Cocktail Capers

Finding myself in need of another bottle of Cutty Sark scotch, I went over to the liquor store after work one night in order to forestall impending disaster. No scotch? Perish the thought! As usual, I wander the aisles looking at all the bottles hoping to find something interesting among all the fruity liquers and low-end liquors.

I found a bottle of chartreuse ... as in that Louis Jordan song You Dyed Your Hair Chartreuse. I'm not overly interested in most liquers as they are overly sweet for my taste ... it's like drinking Pixie Stix or ground up Jolly Ranchers mixed with alcohol. But there are some really wonderful liquers such as drambuie, benedictine and chartreuese. Chartreuse is a very old liquer made from mint and a variety of herbs and spices. It has a complex taste and should be taken in moderation. Frankly, too much chartreuse tastes like Scope.

Bijou Cocktail: One ounce of gin, sweet vermouth and chartreuse with a dash of angostura bitters. This was the first cocktail I made with chartreuse and it wasn't half bad. Most cocktails are forgiving with the proportions: a little too much of this or that doesn't make that much difference. I suspect I had either too much chartreuse or too much bitters since the cocktail got to be progressively bitter.

Rocky Green Dragon: Two ounces of gin, one ounce of cognac, one ounce of chartreuse. I didn't have cognac so I substituted brandy. The result was quite good and now I want to pick up a bottle of cognac ... which I should probably do anyway. This was a nice, smooth cocktail with a slightly green tint which was quite pleasing to the eye.