Virginia Slammer

So there are times, when I’ve gone a long time without posting, that I am tempted to just turn this thing into a food blog.  I could probably post at least a couple of times each month if I were satisfied with the sort of writing I see on nearly every food blog – rote repetition of the facts, pictures (sometimes pretty), and often some sort of rating system for the experience if it is had outside my own kitchen. 

 

But there’s a problem with doing that…

 

Those sorts of blogs bore me to fucking tears.

When I read a blog, I want STORIES.  Whatever the subject matter is, I’m only going to become a regular reader if you take me somewhere.  Most of my favorite blogs are, much like my own, basically very long-format autobiographies, written in entertaining little snippets. (I once described Tina Fey’s book Bossypants as “a very entertainingly-written book about a pretty mundane life” and meant it as a very high form of praise.)

But sometimes I still want to share something I’ve come up with, and a picture posted on Facebook just won’t do it.  So if I’m going to go the food-blogger route, I will at least give you some sort of context/story to go with it.  It’s the least I can do.

 

On that note, I present my recipe for the Virginia Slammer.

A friend in Toronto hosted a Trailer (not so) Trashy dinner party tonight.  I REALLY wanted to go, especially since I have an extra-long weekend.  But snow and the crapload of stuff I need to do around the house intervened, so I’m relegated to participating in spirit.

Now, I feel the need to reiterate that this party was happening in TORONTO.  And that I am, in general, the token Southerner in the group.  It wasn’t just that I WANTED to go…I felt somewhat like it was my DUTY to go.  And I ain’t even that Southern.

The point of this party was not to eat Frito pie and Hostess cupcakes – it was to eat classed-up versions of these things.  Given my natural affinity for all things alcoholic, I naturally assumed the best way I could contribute would be to come up with a classed-up trailer-trashy cocktail (although admittedly, MadMup’s Twinkie Cake might have been just the right note to strike on this particular evening).

One question remained: which cocktail?

Unfortunately, most of the “cocktails” enjoyed in actual trailer parks are either twist-and-pour Kool-Aid + booze type things or involve Jaegermeister.

I refuse to put Jaeger in anything.  I have been known to actually enjoy it straight, but it makes for ludicrously disgusting cocktails.  I will never understand how it became frat boy catnip.

But then…then I remembered a little beverage from my bartending class in college called the Alabama Slammer.

Okay, so my memory was also jogged while watching the BCS Championship game at my local BW3, when the bartender started trying to sell them to anyone who even LOOKED like they were likely to utter the words, “ROLL TIDE”.

For those of you who either a) don’t drink or 2) have blissfully lost any and all recollection of an Alabama Slammer, it is usually comprised of:

Amaretto

Sloe gin

Southern Comfort

Juices (generally orange, may also involve sour mix)

It is a disgusting, overly sweet, overly pink concoction.  It often has a flavor reminiscent of Hawaiian Punch.

So, for my more sophisticated take, I attempted to upgrade each of these ingredients:

Instead of amaretto (an almond liqueur), I opted for homemade orgeat syrup.  Still almond-flavored, but tastes more like an actual NUT than some chemical extract with TONS of sugar.  Also contains orange flower water, which has a lovely floral note if not over-used.

Since sloe gin is rarely made with gin anymore, it’s basically a berry liqueur.  In its place, I used the liquid from my homemade cocktail cherries to get some fruitiness.

Southern Comfort…oh, where do I start?  SoCo was originally made from whiskey, infused with “fruit and spices.”  It is now made from neutral grain spirit, infused with “fruit and spices and whiskey flavoring.”  Instead, I used bourbon.  Actual, straight bourbon.  I figured the spices from my cherry liquid as well as the fruitiness would cover the rest of the flavor profile, and MY drink might actually TASTE A BIT LIKE WHISKEY.

Finally…orange juice.  This is going to be a very sweet, very fruity drink.  I opted to use bitter orange juice instead of regular.  I find it has a better orange scent, but a nice sour/bitter backbone to balance the drink.

I also added a slurp of cherry-vanilla bitters (also homemade – this is why nobody can ever follow my recipes) and a dash of orange bitters.

I wound up with:

It’s pink.  It’s fruity.  But it’s a HECK of a lot more drinkable than the original, and it’s a rather deceptively stiff drink.  I might tweak the proportions a bit (and possibly add a dash of Angostura) but I think I accomplished what I set out to do.  I made an Alabama Slammer that’s just a bit more classy.  Thus, I’m calling it the Virginia Slammer: not quite as trashy as it could be.

 

Correction: When I went to mix a second one, it became clear that what it needed was a dash of, not Angostura, but tobacco bitters.  NOW it’s trailer-trash-errific!