{"id":820,"date":"2012-02-09T14:02:24","date_gmt":"2012-02-09T19:02:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/?p=820"},"modified":"2012-02-09T14:05:23","modified_gmt":"2012-02-09T19:05:23","slug":"the-bitter-truth-vacation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/?p=820","title":{"rendered":"The Bitter Truth \/ Vacation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-collection.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone  wp-image-821\" title=\"bitter-truth-collection\" src=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-collection.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"463\" height=\"308\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-collection.jpg 792w, https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-collection-300x199.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 463px) 100vw, 463px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>We were lucky enough to have <a href=\"http:\/\/the-bitter-truth.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Bitter Truth<\/a> send us a little care package of bitters and liqueurs to try out and review: A travel kit of bitters including <strong>Jerry Thomas<\/strong>, <strong>Aromatic<\/strong>, <strong>Creole<\/strong>, and <strong>Celery<\/strong> (sadly, the orange didn&#8217;t survive the trip from Germany, but if we had to lose one, at least it was the most common of the flavors!), and small bottles of their <strong>Violet<\/strong>, <strong>Apricot<\/strong> and <strong>Pimento Dram<\/strong> liqueurs.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-822\" title=\"bitter-truth-1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-1-199x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"199\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-1-199x300.jpg 199w, https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/bitter-truth-1.jpg 527w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 199px) 100vw, 199px\" \/><\/a>Our friend Becky, Jen and I set them all out and gave everything a taste to see what we were working with, and overall, I&#8217;ve got to say we were pretty impressed. The <strong>Jerry Thomas<\/strong> bitters were spicy and woodsy, while the <strong>aromatic<\/strong> was in the same flavor neighborhood, but more subtle and complex. The <strong>creole<\/strong> bitters had some anise flavor to them, although in a milder way, almost like a mixture of red and black licorice. The <strong>celery<\/strong> bitters were in the same ballpark as other celery bitters we have tried, but less pungent and more savory with hints of citrus. The <strong>violet<\/strong> and <strong>apricot<\/strong> liqueurs were both really sweet and drinkable, but having bottles of Rothman &amp; Winters in both of those flavors somewhat took the magic away. They were great, but not incredibly different from what we&#8217;ve tried. The Pimento Dram (the\u00a0Caribbean\u00a0use of pimento, meaning allspice rather than a pepper), on the other hand, was unlike anything that any of us had ever tasted. It had an intense, spicy flavor that struck all three of us similar to mulling spices; something that might go great with wine or cider.<\/p>\n<p>It was that strong impression that made me want to try out the Pimento Dram in a cocktail, and I&#8217;ve got to say, it came out pretty damn well. Check it out after the break!<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/pimento-dram-cocktail.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone  wp-image-835\" title=\"pimento-dram-cocktail\" src=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/pimento-dram-cocktail.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"474\" height=\"713\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/pimento-dram-cocktail.jpg 527w, https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/02\/pimento-dram-cocktail-199x300.jpg 199w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 474px) 100vw, 474px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Vacation<\/strong><br \/>\n1 oz Landy Cognac<br \/>\n1 oz Bitter Truth Pimento Dram<br \/>\n0.5 oz Strega<br \/>\n0.25 oz Honey Syrup<br \/>\n2 dashes Scrappy&#8217;s Cardamom Bitters<br \/>\n0.25 oz lemon juice<\/p>\n<p>Shake well with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon peel and serve up.<\/p>\n<p><strong>NOTES<\/strong>: First pass, I tried this without the lemon juice and it was good, but a little dry on account of the Pimento Dram. Jen suggested either cutting it back or adding lemon, and that really did the trick. It ended up being just a really smooth, spicy and complex drink that went down a bit faster and easier than it probably should have. If we can get our hands on a full-size bottle of the Dram, this one may find it&#8217;s way onto the menu at our next cocktail party.<\/p>\n<p><em>Thanks to The Bitter Truth for letting us check out their products. You can find them at\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/the-bitter-truth.com\/\">the-bitter-truth.com<\/a> or Twitter at @<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/YOURBITTERTRUTH\">YOURBITTERTRUTH<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We were lucky enough to have The Bitter Truth send us a little care package of bitters and liqueurs to try out and review: A travel kit of bitters including Jerry Thomas, Aromatic, Creole, and Celery (sadly, the orange didn&#8217;t survive the trip from Germany, but if we had to lose one, at least it [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[112,7,115,46,56,116,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-apricot-liqueur","category-brandy","category-cardamom-bitters","category-creme-de-violette","category-honey-syrup","category-pimento-dram","category-strega"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1JYfz-de","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=820"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/820\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":839,"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/820\/revisions\/839"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.homespeakeasy.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}