Affordable At-Home Sous-Vide Cooking

Thanks to a successful kickstarter campaign the Nomiku at-home sous-vide cooker has gone into production. Once the realm of perfectly cooked meats and even cooking temperatures were relegated to professional kitchens and expensive equipment, but no longer! The sous-vide is a fantastic tool in the kitchen but also functions as a great asset for a bar as well. It can be used to make infusions, flavour sugars, and create an aging effect on spirits. This is a piece of equipment that you will be glad that you bought and that you can get really creative with. The Nomiku can be pre-ordered for December for a mere £260. 

NOMIKU WEBSITE

Imbibe.com Explores the Intersection of Spirits and Perfume

 A great article by Alice Lascelles from our archives exploring two of the things we at Drink Factory are most passionate about: spirits and perfume. Alice came into the lab back in 2011 to talk about what we do and smell her way through some of the things we had up on the shelves. I think its safe to say she was hooked... Read the full article below.

 Imbibe UK Article

"Cocktail Dress" No Really- a Cocktail. Dress.

Though it might be a bit much for your next get-together we can't help but wonder a bit what it might be like to wear a dress that dispenses cocktails.  It doles them out based on whether or not the wearer is pleased with how the recipient has played a game of Truth or Dare. Click on the link below for a very interesting video demoing the dress and the concept behind it.
"Cocktail Dress"

Space Booze

That's right. Turns out scientists found an alcohol cloud spanning over 288 BILLION miles in space. Now that's a lot of Margaritas. But, don't get your hopes up too high... Most of the massive cloud is methanol, and that doesn't make for a very good, (and non- fatal) drink.

Booze Cloud

Flavour of the Week

The flavour of the week is Urfa biber. Urfa biber (also known as Isot pepper) is a dried Turkish pepper cultivated in the Urfa region of Turkey. It’s flavour can be described as smoky and moderately hot, with a undercurrent of sweetness reminiscent of raisins, tobacco, and chocolate. Urfa biber is technically a red pepper, ripening to a dark maroon on the plant. The peppers go through a two-part process, where they are sun-dried during the day and wrapped tightly at night. The night process is called 'sweating', and works to infuse the dried flesh with the remaining moisture of the pepper. This creates a color ranging from deep purple to a dark, purplish black. The dried chili has a higher moisture content than other peppers, such as Aleppo, due to this process. Though the flavour is reminiscent of smoked peppers, such as chipotle, it is only the plants’ natural smokiness that gives it this taste.

Urfa biber is less spicy than many other chile peppers but provides a more lasting build of heat. It was traditionally used in Turkey in meat and savoury foods but because of its fruity overtones it is becoming popular in to use in sweet dishes in North America. An excellent pairing with chocolate, and vanilla pairs well with the raisin-y notes.

TimeOut London Names Best Cocktail Bars in the City and 69 Colebrooke Row Tops the List!

                                                              TimeOut London

Books on Two of Our Favorite Things- Wine and Perfume.

Here's a great article from the Huffington Post reviewing four books about the worlds of wine and perfume. Though the summer is almost over hopefully we all can get the chance for one more lazy, sunshiny getaway. If Drink Factory does we are definitely going to have "The Scent Trail" in our luggage.

Four Late Summer Reading Picks on Wine and Perfume

Ferragosto this Sunday 19th at 69.....

New Documentary on Brooklyn Based Perfumery, "I Hate Perfume."

 One of the more avant-garde and interesting perfumeries today is arguably "I Hate Perfume" based in Brooklyn. We at Drink Factory have long been a fan of perfumer Christopher Brosius scents. From the appropriately named, "Burning Leaves", to the ethereal "Walking in the Air", to "Memory of a Kindness, (which smells like sun, tomato vines, and skinned knees), there are few people making scents as unique and evocative. Now production house Monomania have made a documentary about the process of making these scents. Click below for the trailer, and if you haven't smelled these scents before, make it your business to do so.






I Hate Perfume Documentary

Tony C. at Tales of the Cocktail Holding the Award for Best New Bar for Zetter Townhouse and Giving a Shout Out.

Need we say more? Congratulations to the entire team at the Zetter for making it possible!

Tony C. of Drink Factory to Launch New Bar in Paris

 LE COQ TO LAUNCH IN PARIS

A collaboration with Eric Fossard and Thierry Daniel, Le Coq will take inspiration from the glamorous era of 1970s.

Situated in the 10th arrondissement in the heart of the French capital, Le Coq (French for Cockerel) will be Tony’s first private venture outside of London. His partnership with two of France’s leading drinks industry experts promises to result in one of the most hotly anticipated launches for 2012 and a new destination bar on the Parisian cocktail scene.

Moving away from the current trend for speakeasy bars, Le Coq will channel the relaxed yet exuberant glamour of the 1970s. Inspired by iconic fashionistas and musicians such as Marianne Faithful, Yves Saint Laurent and Bianca Jagger, the bar will intertwine references from the art world with those of popular culture.

The boutique cocktail menu will reflect Tony’s signature, future-retro style offering contemporary and provocative twists on classic recipes, plus some very new ideas.

Keep an eye on our face book page Bar Le COQ for further details!

Flavour of the Week

 

The Flavour of the week is sassafras. Sassasfras is a tree indigenous to the North Atlantic region of the US, though it has been imported and planted in the UK and Europe. The tree stands between 20 to 40 feet high and is covered with a orange-reddish bark. The plant is further identifiable by its unique pattern of three different shaped leaves: a mitt, a glove, and a ghost. Its flavour is a unique cross between a subtle nuttiness and a bright citrus.

Sassafras root bark produces an essential oil that is used in perfumes and soaps.

Sassafras extract was a primary ingredient in root beer before the production became commercialized.  Sassafras powder, made from the dried and ground leaves, is used to make spicy filé powder, an essential ingredient in Cajun and Creole cooking.  Sassafras was the main ingredient in sarsaparilla, another beverage that has fallen out of favour. The ingredient is still currently used by microbrew enthusiasts to make beer.

Nowadays commercial "sassafras oil" is generally a by-product of camphor production in Asia or comes from similar trees in Brazil. It is not true sassafras and does not have the same lovely lemony intensity. Safrole is a chemical compound isolated in sassafras production and is a precursor for the ingredients used to manufacture the drug MDMA (ecstasy), so its transport is monitored internationally.

Sassafras has also been shown to cause liver cancer when administered in large doses to lab rats. In 1960, the FDA banned the use of sassafras oil and safrole in commercially mass-produced foods and drugs based on the animal studies and human case reports. Several years later, sassafras tea was banned, a ban that lasted until 1994.  Sassafras root extracts which do not contain safrole or in which the safrole has been removed are permissible, and are still widely used commercially in teas and root beers.