The Bittercube Blog

After a volume shift at Eat Street, I decided to go see some friends around town. I first stopped at the new Maude, at Loring Park to see Chad Larson and Sean Jonze. They had recently released a new cocktail menu and it did not disappoint. The food was also great.

Afterwards, I took a cab to Marvel Bar. Pip wasn’t behind the stick, but I did run into Matt and Peter & co. The drinks were great and I hung around and got some late night food with them afterwards.

Definitely a fun night. And if you are in the Twin Cities and haven’t been to either of those bars, you should check them out. Great cocktails, great barte

Bittercube.com has been redesigned, and is having a “soft-launch” while we make sure everything is polished and ready.

Look for more features to come online in the next few days, and watch the calendar for an official launch party!

Thanks for visiting, come back soon!

We are set to begin maceration on large batches of bitters next week! In the meantime, please head over to one of these shops to pick up some bottles of our last one gallon batches!

Ray’s Wine & Spirits
8930 West North Avenue
Wauwatosa, WI 53226

The Wine Thief
1787 Saint Clair Avenue
St Paul, MN 55105

Mark Metcalf, of Animal House fame, interviewed Bittercube on this Third Coast Digest Radio Podcast. On the podcast, we discuss our favorite cocktails to create, how we got into the cocktail business, why we don’t necessarily like the term mixology, amongst a host of other things.

It was fun being in the studio and Mark was a great interviewer. They also did a good job of editing out our longer rants!! Enjoy.

Nick was up in Minneapolis guest bartending at the Town Talk Diner for a couple of days this week. It was quite a success, both in cocktails created and bitters sold!

Good luck to Adam Harness and Peder with their move to Heartland and Congratulations to Jesse Held and Chad Larson for their leap into the Town Talk scene.

Here’s a few of the cocktails Bittercube created for the event. We’re going to be guest bartending throughout the Midwest so stay updated with our happenings on Twitter or Facebook.

Green Fairy #3

1.75 oz. Bombay Sapphire
.75 oz. Green Tea Syrup
.75 oz. Lemon
1 Egg White
1 Dash Bittercube Lemon Tree Bitters

Glass: Coupe
Garnish: St. George’s Absinthe
Instructions: Mime Shake, Shake Violently, Pour, Garnish

Foothills

1 oz. Plymouth Gin
.75 oz. St. Germain
.75 oz. Lemon
.5 oz. Simple

Glass: Rocks
Garnish: Citrus Twists
Instructions: Lightly Shake, Pour into glass, top with sparkling wine

Iroquois

2 oz. Buffalo Trace
.75 oz. Lemon
.75 Demerara
1 drop Birch Extract

Glass: Coupe
Garnish: Crème de Flora Rinse
Instructions: Shake, Strain with tea strainer,

Bittercube made cocktails with more than eight armagnacs while in Chicago.  The response was overwhelmingly positive, both from attendees and the producers themselves.  Below the photo are the recipes for the cocktails in case you want to attempt them at home!

Here we are at the event while making a batched cocktail for an armagnac dinner.

Antoine Peychaud
Armagnac, Star Anise Syrup, Peychaud’s Bitters, Absinthe

1 oz.                            XO Armagnac
Skinny .25 oz.          Star Anise Syrup
1 dash                        Peychaud’s Bitters

Rinse                         Iced French Absinthe or St. George’s Absinthe

Glass:                        Rocks
Garnish:                   Lemon Peel expressed over the cocktail and discarded.

Add ice to a pint glass, stir to taste, strain.

To make Star Anise Syrup, add 1 cup granulated sugar, 1 cup turbinado sugar, 2 cups water, and 5 star anise pods to a pot.  Bring to a simmer briefly and lower heat, stirring vigorously until the solids are dissolved, then remove star anise pods.

The First Word
Blanche Armagnac, Green Chartreuse, Fresh Lime, Maraschino Liqueur

1 oz.            Blanche Armagnac
.75 oz.        Green Chartreuse
.75 oz.        Fresh Lime Juice
.5 oz.          Maraschino Liqueur
.125 oz.      Simple Syrup

Glass:        Coupe

Shake ingredients in a shaker and strain.

La Pâquerette
Armagnac, Fresh Lemon, Grand Marnier, Bittercube Cherry Bark Vanilla Bitters

1 oz.           Armagnac
.5 oz.          Fresh Lemon
.25 oz.        Grand Marnier
.25 oz.        Simple Syrup
1 dash        Bittercube Cherry Bark Vanilla Bitters

Top:           Seltzer
Glass:        Rocks
Ice:            Rocks

Shake ingredients with ice in shaker, strain into glass with ice and top with seltzer.  Substitute Regan’s Orange Bitters if Bittercube Cherry Bark Vanilla Bitters aren’t available.

Enjoy fellow Imbibers!

Bittercube will be featuring 3 cocktails at an Armagnac Event in Chicago on June 11th, at the downtown Embassy Suites.  The three featured cocktails are:

La Pâquerette
Armagnac, Fresh Lemon, Grand Marnier, Bittercube Cherry Bark Vanilla Bitters

The First Word
Blanche Armagnac, Green Chartreuse, Fresh Lime, Maraschino Liqueur

Antoine Peychaud
Armagnac, Star Anise Syrup, Peychaud’s Bitters, Absinthe

Check out the first of a five part series at online zine Served Raw, where Bittercube discusses what a tincture is and how to properly use them.  A conversation on bitters will be posted soon.
Also, Milwaukee Magazine posted a blurb about Bittercube at Bacchus.

If you haven’t visited us yet at Bacchus and live in the Milwaukee, or Chicagoland area, please come in soon, we’ve only got a month left with our Winter Menu.

On March 19th Bacchus will host the first ever cocktail dinner held in Milwaukee.  Five courses of cocktails will be paired with five courses of food created by James Beard Award Winning Executive Chef Adam Siegel and Chef de Cuisine Andrew Ruiz. This event is unprecedented in that the cocktail menu was conceived and developed first.   The food was then developed around the flavor profiles of the cocktails.

The Cocktail Dinner is $85.00 and begins at 6:30.  The event was moved from the Conservatory to the Main Dining Room because of the overwhelming response.  The dinner is filling up quite quickly with only 15 seats left available. If you haven’t made reservations please do so soon.

As part of a Bartolotta fundraiser for a Haitian orphanage, Bittercube donated a few bottles of bitters, as well as a recipe for a Haitian inspired cocktail that will be sold company wide.  100% of the proceeds will go to charity.  This past Saturday, we built a sour and bottled it for each of the restaurants.  The cocktail is called St. Dominique and has Rhum Barbancourt, Grand Marnier, Demerara, Grapefruit, Lime, and Bittercube Bolivar Bitters.

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