Three distinct variations on one yummy gin drink. Cocktails on the Fly Episode: “Bijou” Alberta Straub: Hi, welcome to cocktails on the fly, I am your flighty hostess, Alberta Straub. And today I am going to tell you how to make a classic gin drink called the bijou, which I just found out means kiss in Portuguese, and I would like to say that this drink is so good, that it reminds me of a kiss. Sometimes I dream about it at night when I haven’t had one, that doesn’t mean that I am an alcoholic okay? That just means that I like this drink a lot. Anyway it is a great classic drink, but I am going to show you how to make it three different ways, because sometimes I like to add a little pizzazz, a little flighty, a little flighty to the cocktail. So we have in this glass I am going to be making the classic Bijou, and this glass is going to be the flighty bijou, and then this glass is what I call the Cuckoo bijou. So what we are going to do, the bijou, the classic bijou is equal parts fine gin. And I am going to use this fabulous 209 gins made in San Francisco California, which is my home town. Well not my home town but that’s where I currently reside, San Francisco. My home town is Petaluma, but that’s another story, anywhoo how, so equal parts gin, chartreuse, and dry vermouth. So the variation with the flighty bijou we are going to put in a little, we are going to shake it up with a little cucumber and Basil. Which adds a nice little twist to the beverage, and then the cuckoo bijou has a fabulous infused Lille, that I made. And the infused Lille is really simple. A couple of days before, if you are having a party or something, or just run into yourself a few nights before you are going to serve. You get a bottle of Lille and a big sealed container and you just add some herbs and some spices or whatever. It’s really easy to do; there is no right way to do it. I like to put cucumber, I like to put come lemon peel. I like to put a little coriander, some juniper berries, some Thai basil, perhaps some cardamom. But any kind of combination anything you want to try. The only thing that you need to worry about is that you don’t want to leave things with fresh ingredients sitting in the mixture for too long. For example I have these cucumbers; I want to keep testing it. Two days is usually long enough for the infusion. You just let it sit out and infuse. And then you want to put it in the refrigerator and put it away because we, you don’t want it to go bad. The Lille does need to be chilled. But you know and if you have something fresh such as basil, you know, I put that in there, you need to just check on it because it can start to get kind of a spoiled taste. So just keep tasting it, and take out the fresh ingredients, and let the dried ingredients go a little longer, almost as long as you want. Dried ingredients actually add, I always thought fresh ingredients were better for maturation or an infusion. But dry ingredients actually add a more dynamic flavor. So here we are the bijou. So first of all, open the bottle. I am surprised I had trouble with that aren’t you? So we want an ounce in each, here we go. And actually the cuckoo bijou I am going to kick up the gin, I am going to put an ounce and a half of gin in there because the Lille has a little bit of a sweeter flavor than the dry vermouth. But here we are we got our gin, ok I am going to say goodbye to you, I love you. Ok, here we go, and then we are going to use dry vermouth. Cinzano makes lovely dry vermouth. A little dry vermouth in there here we go. You know it’s good to sing our make funny sounds people wonder what you are up to. There you go and the nit is time for the Chartreuse. Chartreuse is fabulous herbal liquor. It is the second oldest liquor that’s made. Benedictine is the oldest but chartreuse is the second oldest. The color is actually named after the liquor. Look at that fabulous color isn’t it amazing? I just love this stuff. It is herbal liquor it has got a 150 botanicals in it. It is so fantastic and dynamic and crazy interesting flavor. I just love it. It is made by Cartreusean monks. Apparently only four monks know the secret recipe. And I don’t see how many more could figure it out it’s amazing I love it its great. And then we are going to add the Lille, here is my Lille infusion that I made it has been sitting for a couple of days. And I have a little container of it. So in the Cuckoo bijou I added a little bit more gin so that s going to be one and one half ounce of gin, and then one half an ounce of chartreuse. Turn down the chartreuse a little bit. And then I am going to add about half an ounce, a little tiny bit more, like three quarters of an ounce of the Lille. I call it good day Lille, because of my drink the Lille. Its always a good day when you have Lille, don’t you agree? Ok, so the regular bijou just has orange bitters, Bee Brothers make great orange bitters. Gary Reagan made lovely orange bitters recently that he just came out with. This is a bottle of blood orange bitters that we just tried. And so we add the bitters, there we go. And so the regular bijou, this adds a twist of orange and some lemon. We are going to put that into everything, and then the uh, flighty bijou is going to have some Thai basil. Use Thai basil because regular basil has a little bit too much of a pungent flavor. It kind of over powers the drink. The Thai basil has a more delicate flavor and it is really nice. And then we are going to throw that in here as well. Now when you are mixing a cocktail at home, or if you are just sitting there and mixing a cocktail for yourself, its actually the best way to do it is actually add the ice first to the mixing glass and then season the ice with the bitters, then add the spirits, and then stir. I am not doing that since I am making three drinks together today. And um that’s just because I don’t want the ice to melt. Now another important element of making a classic cocktail or just s simple cocktail, which to me is a drink that is served up in a cocktail glass and composed primarily of spirits, perhaps some modifier too, sometimes with citrus perhaps you can do a little side car or something like that. But something that’s primarily spirits as the cocktail, is to have nice big ice cubes in which to chill your drink. You don’t want the kind of ice cubes that come out of the machine that are all crushed and slushy. Because what does this water do, it dilutes your cocktail. With these nice big ice cubes, you have little dilution but you’re drink gets cold very quickly. And you have a nice velvety tasting cocktail. Its really, you may not think its very important, but I’m telling you, you do yourself at home you make a comparison and you will see the difference that it takes to take the extra time to put nice big ice in your cocktail. It’s really amazing. I am a true believer in this. This is what they used to do in the olden days, the olden times before and after prohibition, they would have the big ice blocks and then they would break them up and then they would shave it, either shave the ice or have cracked ice. And that’s the way to make a real cocktail. And so you can get these bigger ice trays at stores, fine cooking stores around town. And it is worth it to make those in your refrigerator if you want to enjoy a really fine well made cocktail after your work or whenever you are serving your guest. So I am going to stir the first stuff. The classic bijou, so you are just going to kind of get it going around in a circle. You don’t have to do as much stirring when you have this big ice cubes because the drink is getting colder much faster. And then if you happen to have a mixing tins ready, or a Hawthorne strainer or a julep strainer. I am going to give this a little, just gently. And then pour it in my glass. You have glasses, cocktail glasses all ready chilling getting nice and cold getting ready for your drink. There we go fabulous. That is the classic bijou. Put a little garnish here, there we go. And then here is the flighty bijou, give it a shake. The goal is you don’t want to shake it too much because you don’t want your alcohol getting all bubbly. But you do want to break up the cucumber and the basil leaves that you have, so kind of a nice shake. You can see the ice forming on the outside of the mixing tin. And that shows you that your drink is ready. So let’s toss this out. Garnish with a cucumber round and one of these lovely Thai basil leaves. You don’t want to fill your glass all the way up. That’s nice sometimes, but you can’t serve that drink to your guest or to yourself I mean can I lift this to my lips? Well I mean I can probably lift it too my lips without spilling if it was filled to the top. But it’s just a bit nicer. And besides something about a cocktail, there seems like there is this trend towards a new, like this big huge glasses. That’s not true; the cocktail has a certain life for being cold. It should only be three, or maximum four ounces when you are serving something like a martini or something like a Manhattan in a cocktail glass. So this is the perfect size cocktail. Even smaller sometimes, this is the way it should be. And then the final one, the cuckoo bijou, now we are going to give this a little bit more of a shake. Okay create a seal. And then throw out my glass. And then garnish. Look around sand see now, did you forget anything else? Hopefully no, hopefully your guests weren’t watching or if they were just laugh it off. Wait until you see what I did to your main course. Okay, there we go, classic bijou, flighty bijou, and cuckoo bijou. That’s the fabulous, classic, delicious, cold gin drinks. Enjoy. Cheers, another classic. The flighty! In flighty announcements: 1. Add large cubes of ice 2. Season ice with orange bitter 3. Gin, vermouth and Chartreuse 4. Add zest of lemon 5. Stir with bar spoon 6. Pour chill and garnish 7. Its delicious 8. Remember to vary