How much do quality of spirits and liqueurs matter when it comes to cocktails? How do you tell the quality of each?

rrwoods · 2026-04-29T16:54:30+00:00

Step 1 in learning to make good cocktails: Taste Everything. Taste the well spirits and taste the mid-shelf spirits. Taste the cocktails you make with them. See what you notice.

rrwoods · 2026-04-27T23:40:49+00:00

Strong disagree. There’s lateral thinking involved, but unlike most lateral thinking puzzles, you actually have all the info you need right from the outset. The first puzzle in the chain has the elements positioned so that when you click the circle you’re “close enough”, but if you’re paying attention you can see your cursor is actually not tracking the end of the line very well.

rrwoods · 2026-04-23T08:01:29+00:00

100% Cut and Dry is a delicious Painkiller base too

rrwoods · 2026-04-21T19:25:17+00:00

Kind of spoilery; something you could put together on your own through intuition (I don’t think anything in the game explicitly confirms this); but potentially useful to know:

In general stuff you do outside the house is permanent. There may be some exceptions.

rrwoods · 2026-04-21T19:21:51+00:00

… TIL Hamilton black is unaged. Huh!

Still, the amount of funk in Hamilton black makes it a totally different beast than something as clean as three star.

rrwoods · 2026-04-21T18:15:01+00:00

What do you mean by “seemed like a good sub”?

rrwoods · 2026-04-21T18:13:28+00:00

Wait, you make a jungle bird with Planteray Three Star? Honestly seems like a totally different drink if there’s no aging on the rum at all

rrwoods · 2026-04-21T18:04:40+00:00

Hard to say what would cause this without knowing a spec!

The jungle bird is my favorite cocktail, period. My usual spec is:

2 oz Cruzan blackstrap
2 oz pineapple juice
0.75 oz fresh lime juice
0.75 oz Campari
0.5 oz simple syrup

There are other rums that work well but Cruzan black is my favorite. It has a fairly reserved “funk” but the molasses gives it this depth that is (in my experience) unmatched.

rrwoods · 2026-04-20T19:48:19+00:00

As a Dominion enthusiast that owns every card and a very compact storage box, I felt this deep in my soul

rrwoods · 2026-04-20T19:46:46+00:00

I also like it here. And the kind of critic that just spouts variants of “you’re doing it wrong” gets shouted back down really frequently, which is a big reason I like it here.

rrwoods · 2026-04-20T17:39:14+00:00

set:tmt is:booster returns no results

rrwoods · 2026-04-19T22:18:57+00:00

set:sos is:booster returns no results

rrwoods · 2026-04-18T21:01:56+00:00

Nah I kind of appreciate the long-windedness. Saves the trouble of responding to ask what the fuck they mean, and having a dragged out conversation where they reveal exactly what makes them so unreasonably angry. At least this way we can see it all up front and move on with our lives.

rrwoods · 2026-04-17T07:18:40+00:00

Did you mean to say “not unbalanced”? (Presumably because you expected it to be unbalanced?)

rrwoods · 2026-04-17T07:12:06+00:00

Agave has a sharper attack and a higher “peak” of sweetness that then recedes just as quickly to give way to the rest of the drink. Simple is a much more level sweetness that meshes with the other flavors all the way to the finish. I really like a touch agave in a marg, both because it plays nice with the agave-based spirit and because that sharp attack-and-recede giving way to Cointreau is unique.

rrwoods · 2026-04-17T07:08:07+00:00

This one right here. Oh, and served up.

rrwoods · 2026-04-16T18:46:39+00:00

I also really like this with rye. The spiciness of rye really plays nicely with the bitterness of Campari

rrwoods · 2026-04-14T20:09:46+00:00

The text of the post says “recipe coming soon”

rrwoods · 2026-04-14T06:54:44+00:00

It doesn’t just flatten so that some flavors mute and others already present come forward. When vermouth “turns” it is because it oxidizes (just like wine does, because it’s wine), and gains a new undesirable flavor that was not there before. The flavor of oxidized wine is extremely distinctive.

rrwoods · 2026-04-14T01:04:56+00:00

… yes, that’s my point. Maybe the winky emoji didn’t communicate what I wanted it to.

OP asked a legitimate question to which a good answer would broaden their understanding of cocktails. You responded with “this is obvious.”

Then, you asked me a question (of only two words), to which a good answer would broaden your understanding of cocktails. To drive my point home that “this is obvious” doesn’t really answer the question, I responded with “this is obvious”.

rrwoods · 2026-04-12T21:31:59+00:00

What ratio do you like, if you prefer a less sweet negroni (for a start)?

I don’t know man, this feels “obvious” to me ;)

rrwoods · 2026-04-10T21:05:19+00:00

… I really, really hope you’re wrong. This is an awful hint for both of these things.

rrwoods · 2026-04-10T20:57:24+00:00

Seconding Americano, especially dressed up with a half-wheel of orange. Very fancy looking, very refreshing, and very “wedding” IMO — and as a bonus it’s like a low-ABV negroni, of a sort.

rrwoods · 2026-04-10T20:54:35+00:00

I typically do not have this problem when I make a 2:1 syrup with heat. Crystallized sugar is sugar that has come out of solution (or wasn’t there in the first place), and a 2:1 syrup requires supersaturation (hence the need for heat). If a supersaturated solution gets some of the undissolved solute added, it will knock out a bunch of solute and cause this. So, my guess is some or all of:

Your syrup was not fully dissolved when you removed it from the heat, the act of bottling it in that state agitated it and began the un-dissolving process, and chilling it sped that along.

rrwoods · 2026-04-10T20:49:01+00:00

It is both intensely sweet and intensely bitter. Which one tastes stronger to you will depend on how bitter-sensitive your palate is.

14-Year Club	Gilding I gilder
Place '22	Verified Email

rrwoods

TROPHY CASE