Welcome To Wonkette Happy Hour, With This Week's Cocktail, The Garage Sale!

Time to clean out the liquor cabinet.

My special treat after frying a ton of chicken tonight.

Greetings, Wonketeers! I’m Hooper, your bartender. It’s garage sale season here in Ohio. Every weekend, our neighbors spill the contents of their garages/basements/attics onto the front yard and hope you’ll pay them for the pleasure of hauling their junk away. At Hemingway’s, we’re doing something similar — we’re planning the fall menu, which entails using up bottles of stuff we don’t want taking up shelf space. In that spirit, let’s rummage through my liquor cabinet and cobble together a cocktail from bottles I need to use up. Let’s make a Garage Sale. Here’s the recipe.

Garage Sale

1 ½ oz Another Hendrick’s Gin

1 ½ oz orange-infused Aperol

1 ½ oz Camparo Antico sweet vermouth

Pour all ingredients over ice into a large rocks glass. Stir with a mixing spoon/chopstick/your finger. Garnish with a citrus twist.

Orange-infused Aperol

(Note: Do not actually make this. If you do make this, you’re missing the point of this article. I’m including the recipe for future reference. Keep reading.)

750 ml Aperol

Peels from 3-4 oranges

Add the orange peels to the Aperol. Let sit in a cool dark place for 1 week. Strain and store at room temperature. Keeps indefinitely.

First things first: I do not, in any way, shape, or form, advocate making this particular cocktail. If you comment on this post with, “I’d make this, but I don’t have the ingredients!” I will reach through the Internet and gently smack you on the wrist with two fingers. I mean, if you wanted to go pick up a bottle of Another Hendrick’s just on principle, I wouldn’t say no. It’s really good gin. But that’s not the point of this exercise.

This is a fridge-cleaning cocktail, a rummage through my (admittedly eclectic) liquor cabinet in an attempt to find ingredients that love each other enough to make a cocktail. The orange blossom and cocoa nibs Hendricks has been staring at me for weeks. It’s delicious. But you can’t make a G&T with it, and diluting it with soda water felt like a crime. Aperol is a kissing cousin to Campari — another bright red bitter Italian amaro. I infused this Aperol with orange for a cocktail competition months ago. Gin plus Campari is two-thirds of a Negroni. Orange in the gin, orange in the Aperol … we’ve got some synergy here. Do we have sweet vermouth to finish the drink? Yes, we do, and that vermouth is close to expiring. Bingo.

Pulling this stunt off requires some cocktail knowledge. As a professional, I’ve memorized most of the basic recipes, and it’s easy for me to take those templates and swap in some ingredients to make something good. But you can perform this trick with very simple recipes. Do you love Mount Gay rum and cola? What if you cook down that bottle of yesterday’s flat soda into a syrup, stick it in the fridge, and splash a little into tomorrow’s cocktail? What if you add two lime wedges instead of one? How about a pinch of salt over the rum before you add the pop? A basic drink, like a gin and tonic, can be that much better if you think a bit about how to use your leftovers.

Look at your liquor cabinet. Think about what tastes good with other things. Are you a vodka fan? Good news. Vodka goes with everything. Pick bold flavors, things that taste good together. Don’t be afraid to try something that isn’t ordinary, but uses stuff you have already. Be brave. Try something you haven’t tried yet. Raid the fridge — if I didn’t have a bag of fresh limes in the citrus drawer, I would be utterly lost at the end of the shift. You already bought the bottles of booze. Be bold.

Let’s talk ingredients:

Ingredient shot. I’m so grateful that my wife helped me clean up the mess after frying all that chicken.

Another Hendricks: This is an amazing gin. But if you’re building a cocktail using the Negroni as your base recipe, non-amazing gin is fine. Beefeater works. So does Citadelle Jardin d’ete, if you want a cheap citrus gin. So does vodka, if you want something that isn’t as intensely flavored. If you use bourbon, you’ve made a Boulevardier, a perfectly respectable cocktail. Tequila? Rum? Why not? Put things into a glass that taste good. There are no rules.

Orange-Infused Aperol: If you’re following the Negroni as a base recipe, this is where the rubber hits the road. I am of the opinion that you should stick a bitter Italian amaro in your liquor cabinet on principle. A flavor bomb that isn’t laden with sugar is always going to be useful. Aperol is the default — Aperol spritzes will never go out of style. But if you fall in love with Cynar or Fernet Branca, who am I to say no?

Sweet Vermouth: Use dry vermouth if you have that. Use leftover wine if you have that. Put whatever you think is tasty into the glass. Experiment. Be bold. Your favorite cocktail is waiting for you. You just have to try.

My home bar is Hemingway’s Underground, the hottest cocktail bar in pretty little Medina, Ohio. I’m behind the stick Wednesday-Saturday, 4-10. Last call’s at midnight. Swing on by, and I’ll make a drink for you … or anything else from our little Happy Hour here at Wonkette. We’ll make it through this together.

OPEN THREAD!