. She gave us confidence to take what she taught and experiment on our own.  

Marie mentioned using Mezcal in place of gin in the Martinez and, in fact, I've enjoyed a cocktail she makes that does that very thing. So I tried messing with spirits and other additions myself and came up with this little number. Here's the recipe first for Marie's classic Martinez.

Want to learn that cocktail confidence yourself? Sign up for upcoming classes at Tender! I'll see you there!

Martinez - Marie Perriello

• 2 oz. Haymans Old Tom Gin
• .5 oz. Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur
• 1 oz. Sweet Vermouth
• 2 dashes Boker's Bitters

Stir all ingredients in a mixing glass. Use a julep strainer and strain into chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with lemon peel.  

Mezcal Martinez - my version

 

• 2 oz. Wild Shot Mezcal
• .5 oz. Luxardo Maraschino Liqueur
• 1 oz. Noilly Prat Dry Vermouth
• dropper full Bittermens Elemakule Tiki Bitters

    
Stir all in a mixing glass. Strain into a chilled coupe. Garnish with lemon peel. 

Mezcal Martinez - my version

Cocktail education really is Marie's specialty. In addition to bartending at both Tender and Acacia, she owns her own cocktail education business, Stir Society. 

Marie conducts demonstrations and classes in homes to delight and amaze your friends or businesses as a team-building exercise or entertainment for clients. Check it out for your next party or business meeting...it will be an event to be remembered!



 
 

Bar Marco: On the Cutting Edge of Ice

Bar Marco has an ice program.  No, not a show featuring Tai Babilonia or Dick Button -  nor even Sidney Crosby now that he apparently has some time on his hands.   

In the bar business, an ice program is one that only the best of the best cocktail establishments are taking on these days. They make ice.  Hand cut ice.  From the clearest, food-quality ice sculpture grade ice available.  And Bar Marco is the very first bar in town to bring that quality to Pittsburgh. 
 
Bar Marco partner, Bobby Fry (yep, that's Bobby behind the bar up there), recently spent almost two weeks apprenticing with Derek Brown at the famed Washington, DC speakeasy-ish Columbia Room hidden behind the equally-famed classic cocktail bar, The Passenger.  Yes, nearly two weeks of training went into learning just how to carve and perfect the right ice for your drink. 

Last Thursday was a stellar fall day to witness the ritual cutting of the ice outside Bar Marco in the Strip District.  The sun was shining and the temps were in the 80's...let the demo begin!

A large block of ice was set up on a cutting board outside and let to sit for a while.  The wait time reduces the chance of the ice fracturing at unwanted spots and angles, it's less brittle and more maleable.  Just right for carving. 

 

One big hunk of ice waiting to become perfect cubes.

The first ice-taming tool to come out of the chest is a cleaver worthy of any horror movie.  It isn't used to hack the ice, however.  It gently and smoothly scores guidelines into the surface.  (For right now the mighty cleaver is the tool being used. A similar looking Japanese udon noodle knife with a much finer blade is the preferred choice - Bar Marco is just waiting for it to arrive!)

Getting ready to score.

And then the manly tools come out, the testosterone surges and a crowd gathers on the street to witness the show.  Yes folks, the chainsaw!  The call of the chainsaw never fails to summon curious onlookers and lovers of a streetshow.  Honestly, it's such a spectacle they could pass the hat for tips as the engine roars and the ice chips fly!

Do not try this at home!

The ice block slowly and carefully becomes slabs of ice, then each slab is deeply cut, again using the chainsaw but not all the way through, into precise columns.

And the columns of ice are then cut evenly into cube-ish shapes - again, not all the way through.

Now the cleaver is brought back into play to gently, but firmly, separate and trim the ice into nearly perfect cubes approximately 3" X 3" each.  Beautiful.   

One beautifully clear cube reflecting the sun and the scene.

   
But what's the point?  Why produce ice in such a time-sapping, laborious process?  What makes it better than what comes out of your refrigerator door?  It's the speed of the melt and the resultant controlled dilution of your drink. It's the attention to detail when creating a cocktail of the very finest ingredients...top shelf bourbons and ryes, peerless gins and liqueurs, the Perfect Manhattan or Martini made perfectly. 

Who wants a precisely made cocktail that in a minute or two is diluted beyond recognition with chipped ice or normal cube ice?  Probably not you and certainly not me...nor any discerning cocktail afficianado.  If you're the sort who appreciates the contents of the glass, the aroma, the mouthfeel, the subtle flavors vying for your tastebuds' attention, you're also just the person to appreciate the effort of an ice program to preserve your experience to the very last drop. 

Remember hearing about Derek Brown at the beginning of this post? What?! You don't know the Passenger or the Columbia Room?  The bar was named to GQ's 25 Best Cocktail Bars in America and to Food and Wine's 50 Best Cocktail Bars. Who is Derek Brown?  Only the owner of those esteemed establishments and himself a semi-finalist for the James Beard Foundation Outstanding Wine, Beer or Spirits Professional Award in 2010 and was featured in the Wall Street Journal's article, "Master of Mixological Science."  He knows his stuff.

GQ magazine also applauded Derek for making the best martini in America.  While Bobby was working with Derek he taught Bobby how to make his Perfect Martini.  Bobby shared the handed-down martini wisdom with me.  And now, I'm sharing it with you.  Here's how.

The Perfect Martini

• 1 1/2 ounces London Gin - Bobby used Martin Miller's London Dry Gin
• 1 1/2 ounces Dolin Vermouth
• 1 dash Bittermens orange bitters
• a wide strip of lemon zest, no white

In a martini pitcher, place 2 large, beautiful cubes of ice.  Measure in the gin, vermouth and the dash of bitters.  Stir 60 smooth turns gently around the pitcher.  

Two beautiful cubes in one beautiful martini pitcher.

Strain into a chilled martini glass and twist the lemon above the glass, forcing out the oils.  Rub the rim with the yellow side, if you wish.  Cheers!

 

 
 Bar Marco
2216 Penn Avenue in the Strip District
412 471-1900