The Unnamed Drink

Happy Friday everybody, it's four o'clock. And that means I'm about four hours late for a drink. I got to tell you all I've been really anxious all day for this, because this is absolutely one of my favorite drinks right now. It's a more complex drink, it's users pretty much all the skills we've kind of been building up to. It's something that you won't find anywhere, I guarantee it.

And so with that, let's kind of get going, but before we do that I just got to show you guys something, it's killing me. So my oldest daughter, I don't know, last year went to some fish store or something like that, and she bought like this old record player, right, and she's found are all of our old records, and so we've got this whole box full of these old albums. Check out, check out some of them, oh yeah, a little Saturday Night Fever, yeah, you guys will love this one, uh-huh.

Yeah, see, I also have my brothers and sisters albums as well, so then you want to see my albums? Hey, yeah, as one of my own, it's like a double album where they got the, all the cool stuff in there. Anyway, I thought that was super cool, okay, but let's get back to drinking. So this drink

is super good, you guys need to make this and then give me ideas for what you're, what I should call this drink. So I want to go in a little bit of history about this drink and how it came about and how I found it in the first place. Anyway, so for Christmas this year my youngest daughter bought me a Groupon for bartending class, right, super awesome. So with this bartending class, super stoked to go, only to find that it was kind of like, like bartending one, and when I was figuring out its gonna learn how to like spin shakers or pick up something new or learn something like tip, right, but now it was like make drinks. Like, I think they had, I think one of the drinks I made was a margarita and Another one was like mule and it's just kind of very common pedestrian stuff, but I was talking to the bartender, they kind of picked up on the fact that I was kind of bored.

He's like a hey, look, let me make you something different, right. So he made a drink, and watch her make this drink, you guys should try this. I tried it, I'm like, oh no, that's pretty good, like I've never had anything like that. It's like, yeah, I neither of mine, and I look at Michael, what do you call, he's like, I have no clue what to call it. And so I'm looking at like, well, you got to give it a name. He's like, well, I call it the Kevin. I'm like, a wine? He's like, I don't know, I couldn't think of a name for it. So I got the recipe from him, there were some things I didn't like about it that I changed a little bit, and I think it's way better, my version, right. And it's one of the drinks that we'll make that uses Campari.

Campari is not good, it's not, it's super bitter. Italian swear by, they think like Campari and soda water, orange juice, is like the bomb. It's not that great, but it's got some really cool history. Like Campari, there's really no substitute for. It was created around like 1860 by Gaspare Campari today, it's, it's still

produced by the family, the family's name is, I've actually got it written down someplace so I wouldn't forget, Gruppo Campari was the kind of distiller. It's got a really unique taste, there's only two known ingredients in Campari, alcohol and water, the rest of this, this secret recipe, it's supposed to be infused with bitter herbs, herbs and some fruits, you can try it yourself. In fact, you know, I highly suggest, if for any alcohol that you use in a drink, you should try it yourself, adjust your tastes, like say, it's normal, well, normal shot glass, I want to try a drink, oh, that's too much.

Oh god, this is Campari, that's good, but it's featured in the string and it works out, why? Because of all the other ingredients. So the original recipe called for something called Cynar, which is a very bitter liqueur, it's actually paste on artichokes, it doesn't taste a lot like artichoke because it's so bitter, but it's pretty freakin nasty. A buddy of mine today actually sent me a recipe, the totally surprised call for Cynar, and I'm like, was a little blown away, but so I didn't want that, I want to take that out. I also wanted to add something else to it, to make it taste a little bit more unique, so I added mint leaves to it. So what we're gonna make is the unnamed drink, I just call Kevin

right now cuz I can't think of anything better. I'm looking for ideas for names, right, and it is going to be Campari, ok, this magical Italian elixir that's been Around forever, it is going to be freshly squeezed lemon juice, right, and I got questions for Swami elastic, like, what juicer, this is what I used, like, it is a cheapo little juicer, nothing special. There some OJ, simple syrup, right, we learn how to make this, equal parts of just white granulated sugar and water, and this is just regular little simple syrup. It's not, my America in bourbon, I'm super stoked, I've been talking about this for a while, this Eagle Rare bourbon.

This is, for the last couple years, has always been like in the top 5 bourbons out of $30, consistently, and I've never tried it. So, well, there we go, gotta try it. Oh man, it smells good. So this is what I'm gonna use today, except, and I'm super Stoked to try it, but I'm even more stuff. to just have a little drinky here. Cheers. Oh wow, that is a good bourbon, this is a bourbon, I can see why it gets on the top five lists all the time. Super good, super

mellow, it has that sweet vanilla taste, a little bit of caramel, and the tail is super good, it's a little, a little hot, but boy, it's tasty. This is really good, this is gonna be one of my go-to bourbons, I can tell already. One thing about this drink, and I think I talked about this in the very first week when we're making the old fashions, it's about muddling. So tools you'll need, muddler, of course, your jigger, and a shaker, these are our tools when you have any type of.

Oh, I forgot mint, see, actual real fresh mint. That's one of the other ingredients if you are making a drink with any kind of leafy stuff, so mint, basil, that kind of stuff, you need to be careful how you muddle it, and so I got this clear glass to kind of show you what I'm gonna be doing here, and here's a mint leaf, here's my muddler, you may actually want to use the blunt end of this so you don't totally bastardize the mint, but I actually like this end because it helps me that do what I need to do, what you kind of, you don't want to tear the leaf.

In general, if you tear the leaf, the chlorophyll from the leaf is going to get in the drink, and it can taste, it can sour the drink a little bit, you may or may not notice it, depending on how much booze you have in there, but it can sour the drink, and so you want to bruise the leaf, but you don't want to, terribly, so it's kind of, that's a little tough, so what I'm gonna do is I'm going to take my muddler here, and I'm just going to kind of twitch around, you can't really hear, but you can kind of hear, none that you can see, that,

or not, probably not, but you can kind of see it's, it's, it's kind of dimpling a little bit, it's bruising, and you can smell, and you can definitely smell it, you can smell, or, and you can definitely smell the mint coming out of there. I want to see if it, there you go, this might be a little, see, it's all speckled there, maybe can't see that, if I put my hand behind it, see where you're bruising it, that's what you want to do with this stuff. When you shake it, you have to be careful when you shake it too, because you don't want to kill it. So that's kind of a general note about dealing with basil, mint, time, that kind of stuff, leafy stuff, when you're making these drinks. Another kind of interesting note about Campari, this is the thing that actually started the whole digestif, an aperitif thing. It's supposed to have

these digestive properties where you have like a drink before dinner, and it helps to digest red meat. I don't know about that, what I would say though is, have two bourbons before every meal, and not only will it help with any of digestion, but you won't care so much about eating anyway, you'll probably lose weight, so it's a good diet tip. So let's go ahead and make this thing, are you ready? I'm ready. One more thing, if you don't like Campari, I've chosen Campari, like, it's not good by itself, in my opinion, but it's super bitter, and it fits the rest of the flavors super well.

Some possible substitutes for Campari, you could, you Cynar, but that's not really like, there aren't any real direct substitutes for a Campari, but things that are close that I've tried, I have tried a pur TiVo. I've tried Luxardo bitter, I have tried Tempus Fugit. Classic. Oh. Those are things that are kind of

similar, but for this just stick with Campari, it's really not that expensive. I think it's like 18 bucks a bottle, and the cool thing about it is you don't use any much of at any one time, and so you'll have around for a long time. So let's make this bad boy, so this is the Steve's version of the unnamed drink. I will say this, I'm super happy, super Excited you here and watching super excited to make this drink. I've been making this drink for about six weeks, seven weeks now. Every single person I've made the drink for, every single person I've taught how to make this drink, love this drink. Nobody, and I mean nobody, does not like this drink. So if you don't like it, you suck. So let's go ahead and get started. I'm gonna go ahead and I'm gonna pull off, let's pull off see ya for, let's

pause five of these leaves in there. I'll use that muddle one, so it'll be super Manton, you may not want to you so much mint, it's kind of up to you. I like the minty flavor. You've got the Campari, which is super bitter. You've got the lemon, which is bitter. You've got the OJ, the orange juice, which is sweet. You've got the simple syrup, which is sweet, the bourbon typically is sweeter, right, and so I really like the mint. I like a lot of it because it cuts through a lot of that in it, and it brings it together. Okay, so I'm being super careful, I'm muddling my mint. Means his mother.

Okay, now the important part, ingredients. Simple syrup. Okay, you're gonna use a half an ounce, just a half an ounce of this. Okay, oops, I said a half an ounce and I poured too much. There we go, half ounce, half ounce of simple syrup. All the other ingredients for the most part are a single part, except the booze. I up the booze quotient, right? So, half a half of an ounce of simple syrup, one ounce of freshly squeezed lemon juice. If you are a lazy ass,

you can use this stuff, it's not bad, but like I said, I highly recommend freshly squeezed stuff, it's easier to get, it's cheaper, little squeeze and you're fine. So we've had our simple syrup, we've had our lemon juice, we're going to add one ounce of orange juice. Okay, we're going to add an ounce of Campari. Okay, and we're going to add one and a half ounces of bourbon. Okay, I use an ounce and a half of bourbon, try it out, you may want to up it to two ounces occasionally.

I, you know, like I said, I didn't ever make anything with less than two ounces of booze. You've got an ounce of booze and Campari, you've got an ounce and a half in the bourbon. I do make these with two ounces of bourbon as well, for those who have to go out and run them ten miles afterwards, maybe use one ounce of bourbon, but I'm going to use an ounce and a half, maybe a little bit more than half. Okay, so, they make sure I've got everything, we got our bourbon, we got a Campari, we got our simple syrup, we got our OJ, we got our freshly

squeezed lemon juice, we got our muddled mint. It kind of looks, you can't even see it now. We're gonna put it in the shaker, it's already in the shaker. I'm gonna add ice to the shaker, and I had plenty of ice to these, just load that bad boy up because, like I said, I like when shaking drinks, I like these things, like I'm super tasty, like that. Okay, now we're gonna shake. Now, you notice I'm not going to town like you did to shake, because we don't want to tear the wheat, so just kind of a gentle shake, but you've got enough ice in there, you see, still got that nice, nice cool bit. But don't shake the heck at least, because you, like I said, you don't want to upset the leaves too much, you don't want to rip them up, I'll get a bunch of chlorophyll in there.

It's just, like I said, it can kind of ruin the taste for this. Bad boy, out. Cheers. Holy crap, that's amazing. See, the funny part about this drink is you look at these components, right? I mean, they're all over the place, right, I've got sweet, I've got bitter, I've got sour, I've got mint, right, so many different flavors that you don't think it'll work well together, but this drink is freaking amazing. For those of you that know Jeff Chris, for my buddy Jeff Christopher, I taught him how to make the drink, he makes him two at a time and just drinks him in a big tumbler, like these are freaking nuts.

So if you made this, you have to let me know what you think I should name it, like let's come up with a name. Jeff said he should call it the Kevin, I don't really want to name it after myself, I think we should come up with a better name for it. Oh, Patti came up with a name, Patti Moriarity capable name, I can't remember what it was, but it was actually pretty good. It's like the, the bitter spring solstice or something like that, which actually was a decent name, but a little bit too much. I want to call it something other than the Kevin, because that's what I call it right now, is the Kevin. I think we should go with a different name. Mmm, oh man, this is really good, oh, this is Really good. Okay, he wants to see me

awake. One more, I'll make one more of these, just in case you didn't get it, the mint is actually, okay, the minty flavor will, will be more than enough for two drinks. So we weren't paying attention before, pay attention this time. Oh man, so we're gonna using, let's see, let's start with the simple syrup, 1/2 ounce of simple syrup. Okay, and ounce of lemon juice, man,

actually wasn't planning on making to us, it's gonna make one. So now I do have to go to the wildest stuff which is gonna be weird and have freshly squeezed stuff in this stuff, but I'll live, I'm doing this for you guys. Okay, got it, else of lemon juice, an ounce of orange juice, one

ounce of Campari, and an ounce and a half of bourbon. This is one of those drinks where you don't really have to use a good bourbon in because it's got so many different flavors, but use like a drinkable bourbon, a bad bourbon will ruin any drink, guaranteed. And a rye, I think would not work in this drink, you want something that's a little bit sweeter.

I think the rye would add a interesting spice to the drink, but it might clash with the mint a little bit, so I'm not sure it'd be good, but why change something that's not broken. Shaker top, shake, remember we've got leaves in here, you don't want to tear the leaves on this, float shake. Oh my god, that's like oh, as goodness in a glass right there.

Look at that. I hope so, you are actually making this one with me because this is freaking amazing, and anyway, hope you guys loose about Campari, it tastes nasty, I think, but it has some really good juices and drinks, and this is one of the drinks that I think it works super well in the amount of flavors that are in this drink, you think it's too much, too much weirdness going on, but the end result is perfect. I mean, this drink is

awesome. If for some reason this is a little too boozy for you, you might want to bounce back the bourbon a little bit and do one shot, and then the ratios are super simple, it's one ounce for everything except for the simple syrup, only half an ounce, but if you do that, don't tell me because I'm gonna call you a big wussy, use at least an ounce and a half a bourbon, I think, in this drink, and it makes it perfect. In fact, you probably Want a little bit of that bourbon, a flavor to counteract a lot of the other sweetness and stuff that's going on in here. Mmm, my goodness, this is good, so this is the drink with no name. Let me know how you like it, I think you're gonna love it.

Let me know a good name for it, because I don't want to call it the Kevin, but That's what I'm calling right now. because I can't think of a freaking good name for it yet, and I don't want to call it The Hague ear, The Hague endure fur, because that seems kind of pretentious, not that I'm not vain, because I am, but this is one of the best drinks I've probably had in forever, I think you guys are gonna love it, makes a perfect spring and summer drink. Hmm, enjoy. Next week will be interesting, I've actually asked Molly to maybe make it a tequila drink, cuz I'm not a tequila drinker, my wife, so

maybe she will do a guest appearance next week, which we fun, for those of you that haven't met my wife, you're gonna meet Molly, for those of you have, you loved her more than me, anyway. So but maybe we can get Molly to do something next week. I've got a couple other ideas I want to teach you guys, at some point how to make a gin gimlet, and I've got a couple of variants of that which are amazing, those are really good drinks in the spring and summer, when it gets warmer, there's a couple morning drinks like a revolver that I want to show you guys how to make.

We could make my hangover drink, which is a suffering bastard, which is a good drink as well. There's a whole ton of drinks, it we made you next week, but as always I'll post what you need to make those midweek. Hopefully we can get Molly to help us out, we'll do a tequila drink, it could be fun for those of you that like tequila, if nothing else, if you like tequila, go back to the old fashioned recipe, remember we talked about replacing the bourbon with tequila, it is amazing. Follow the exact same recipe from a few weeks ago, and just use tequila, that's awesome. I'm rambling because I'm gonna drink more, so hope you guys have a great Friday, I hope you guys have a great weekend, be safe.

Shelter in place, do smart things, we'll get through this, and the best thing about this stuff that I'm doing on Fridays is this is like hand sanitizer for the insides, really it is, it's great, and I think it keeps you healthy. There you go. So take care guys, and I will see you guys next week.