Cocktail O’Clock: A Greener Bloody Mary

(Photo courtesy of Noah Fecks)

(Photo courtesy of Noah Fecks)

When you’re in your 20s you spend the week before New Year’s planning out your drinking schedule for the big night.

When you’re in your 30s you’re more concerned with how you’ll treat the hangover the next day.

Fortunately, we’ve got that one solved for you. Putting a Southern spin on America’s favorite brunch cocktail, the Green Bloody Mary mixes up Ole Smokey Moonshine corn whiskey with tomatillos, pickles, and plenty of spice for a New Year’s Day drink that will kick your 2015 into high gear.

Green Bloody Mary

6 tomatillos
1 dill pickle
3 garlic cloves
2 yellow heirloom tomatoes
1 serrano chili (seeds remove)
1 oz. Ole Smoky Original Moonshine
1 1?2 tablespoon preserved lemon
1?2 teaspoon each sugar, salt and pepper
Juice of 1?2 lime
3 dashes Tabasco

In a blender, puree ingredients. Fill glass with ice and strain in blended mixture.

To salt rim of glass: Put 1 tablespoon each salt, pepper, sugar and Aleppo pepper (optional) in a saucer. Wet rim with lime wedge, dab in saucer.

*Cocktail recipe courtesy of Distilled NYC

Endless Beer: 2014 Anchor Christmas Celebration Ale

 

The tradition continues! Anchor releases their 40th Anniversary edition of the Christmas Celebration Ale. Every year, Anchor Brewing tweaks the recipe to the traditional Christmas Ale. And of course…they add a new illustration of the tree to the collection. Generally, Anchor ensures a dark ale packed full of spices that remind us all of Christmas. This is my third year sipping this beverage and it has become a tradition for myself as well. Anchor keeps the recipe secret, but we know that it is made with a mix of strong malts, spices, and hops to be complemented by the dry hopping process. Anyway, here’s to beer traditions.

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Cookies Gone Wild! Top 10 Christmas Cookie Recipes

Christmas is around the corner. I know I’m counting down…yes…4 days of work left until break. Co-workers are coming in with their trays of Christmas cookies to share and we all poke around to see if our favorites are there and leave the lame ones to go stale. We spend hours upon hours creating tons of cookies to share with our friends and loved ones and there are always rejects left behind. What if tradition was thrown out the window and you could make any kind of Christmas cookies you wanted? Leave the plain butter cookies and the raisins and fruit filled cookies behind this year and try out our top ten Christmas cookies. Enjoy…

10. Peanut Butter Oreo Truffles

These are so easy and so tasty. You can through them in your Christmas tin and all of the sudden, these will be all your friends are talking about. You can make them in dark, milk, or white chocolate and can even add coloring to suit your season of choice.

RECIPE: Endless Simmer

Dark Chocolate Dipped Coconut Macaroons recipe by Barefeet In The Kitchen

9. Coconut Macaroons

My fiance makes bakery-quality macaroons. Seriously – best I ever had. But these take a very close second. Macaroons are not often thought of as a Christmas cookie, but they are too damn good not take a spot on the dessert table after Christmas dinner!

RECIPE: Barefeet in the Kitchen

8. Red Velvet Cookies

Red Velvet is not necessarily a “Christmas Seasonal,” but I think these will easily earn a place in the cookie tin. Especially with that cream cheese filling…

RECIPE: Amy Bites

7. Salted Caramel Clusters

Okay…they are not technically cookies. But they look so easy to make and even easier to eat.

RECIPE: The Small Things Blog

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Top 10 Foodie Gifts

Ah yes, Christmastime is here. Christmas music is playing at every department store in the nation, fathers and husbands are crankily rushing around to strings of lights, Christmas trees, and other gadgets that are used for one month out of the year, and yes- – we are all searching for gifts to please those special people in our lives. There are so many things to choose from. But what about for those of us who love food the most? What are you going to get them? A fruit of the month club? Another cookbook that will sit on the shelve to collect dust? NO! How about something that is different/unique but also enjoyable? Well, we’re here to help. Here are our 2014 suggestions:

First Nibs: Chocolate Subscription

10. Raaka Chocolate Subscription

Raaka now offers a subscription service that offers two limited edition bars and one of their “classics” sent directly to your doorstep. The limited edition bars are only available through subscription. We were in Bryant Park and got a chance to sample their Pinot Noir Salt and Pink Peppercorn bar which was very tasty. A neat idea for any chocolate lovers out there who also appreciate a twist on some original flavors.

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9. The Original Bacon Kit

If you don’t like bacon, you most likely hate America as well. This kit would be fun for ANYONE to try out themselves and pride themselves on serving their own bacon on Sunday morning.

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8. Handpresso Auto

You already know how I feel about this product. If you have an espresso lover in your life, I guarantee they will enjoy this. Fresh espresso in your car – what else is there to say? I mean, other than the fact that it also ensures your car will always be smelling like Starbucks!

7. Spiegelau Craft Beer Tasting Kit

Spiegelau is known for their high quality glass and practical designs, enhancing the flavors of the beverage poured into the glass. We’ve already tried the IPA, Stein, and Stout glass, but this kit gives the beer lover a glass to drink each beer they have in their fridge. I’ve been doing some in depth testing of the kit that Spiegelau sent us and I will say that I was pleasantly surprised by the way each glass enhances the aroma, flavor, and sometimes carbonation of the beer. If you know someone who loves beer, invest in two of these kits as a gift – they need to have enough glasses to share with you!

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Top 10 Most Ridic Thanksgiving Recipes Roundup

Here at ES we obviously LOVE Thanksgiving. Mass quantities of turkey, gravy, stuffing, cranberries, pumpkin… what could be better?! Weeeell, okay, the only thing better than traditional Thanksgiving dinner is ridic Thanksgiving dinner. Luckily, thanks to the advent of Pinterest, there’s no end to the creative, tempting, and sometimes downright insane recipes people can come up with and share these days.

We scoured Pinterest to find some of the best/weirdest/most intense Thanksgiving recipes from the bloggers out there. Some posts very new, some from a few years ago but making a renaissance thanks to social media. Make one of these for the big holiday and freak out your family, or wait until you have an overload of leftovers and go crazy.

Oh, and – Happy Thanksgiving!

1. Cranberry, Butternut, Brussels Sprouts and Brie Skillet Nachos
from Half-Baked Harvest

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2. Stuffing Waffle Croque Madame
from Serious Eats

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3. Bacon Blanketed Herb-Roasted Turkey
from The Runaway Spoon

Bacon Wrapped Turkey

4. Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Caramelized Onions, Brie and Sage
from Recipe Girl

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Cookies and…Beer? Flying Dog Holiday Collection

image1 (3)What’s the best drink to have with cookies? BEER. Why not, people? The holidays are coming; we’re celebrating getting fat and doing it with our families and friends. To support our mission, Flying Dog created The Holiday Collection: Four Otterbein’s Cookie Inspired Craft Beers.  While I was hoping that the kit would come with Berger Cookies, the Otterbein’s cookies did not disappoint.  But what about having them with beer? Well, luckily I’m here to do the hard work of tasting and drinking each beer and cookie. After our DIY beer pairing, we continued on with dessert, complements of Flying Dog. We judged the beers, the cookies, and then the pairing. Here we go!

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PUMPKIN Spice Yogurt

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Before all you jerks out there get into the Christmas frenzy on November 1, let’s take a moment to enjoy yet another offering of fall. Since, ya know…today IS Halloween! Chobani has been good enough to offer us pumpkin spice yogurt. And it is delicious. Yogurt used to be one of those things I ate because I knew it was good for me and added things like chocolate sprinkles to make it taste better.  BUT NOW I can actually enjoy my yogurt AND appreciate fall flavors.

Of course, we could have the pumpkin spice vs. pumpkin argument. I will admit that pumpkin will always trump pumpkin spice. However, it still has the essence of fall infused into the creamy yogurt. The spice flavors are definitely there and it reminds me of a pumpkin pie filling, just a little creamier. It’s not too heavy, but it is a good snack that will satisfy. Of course, in true ES fashion, I’ve started to make a list of concoctions to make with Pumpkin Spice Yogurt. Here we go:

  • Put it in the mini graham cracker crust pies and freeze – top with whipped cream
  • Mix with cream cheese and make a pumpkin cheese cake
  • Pumpkin Spice Smoothies
  • Pumpkin Spice Yogurt Parfait layered with Vanilla Wafers and chocolate chips

Since it IS Halloween, check out our pumpkin recipes, beer lists,  and everything else Halloween at ES!

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