Rye Sazerac

From the @whiskey_CA_mmelier Collaboration Dinner

This is the opening cocktail for the Whiskey Pairing Dinner. The Rye Sazerac is one of the oldest, prohibition-era cocktails. It’s classic, elegant, and simple. With rye whiskey, lemon, absinthe, and bitters, a Sazerac is as refined as a cocktail can be. Here we present this simple cocktail recipe as a forward to the rest of a classic meal. The absinthe on the nose provides an interesting twist to a classically whiskey-based cocktail. We used Sazerac Rye as the base.

what you need

1 oz rye whiskey (we used Sazerac)

1/2 oz cognac (we used Courvoisier)

3 dashes Peychaud’s bitters

2 dashes Angostura bitters

1 sugar cube

1 lemon rind

1/2 oz absinthe

how to make it

Chill a glass and run a lemon rind around the rim.

Pour absinthe into the glass and swirl it around.

Combine sugar cube and bitters in a glass and muddle until combined. Add the rye whiskey and the cognac, and stir with filtered ice cubs. Pour the absinthe out of the serving glass and strain the cocktail into the glass with a small ice cube if desired. Twist another lemon rind over the top to express the oils.

Serve chilled using the lemon rind as garnish.

Pot Roast

This is the main course for the Whiskey Pairing Dinner and, my, what a deep, flavorful pot roast this is! Let me start by saying that I sourced a 4.6 pound chuck roast from the Spring House Farm Store to feed the four of us and had no regrets. A simple pot roast is easy enough to pull off especially if you have a slow cooker, but this really takes the flavor profile up a notch to make this velvety, sinful, fall-off-your-fork roast with plenty of fall veggies.

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November 14, 2021 3 Comments

brussels sprout recipe whiskey pairing whisky one and a half slices

Spicy Brussels

Brussels Sprouts are one of our favorite falltime veggies, especially when they’re made crispy. There are so many unique toppings for sprouts (sprouts!) that they’ll never get boring. Here they are paired with a round, fruit-forward Orkney Island Scotch Whiskey to really accentuate their sweetness.

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November 14, 2021 2 Comments

Pecan Pie

This is the dessert for the Whiskey Pairing Dinner generously provided by The Piemaker. I’ve never been a huge pecan pie fan (nor was I a big Key Lime Pie fan) until The Piemaker came into my life. This pecan pie is as ‘from scratch’ as it comes, with hints of bourbon and maple folded into the filling, served with a luxurious maple cinnamon cream. This is a decadent dessert – decadent is an understatement. But if you’re looking to level up your Holiday meal game, this is the place to start. We definitely felt the need to eat one and a half slices… 😃

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November 15, 2021 3 Comments

The Whiskey Post

OneandahalfSlices is starting to go rogue with cocktails. A couple gems await you all in the near future. But one thing is for certain – there will be a lot of whiskey-based beverages. For that reason, I decided to kick off our foray into the vast and captivating world of libations with a What’s On My Whiskey Shelf post to familiarize you all with some of my favorites. Seemed like the perfect thing to post on a Friday night! So pick your favorite and get ready to whip up my signature drink – the Smoked Old Fashioned. For the more adventurous, we’ve also got the Burnt Peach Old Fashioned, the Ginger Peach Smash, and the Paper Plane.

Of the three main whiskey/y varietals (bourbon, scotch, and rye, for our purposes), bourbon is by far my favorite. It is the sweetest and tends to be the smoothest, though ‘smoothness’ typically has more to do with age than anything else. Bourbon, by law, must be distilled in the United States and is native to the Kentucky/Tennessee area. Us Virginians make some passable bourbon but some of my favorites hail from Colorado. Also by law, bourbon has to be >51% derived from corn mash (as opposed to some form of grain mash). For an awesome overview of the process for those Virginia-dwellers, I highly recommend a visit to Copper Fox Distillery in Sperryville (followed by lunch at Penn Druid Brewing expertly concocted by upstart pop-up cook Sumac VA). Now, without further ado, the list…

#1 Jefferson’s Ocean is a unique bourbon – sweet, smooth, and just beautifully drinkable. What most people know from the Jefferson Distillery is Jefferson’s Small Batch, which is also good, but Jefferson’s Ocean is aged at sea!!! Maybe that’s why I like it – my soft spot for the sea… It has to be labeled “blend of straight bourbon whiskeys” even though it isn’t technically blended because the final batch is created from the contents of several different barrels that have spent months – sometimes years – on container ships charting course through the Atlantic. $70-90.

#2 Angel’s Envy is what happened when long-time Woodford Reserve distiller Lincoln Henderson got bored. Woodford is a staple of mine and typically what I use to make cocktails such as an Old Fashioned, a Manhattan, or a Sazerac. Woodford is a robust yet smooth bourbon that is only mildly sweet. But Angel’s… Angel’s is lighter still and while it tastes somehow younger and crisper than the heavier Woodford, it is smooth all the same. It is by far Lincoln’s finest work, evidenced by the fact that it is frequently out of stock on liquor store shelves. $50-60.

#3 Breckenridge (yes, like the brewery, and yes, like the ski resort). Breckenridge makes some heady stuff. Sweet, bold, powerful. I like just about everything Breckenridge makes. Pictured here is the quintessential bourbon and the PX Cask Finish. The Port Cask Finish and the High Proof Blend are also both fantastic. There is also an elusive Breckenridge that I am simply dying to try but haven’t for my unwillingness to spend $400 on an unknown bottle. Once you hear the name you’ll understand the nature of my intrigue – Breckenridge: Dark Arts. Distilled from Malt Mash. So, yes, naturally I want to try it. $30-60.

Honorable Mention. Arguably the best bourbon on this list was introduced to me by the Piemaker – Blanton’s. Blanton’s is easily recognizable by its squat little geometric bottle with a galloping horse on top. It will set you back upwards of $200 but that isn’t really the problem – finding it is the problem. Most liquor stores are restricted to a 1-2 bottle quota per shipment and it will be gone within 10 minutes of delivery. It’s that good. The second honorable mention is likely more elusive still than the first. The Kentucky-born Willet Distillery puts out all kinds of bourbons but one, in particular, caught my taste buds at the DC classic Jack Rose Dining Saloon (with over 2,500 bottle of whiskey on the shelves!). Willet Milk and Cookies Bourbon might as well have been dessert. It was sweet and very complex – slightly spicy and very bold.

Scotch is a different animal – peaty and harsh, scotch tastes like yesterday’s burnt out campfire… in a good way. By law, scotch has to be produced in Scotland, like Champagne has to be produced in the Champagne region of France, Prosecco in Italy, Cava in Spain, Bordeaux wines in Bordeaux, so on and so forth. Some are harsher than others – Laphroaig and Lagavulin (considered “lowland” scotch) hold the reputation for being the peatiest where highland scotch like Oban can be a bit smoother. Then there’s Speyside scotch and Islay scotch… there’s a whole map… it’s a whole thing. Anyway, I’ll typically take a good bourbon over a good scotch any day but these have captured my taste buds and proven themselves to be some of the most expertly distilled spirits I have encountered.

#1 Scapa The Orcadian is distilled on the northernmost Orkney Islands of Scotland and comes in two varietals: Skiren and Glansa. It is considered highland single malt scotch. Skiren is delicate, smooth, and exceptionally creamy, where Glansa is peaty, spicy, and bold. Both Skiren and Glansa are Old Norse terms to describe the skies – skiren the glittering, bright, summer skies and glansa, the tumultuous, stormy-weathered skies over the sea. Skiren is my favorite but pictured here is Glansa. Note that you can only get this in D.C. proper. $80-100.

#2 You’re going to want to write this one down, if for no other reason than you are never going to remember how to spell it, much less pronounce it. Brook-lah-dee comes in an iconic, sea-blue-green bottle inside a same-colored can, and is also best procured inside D.C. city limits. It is probably the most expertly crafted spirit I have ever tasted and is considered an Islay scotch. Light, smooth, and exceptionally drinkable, it makes a lovely nightcap. $60-80.

#3 Finally, if you’re looking for a more traditional scotch, this is my pick. If you haven’t noticed by now, smooth and sweet is my jam. The Lagavulin 16 year is exceptionally smooth and levels out its heavily peated body well. Many will argue that Lagavulin 10 year is one of, if not the best scotch on the market, and it may very well be for the price, but if you find this one on sale, it’s worth it. $70-100.

As I mentioned, I’m not big on rye. Period. The whole Whistle Pig thing was just lost on me. But here are two noteworthy exceptions. Possibly, the only two exceptions. 😁

#1 Basil Hayden’s is a good stand-by bourbon for cocktail making and I’ll drink it straight any day of the week. But this Basil Hayden’s is unique. This Caribbean Reserve Rye isn’t just aged in rum barrels, it has rum blended in! It is very sweet and makes for an excellent dessert. $30-50.

On another note, who knew that rum could be just as enjoyable to sip as whiskey? Even more so when sitting on a beach. Don’t believe me? Try a <$30 bottle of Zaya Gran Reserva dark rum.

#2 Here we have saved the best for last… or certainly the most grandiose. A Midwinter Night’s Dram (hat tip Shakespeare) hails from Park City, Utah and, as of 2021, will no longer be available in retail stores! It is dark, stormy, complex, and beautiful, and will only be available at the distillery. This bottle of Act 8, Scene 1 set me back $475 and will be consumed sparingly, caringly, on cleansed palettes over the next several years.

Are you sure

That we are awake?

It seems to me

That yet we sleep, we dream.