The Mule

Good afternoon, everybody, it is four o'clock on Friday, the 7th of August, I can't freaking believe we're in August already, it seems like we just started drinking in March. It's been an interesting week, super busy week for me, super interesting week. Not particularly difficult, just really really worky. But work weeks are kind of worky like that, so there you go. Today, we are going to make mules, mules are great drinks, they're super easy to make.

A lot of people just like buy mule mix or they do some weird thing to it that makes them nasty, but they're really easy to make. There's all kinds of different mules you can make. I'm going to be making a Kentucky Mule today, but the traditional Moscow Mule is made the exact same way with vodka, we'll talk about that a little bit, I've made tequila mules before. Tequila actually makes a pretty decent mule when you mix the lime with it, so tequila Meals are actually, pretty good. If I was going to have a tequila mule I would probably use a reposado tequila rather than like a silver tequila or something like that, that's just me, personal preference, and I might add a little bit other stuff to it, but we can talk about that later too.

The one thing about the mule that I love is the back story for the mule, and we've talked about the back stories for some of these drinks kind of on and off over the weeks, but the mule has a really cool backstory, mostly because of the characters are involved in kind of how this drink allegedly came together, right. And so I, I looked at a bunch of different stories of the mule, I was actually just looking for the history of the mug, right, not the drink itself, I wanted to figure out where this mug came from.

And I found that out, and a lot more, and the history of the mug is actually intertwined with the history of the drink, believe it or not. So these drinks, or these mugs, actually were around at the invention of the drink itself. So the story's super cool, and as all stories go, there are variants, there are differences or accusations that, you know, people point out that may or may not be true.

But I'm going to tell you this, the version of story that I like the best, and it actually combines three or four different tales that I have read, and I think this is pretty accurate, but it's cool, so the story is great and it starts way back in 1941, so it's not that old, but it's old, right, and you have three main players, three main actors in this story, and the first one is Sophie Berezinski, she was a woman on a mission. She had migrated to the United States from Russia, and she was carrying a heavy burden, 2,000 copper mugs,

okay, that she brought to the United States with her. Now her father owned a copper factory in Russia, known as the Moscow Copper Company, and back in Russia, Sophie had designed this mug and had her father stamp out a ton of these a ton of these mugs that are so famously linked to the Moscow Mule, right, her father ran the press to stamp the mugs, and so, you know, it was, it was in the family, this kind of design was in the family.

So that's actor number one, Sophie Berezinski, right. Actor number two, John G. Martin, now John G. Martin was an executive at the Hublin, or Who line, saying that wrong, I think, drinks company, if that sounds familiar to you, and you have a bottle of A1 at home, probably somewhere in the tiny little print you will find mention of this company, the Heublein Importing Company, because John's big hit was A1 steak sauce back in the 30s.

He's the one that figured that out, or invented or imported it from wherever the heck it came from, brought it to the States. Right, so he had this big hit on his hands. Now, John was a rock star at the time after A1, and he convinced his company to buy Smirnoff vodka, the actual distillery in Russia, right. So we created this massive sensation with A1. They got this Russian distillery, Smirnoff vodka. And the whole idea was, hey, like, let's take vodka, let's bring it over here. No one's drinking vodka in the U.S., right, but that was a problem because no one was drinking vodka in the U.S.

So that's actor number two, John. The third actor is Jack Morgan, and some of you may actually recognize that name. Jack Morgan was the owner of Cock and Bulls in Los Angeles, which was his famous bar back in the 40s and 50s and 60s. I think it's still on the sunset strip today, actually, down in Hollywood. But Jack was an entrepreneur himself, and he had this thing for ginger beer, and so Jack was trying to bring his own American gingy bear to market, it wasn't having any success, right. So those are our three actors.

We've got Sophie from Russia, we've got John, who just bought Smirnoff vodka, and we've got Jack, who's trying to figure out what to do with all this ginger beer that he's made in his bar, right. So the one thing that Sophie and her father didn't have in Russia was any kind of sick salesman skills, right, they couldn't sell these things in Russia. And so the decision was made that Sophie was going to journey to America, right, hence the big trunk full of 2000 of these mugs.

However, after some time it looked like those mugs were going to meet the same fate in the U.S. as they met in Russia. Nobody wanted to buy them, And Sophie's husband at the time, max and I think he only she only ever had one husband, so I should say at the time her husband, Max, said, hey, look, find a buyer for these mugs or I'm tossing them. I mean, think about it, you got two thousands mugs hanging around your house, your spouse is turning into a hoarder. That's probably not a good sign. So Sophie couldn't bear to see these copper mugs go to waste, right, this was her design, her father stamped them out, she brought them all the way over the Russia. She was not going to fail.

So she desperately began seeking out a buyer for these, and she was walking door to door in Hollywood in search of a restaurant or a lounge owner who wanted to buy these mugs, and during one of her long days of search, at the end of the day fate intervened at the Cock and Bull pub on the Sunset Strip. So, remember at the time Americans had no love of vodka, it wasn't a thing. Whiskeys, drinks, beer, other cocktails kind of ruled the roost at the time.

One thing about John Martin and Jack Morgan is they were buddies, and so John and Jack actually met at Morgan's pub, the Cotton Bowl, on the strip, and they were both just kind of there to, to drink and lament their woes on where they were, right. John had this Smirnoff vodka he couldn't do anything with, right, Jack had all this ginger beer he didn't know what to do with, and so they're just sitting in in a Jack's bar drinking and saying, how do we fix this, right.

It was about that time that you know, Sophie walked in with her, you know, probably a bag full of copper mugs, remember Jack and John were already good friends. Sophie walks in, and the way that Sophie tells a story is that the trio spent hours developing a drink, and the drink was kind of specific, right, because they wanted to bring the fizzy nature of that gingerbread together, the kind of punch of the vodka, and the coldness of a copper mug, the properties that came with copper, which are great, and so they created cocktail after cocktail after cocktail, until finally they stumbled upon the recipe. It would solve all of their problems, and the Moscow Mule was born on that day on the Sunset Strip in 1941, and that's the story I'm sticking to, because it's The best.

So I love that story, I think it's awesome. You know, not a lot of drinks have a really cool rich story like that. You know we talked about the old fashioned history, the old fashioned, which is super interesting. But that story is just really cool, right, and the way that it came together. And like I said, in most of the stuff that I've read, this is actually fairly accurate. I'm sure there are some things that have been elaborated on over the years and the story probably grows a little bit longer and taller, but I love that story, it's awesome. Now let's get to the mule on making this bad boy.

The meal is actually a super good drink. It's a great drink for summer, it's a very light drink, refreshing drink, I think we're going to be making a Kentucky Mule, Moscow Mule though, is the exact same thing with vodka, right. So either way we're just going to be switching liquors, right, so I'm going to use bourbon. If you'd rather use vodka and we'll make a traditional Moscow Mule. Like I said, the only difference between a Moscow Mule and a Kentucky Mule is the booze that you use, right. If you want to make a tequila mule, go ahead and grab your tequila and and we'll go ahead with that, but the mule's super simple, so the first thing about a mule is you really do need this copper mug and it's not because the mug is that special, but it is copper and it actually will retain heat or will retain

the cold better than just about any other kind of non-insulated thing out there, so copper mug get really really cold, which is great in the summer when you're making a mule, a lot of folks don't take the extra steps that I do for the mule. One thing's I really like in the mule is I like some mint. So what I did is I went out and I got two big old, grabbed my on my mint plant and grab two big old fatty mint leaves, is what we're going to start with, so we're going to put them at the bottom Of a meal cup there, okay, and remember.

when we made the Kevin, we use mint and we talked about, like, not destroying the mints, you don't want to Destroy them in what you want to do is. you want to take your muddler and you just kind of want to, to bruise the mint, right, you don't want to break the leaves up, you don't want a bunch of chlorophyll in your drink, you just kind of want to bruise them and I don't think you guys can see that, but they, the leaves themselves, you kind of see they're, they, they look bruised, they're kind of like black and blue looking, right, and if you do it right you will immediately smell the mint.

Okay, so that's the first thing we want To do, we want to take our meal cup. we want to muddle that mint down at the bottom, the next thing we're going to do is we're going to fill this bad boy full of ice. Okay, a great meal is super cold. and my ice thing is broken, so we're gonna grab some ice, we're gonna put this in our Copper meal cup here. load that bad boy full of ice. Okay, the next thing we're going to do is we're going to add our booze, right, so if you want a traditional Moscow Mule, use vodka, if you want a Kentucky Mule, use bourbon, I'm making a Kentucky Mule here, I'm using buffalo trace, it's kind of my new house bourbon, I love this thing.

We're going to use two ounces of liquor, whether it's vodka or bourbon or whatever you want to use, use two ounces. Okay, so I'm going to take two ounces of bourbon, I'm going to pour that in there. The next thing we're going to do is we're going to add some freshly squeezed lime juice, and I got to tell you guys, like this little guy, this little lime, this little juicer, we've used it before, it's got to be like one of the best seven or eight dollar gadgets I've bought.

Now this is kind of a little bit variable, you, you typically want to use an ounce to an ounce and a half of freshly Squeezed lime juice, it depends on how tart you like it. I actually don't like tart stuff, but I'll use about an ounce and a half of this lime juice, because it seems to pair really well with the sweetness of the bourbon and the mint flavor. It works really well, so I'm going to take an ounce and a half my lime juice, actually just a little less than an ounce and a half. I'm gonna pour that in there, okay.

So I've got my muddled mint. I've got my two ounces of bourbon or vodka. I've got my ounce and a half of lime juice. The last I'm gonna add is a ginger beer. I actually buy gingerbread, these little four ounce or eight ounce cans, because I never drink a whole bottle of gingerbread and throw it away. but I always drink two or three of these so they work out pretty well. These are eight ounces, seven and a half to eight ounces, we want to use about four ounces of ginger beer, so I'll just pour about half of a can in there, so it makes it actually pretty easy to kind of measure out.

Okay, got everything in there, take your bar spoon, stir it around, and that is your mule again. This is a Kentucky meal, Moscow meals, the exact same thing, but with vodka. Boy, I can get used to these. The thing about it is, like I said, the lime is kind of variable.

Use a bit more if you like a little bit more tart, back it off, you don't like it so tart. If I'm using tequila in this, I may actually take the mint, muddle them in, I may muddle in orange as well, so mint and orange. Most people will take a lime and they will take a little slice of the lime, okay, and they will use this as a garnish. We've got freshly squeezed lime juice in there, so this is really just for looks, like all drinks when we have a garnish like this.

You'll take it, you'll kind of rim the glass there, if you get some nice lime flavor on there, but we're using freshly squeezed lime in here, so it's not that important, the mint's way more important than the lime garnish. Remember with the mint you want to muddle that in the cup, don't don't like rip it up or break it up or kill it, right. The leaves shouldn't be all ripped up after you've muddled it, just take your your muddler, just be very gentle, okay.

You don't want to kill the leaves, you just want to bruise them so that you can start getting that mint to express itself from the, from the leaf, and you'll be able to tell right away. You'll smell it right away, so mule, super easy, two ounces of booze. I'm using bourbon, if you're making a Moscow Mule you'll be using vodka, an ounce to an ounce and a half of freshly squeezed lime juice, ginger, about four ounces of ginger beer and mint, muddled mint, super easy to make.

Put it, go out, get yourself some mule glasses, you'll thank yourself later because these things are awesome and enjoy. Super tasty, so that's the mule, easy drink to make. You could probably make them, in like pictures, just take those measurements and extrapolate out, so if you're gonna use, let's say

oh, a fifth of vodka or bourbon, right, you've got about 27 ounces and a fifth, right, so divide by two, right, so 26, it's going to be about 13 pours of bourbon, okay, that means you're going to need between 13 and about 20 ounces or so of lime juice, you need a lot of mint, and then you're going to need 32 or 50 times four, you're gonna need about 50 some ounces of ginger beer, right, if you want to make this into like a big pitcher or a punch, but it's, it's easy, just you can do the math yourself, two ounces of booze, ounce to an ounce and a half of freshly squeezed lime juice, four ounces of ginger beer, muddled mint, lots of ice, mule glass,

mule copper meal cup stir drink awesome So thank you, Sophie, John and Jack for that amazing drink in the 40s. Perfect, next week We won't be doing this. I'll be taking my oldest daughter, Hope, back to Colorado State, and we're driving, so pray for me as I take my entire family on a road trip. And we're not a family that does roaches, we do trips, but we fly places. I don't typically drive cross country because I really just don't enjoy driving that much.

It's a long drive, and we're gonna stop at all the little parks and stuff on the way, so we won't be doing this next Friday. In fact, I may take a break for a while. I think we've made like 20 plus drinks all different, all interesting. I've still got more drinks on tap, don't get me wrong, but I think I might take a little bit of a break, we'll see, because I know a lot of us are taking kids back to college, so next several Fridays will be interesting, a lot of people won't be around.

So I may take a little bit of a break, but as always I'll post stuff on Facebook around Wednesday for drinks for that Friday, but we won't be meeting next Friday, so go drink by yourself, go make one of the awesome other drinks that we, we made. If by chance you want some of the past drinks we made, you can just go to YouTube, look me up, you'll find like Steve's, or Drinking with Steve, or whatever. I've posted all the videos on YouTube that I post here on Facebook, so excuse me, you can go to YouTube and grab this stuff too.

If you ever want to go back to figure out one of the drinks to make, it's usually easier to navigate than Facebook, I think. Besides that, let's not give Zuckerberg a second more of our time than we have to, even though I'm doing this every week on this platform. It's kind of stupid anyway. Hope you enjoyed the mule, like I said, super easy to make, two ounces of booze, ounce and a half of freshly squeezed lime juice, four ounces of ginger beer, muddled mint leaves, plenty of ice and one of Sophie Berensky's awesome copper mugs.

Hope you guys liked it, we'll talk to you guys in a few weeks, probably. Have fun, have a great weekend, cheers.