It's been another brutally hot and dry weekend here in Flyover Land. For dinner tonight, I decided to try my hand at barbequeing fish...salmon to be precise. The results were spectacular, to put it unhumbly. Missus BH made a simple marinade of fresh basil from our herb garden, olive oil, and kosher salt. I grilled the fillets over indirect heat with a few mesquite chips to add a bit of smokey flavor. We rounded out the feast with fresh-baked bread, broccoli, and basmati rice with mango chutney. Unbelievably tasty!

To go along with the meal, I concocted an impromptu tropical cocktail I call Sweat o' the Gecko, that I served in my very favorite tiki mug, the Gecko Tangaroa, which tends to form condensation on the outside when you fill it with a chilled libation. Here's the recipe, if you care to attempt to duplicate it:

1 1/2 oz. fresh lime juice (never canned, you Philistines!)
3 oz. fresh-squeezed orange juice
3 oz. unsweetened pineapple juice
1/2 oz. Creme de Banana
1/2 oz. Kalani coconut liqueur
1/4 oz. Trader Vic's Macadamia Nut liqueur
1 oz. 10 Cane Rum
1 oz. Appleton Estate Rum
1 oz. Whaler's Dark Rum

Combine all ingredients in a cocktail shaker with 1 cup of crushed ice, and shake until frost forms on the outside of the shaker. Pour into Gecko Tangeroa mug half-filled with crushed ice, and garnish with fresh mint.

Bottoms up!

Posted by MrBaliHai at 5:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Derrick Bostrom blogs about his grandparent's crap: a set of beautiful old menus from various restaurants in Phoenix, Arizona, and fond memories of dining at Guggy's.

[Link: Menu Collection, Part Two]

Posted by MrBaliHai at 7:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I'm a big fan of punk cheflebrity, Anthony Bourdain, so I was surprised and concerned to hear that he and his No Reservations crew were trapped by the fighting in Beirut while filming a new episode. He still has Internet access, and has been sending updates to eGullet founder, Jason Perlow. At last report, he and his cohorts were "in good health, good spirits and working ferociously on [their] tans...sipping blender drinks while watching the fireworks from a secure location." Hopefully, the gold-plated, monkey-navigated rocket-sled he requested will show up soon to whisk them out of there. Stay safe, Tony!

Somewhere, Emeril is cackling evilly. Bam! Bambambam!

[Link: No Reservations: The Shwarma and Shrapnel Episode]

Posted by MrBaliHai at 7:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

By an amazingly serendipitous coincidence, I found the following souvenir photograph at a local antique emporium this morning (click for full-size image). As you'll recall from the Wikipedia entry I linked to in my earlier Zombie cocktail post [Link], the Beachcomber's famous cocktail acheived mass popularity at the New York 1939 World's Fair [Link]. Well, here's a snazzily dressed couple hoisting said libation at the aforementioned fair!

The name on the front cover refers to legendary Broadway producer, owner of the Copacabana nightclub, and several Beachcomber restaurants, Monte Proser [Link].

Posted by MrBaliHai at 12:01 PM | Permalink

The legendary and mysterious Zombie cocktail was invented by Don the Beachcomber in the 1930s, ostensibly to cure a businessman's hangover. Kaiser Penguin took 6 Zombie recipes and put them all to the taste test. Hopefully not all on the same day, because depending on whose recipe you pick, a single Zombie can contain as much as 7 1/2 oz. of alcohol! The winner? Well, you can go ahead and read the post, but it's the same version I mix up occasionally down in the Hai'deaway when I know that I'm not going to be going anywhere for 24 hours or so.

There's another Zombie recipe that claims to be a Beachcomber original, and it's listed on page 56 of Hawai'i: Tropical Rum Drinks and Cuisine, written posthumously in 2001 by Don's last wife, Phoebe. It's got some very exotic ingredients like 30-year old Cuban and Jamaican rum, Falernum, and Absinthe (!), so I don't think I'm going to be mixin' one up in the old cocktail shaker any time soon.

[Link: Zombie Recipe Comparison]
[Link: Zombie cocktail Wikipedia entry]
[Link: Don the Beachcomber Sahara Hotel Menu]

Posted by MrBaliHai at 7:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)