Beefsteak Bacchanalia at the Fat Bear

So here's a question: When an email pops up in your inbox offering infinite steaks at a beefsteak bacchanalia, what is the correct response?  Well, obviously, book yourself a spot at The Fat Bear's beefsteak bacchanalia event - which generates you the amusingly entitled ticket typer "Mountains of Beef".  Sounds like my sort of thing.

The Fat Bear is situated in the upstairs rooms of The Rising Sun pub, an ale house in the quite backstreets just a couple of minutes stroll from the hustle and bustle of St Paul's Cathedral.  We've been in before, actually - way back, before it was the Fat Bear, GrubsterGirl and I visited when the upstairs rooms were B.O.B.'s Lobster's pop-up.  Pretty much since then, however, the Fat Bear has been in residence, moving from a pop-up to more of an established restaurant in its own right.

First up, there's a fully stocked bar - with, in the far left of the picture, the largest section cocktail bitters I have ever seen.  There's clearly a great deal of passion, commitment and professionalism behind the mixology here.  From the house creations to the classics, the drinks at the Fat bear are excellent.

GrubsterGirl started with the self-styled "Really Bloody Good Martini@ - served wet, which effectively means a larger measure of vermouth than usual.  This was delicious, a complete revelation - the use of Cocchi Americano (a more authentic substitute for Kina Lillet in a Vesper, if you're interested) was fantastic and really changed the drink.  Thinking back, actually, to Dry Martini in Barcelona, their historic martini recipe used half-and-half gin and vermouth.  Whilst I would't go that far (and they haven't here) I can certainly see why a larger measure of vermouth can, in the right context, work pretty bloody well.

I had a Problem Solved, a combination of rye whiskey and cherry Heering.  I do love a good whiskey cocktail, and this was no exception.  Complex and family sophisticated - my only note is that it might have been better at the end of the meal, being a bit sweeter.  But excellent generally.

Round 2 (when did we ever limit ourselves to one) for GrubsterGirl was the 1934 Cosmopolitan.  Using a more traditional array of ingredients, this was seriously good.  A great twist on a classic.

It is also quite possibly the prettiest drink I've ever seen.

I'm going through a bit of a Negroni phase at the moment, so thought I'd see if they could knock one up for me - which was done to great aplomb.  The barman's personal house blend of red vermouth - a combination of Martini Rossi and Carpano Antica - it makes a brilliant drink.  I was also advised to have it straight up, rather than over ice, on the basis that it would avoid dilution and that further flavours would come out over time.

Then onto the food.  The event was held around large, communal tables, which is always fun.

On the tables were pots of quick, mixed pickles - all of which I expect had been made the same day, so were beautifully fresh and crisp, and mixed in a sweet vinegar brine.  Perfect as a palate cleanser.

Also available was a bone marrow whipped butter.  No two ways about it, this was incredible.

Then the meat started coming out.  And it didn't stop.

Smoked brisket with a devilled gravy on toast.  Deeply, deeply smokey - but avoiding the over-sweatness that most brisket is dredged in.

Pulled brisket in BBQ sauce.  Perfectly done, the meat was still moist and had been cooked to perfect tenderness.  The sauce was good as well - classically BBQ, but not too sticky or cloying.

The star of the show, in our view: Korean-marinated onglet with a Korean inspired dipping sauce.  This was a proper steak.  Cooked rare - very rare in some cases - which was smashing, and it was wonderfully tender and tasty.  The marinade also shone through and perfectly set-off the beef.

Hot link sausages.  Perhaps slightly more chorizo-esque than I would have expected, they were nevertheless great.

And then...

...round two.  Seriously, that lot wasn't enough between two?  Fine, here's the next batch.  We were pretty much driven to a standstill by now, but bravely had a good stab at our next round.  I have no idea if it would have kept coming, but I expect it would have.  You need to be pretty hungry...!

After a lot of food, though, there really is only one cure: more cocktails.  I had a classic old fashioned, made with Buffalo Trace, that was expertly put together.

Whereas GrubsterGirl had another house cocktail, the Pendennis.  This was a gin, lime and apricot liqueur concoction that was good - if perhaps not as good as the very excellent 1934 Cosmo GG had enjoyed earlier.

And with the bill?  Well, just to finish off: a quick round of classic pricklebacks - a shot of bourbon chased immediately by a shot of sweet pickling liquor.  Perfect ending to such a heavy meal.

The Cocktail Trading Company

The Cocktail Trading Co. is not easy to find.  Ostensibly, its address at 22 Great Marlborough Street leads to a small residential flat (who knew that actual people actually lived around there?!).  Instead, you have to pop into the bar next door (Central & Co) and head directly downstairs into a tiny wee bar hidden away in the basement.

Like so many other new and trendy joints, The once inside the Cocktail Trading Co. it's cramped, loud and extremely busy.  But none of that seems to be problem - unlike most other basement-based cocktail bars, The Cocktail Trading Co. seem to have managed to make their diminutive little piece of overpriced London real estate feel homely rather than an attempt to crowbar as many covers into the place as possible in the hope that you can sell enough booze to break even.  The feel of the place is almost 70s pub / working men's club chic.  With old records on the wall (I was squeezed in next to a rare Pink Floyd album, something a little vexing as I reckon they should have been playing it rather than displaying it), pint mugs of free monkey nuts and little lampshades on the tables, the place felt genuinely vintage, rather than the more common Hoxton pastiche.  There was even this little piece of 'bar history', for interest:

Then there were the drinks, each of which can be ordered from a cute little A7-sized cocktail book (complete with a crossword in the back, just in case your friends are dull).  These were sensational.  One can choose to go for run-of-the-mill drinks (e.g. bellinis, mojitos, daiquiris). I am afraid eschewed this option in favour of the more exotic, creative concoctions – this is, after all, a "Development Bar".

GrubsterGirl's first choice was the Scout's Honour, a mix of tequila (her favourite), lime juice and smoked marshmallow syrup.  So a sort of re-take on the classic margarita. (By the way, did I mention it was dark?  It was dark.  So the pictures are all a little... grainy.  Sozza, nothing to be done about that.)

Let's start with the presentation, because this is clearly a big thing for these guys.  It's called "Scout's Honour".  So it comes in a tin cup.  With a tin of spam.  And a couple of flame toasted marshmallows (presumably broiled over the camp fire) as a snack.  Pretty damn impressive, no doubt.

The drink itself was pretty good: boozy and smoky, with all the taste of the toasted marshmallow syrup coming through – a good thing, I assure you.  The mint garnish was a bit out of place though, and tended to jar with the more Mexican / margarita flavours of the main attraction.

I opted for the 欢迎到肯塔基州 (trans. Welcome to Kentucky, Have A Nice Day (apparently, although Google Translate thinks otherwise... not that I care, to be honest)).  Described as "the perfect fusion between east and west", this drop mixes bourbon, 'ginger & plum infusion' (whatever that is), yuzu juice (a tart, citrus fruit somewhere in flavour between s grapefruit and a mandarin) and matcha tea (ground green tea).

Again, presentation.  Wow.  Ten out of ten.  It's served in a noodle box.  It's got actual noodles and basil sprouts on top.  The straws look like chopsticks.  Let's face it, that's got to be the reason it's being named as one of the got-to-drink drinks of the minute, right?  Right?

WRONG.  It's gotten that status by being awesome.  It's fantastic, in fact.  Sweet, malty rich notes come through from the bourbon (my drink of choice at the moment, so yeah, I'm biased), followed by a long, spicy finish.  It's very nicely put together.

For seconds, I had the Sauvignon Private Ryan.  This was a hotch potch of calvados, dry sherry, sauvignon blanc, lemon juice and a cardamom and passionfruit syrup.

This was, dare I say it, a touch disappointing.  Not because it wasn't good – it bloody well was – but because it didn’t live up to the list of ingredients.  I lost the calvados and the sherry entirely, and the passionfruit was almost overbearing.  The white wine came through nicely though, like drinking white wine in the sun – leaving GrubsterGirl to say that it "tastes like Argentina".

But, they do give a quid for every drink served to The Royal British Legion's Poppy Appeal.  Which is kinda impressive when you think about it – especially given that Pret a Manger can only rustle up 5p per Christmas sandwich.  So a small, independent cocktail shop is prepared to give 11% of the proceeds of a drink to charity, whereas a massive, multinational company with a turnover of £510 million is only prepared to give away 1.4% of the proceeds of one, highly seasonal, sandwich to charity.  Compare and contrast that, Jules.

Mrs G finished up with a drink entitled For Whom the Bell Bols.  This mixed lavender & chamomile infused genever (the precursor drink to gin, from The Netherlands), golden syrup lemon juice and egg white.  It was garnished with star anise and other spices, and served with a  shortbread biscuit.

This was an absolute bloody triumph.  Somehow warming and milky (despite being perfectly chilled), with rich spicy notes as well as floral flavours coming through.  It was complex, but not overly so.  A perfect pudding drink, said Mrs G.

If quirky containers were the theme of the night, though, then this one won HANDS DOWN.  Seriously.  Sure, it didn’t have noodles.  Or a tin of small and toasted marshmallows.  It didn’t have huge matchsticks that obstinately refused to light.

But it was in a weird glass.

Which, on closer inspection, was a bell.

Seriously.  It's called For Whom the Bell Bols AND IT'S SERVED IN A SODDING BELL.  A BELL.  Which is carefully cupped in a glass of ice so it stays perfectly cold.  This is a GENIUS idea.  Barware skill level achieved: Expert.

 - GrubsterBoy - 

Old Pomegranate

On Tuesday I mixed a pomegranate cocktail as a sort of pre-dinner drink.  As the pomegranate I was given was bloody enormous I had plenty left for another fantastic drink.  I personally much preferred this one, but I'm sure it's completely a matter of taste.  It does, I think, include all of the required elements of a perfectly balanced cocktail: Sweet, sour, bitter and fruit.  It's also more complex than the pomegranate cocktail, but I recok it's worth it – and not nearly as tough as it looks.

As an old fashioned style cocktail it's strong.  One is enough.

Ingredients:

50g soft brown sugar
50ml water
1 tsp cloves
1 tsp cardamom pods
2 tbsp pomegranate seeds
12.5ml pomegranate molasses
75ml bourbon
Orange peel

1. First, you gotta make a spiced syrup.  This is probably the complex part, and it's not complex.  Crack the cloves and cardamom pods in a pestle and mortar then chuck them in the smallest saucepan you have.  Add the water and sugar and heat until the sugar is completely dissolved (this won’t take long).  Turn the heat off and let the mix cool right down before straining and bottling.  This will make way too much syrup, by the way, but it'll keep for at least a month in the fridge and I can’t really see a way of making it in smaller quantities.

2.  When your syrup is bottled and ready to go, you can get on with mixing the drink.  Start by placing the pomegranate seeds in a cocktail shaker or boston glass.  With a muddler / end of a rolling pin, crush the seeds gently – push too hard and you'll end up cracking the seeds themselves, which are bitter and unpleasant.  Add the bourbon to the mix and stir.

3. In an old fashioned glass mix the pomegranate molasses (despite the name, this is really sour – a proper kick of sharpness) and 50ml of the spiced syrup.  Stir together.

4. Strain the pomegranate juice and bourbon mix.  Add about half of it to the molasses and syrup mix and stir so that they're fully combined.  Add a handful of ice and stir again until properly cold.  Add more ice and the remainder of the juice / bourbon and repeat.  It has to be utterly chilled to be right.

5. Cut a thick slice of orange peel off the fruit using a vegetable peeler – I find that this takes away as little pith as you can get, which is (again) horribly bitter and should be excluded to the extent possible.  Twist the peel over the glass to release the oils, before adding to the drink and giving it one final stir.

 - GrubsterBoy - 

Whiskey Sour

The best drinks are, without a doubt, simple.  Aside from the old fashioned, there is not a lot simpler (in my mind) than the humble whiskey sour.  Following on from a tradition of making mixed drinks to hide the harsh nature of badly distilled, cheap whiskey, it is a simple (albeit effective) mix. 

Just as a quick note, I used egg white*.  Highly controversial – apparently this makes it a Boston Sour, but whatever.  You don’t have to use this, and reputedly it's lazy cocktail-craft, but I think it improves the drink as it adds a silky texture.  Any anyway, everything's better with foam.

Ingredients (per head):

Juice of half a lemon
50ml bourbon (I've used Four Roses, which is just about the best easy-sippin' bourbon out there.  But this is a drink that can adapt to harsher, less refined bourbons – and actually benefits from it in some ways.  So you can even go as far as using good ol' Jim Beam if necessary.)
2 tsps caster sugar / 25ml simple syrup
Half the white of an egg

Put the sugar, juice and bourbon into a shaker and mix like hell until dissolved**.  Add the egg white and lots of ice and shake, rattle and roll.  When you're done, add more ice to a fresh glass and fill to the brim. 

As this is an American whiskey drink, it can only really be served with two garnishes: A fat slice of fresh orange and maraschino cherries (make them here!).

Booze and food matching?  Well, it'd be perfect to sip alongside a good ol' chilli con carne.

 - GrubsterBoy -

* I was about to say, omit this step if you're pregnant.  But, if you're making this drink and you're expecting, I'm guessing that the ingestion of raw egg is actually not your biggest problem...

** To make life easier for yourself, you could make a simply syrup for cocktail making that'll keep in the fridge for a few weeks: Heat equal parts sugar and water over a pan until the sugar's dissolved.  Allow it to cool.  Be proud of yourself. 

The Candy Store at Callooh Callay

Whisk(e)y and I get on well.  Have done for a number of years.  A very large number of years, in fact.  If I have to choose a cocktail on the spot, I'll always go for an old fashioned (and be often disappointed that they don’t seem able to produce one to my exacting specifications.  If I find myself in a cocktail bar, first thing I'll do is start leafing through the menu in search of the next whisky cocktail to down.

 

I also have a famously sweet tooth – something that I think manifests itself in this blog – whether through singing the praises of Mr Whippy or making homemade maraschino cherries or mixing in sugar-coated onions with toad-in-the-hole.

 

So when I heard about Callooh Callay's most recent installation, The Candy Store, the first thing I thought was: I have got to go.

 

Billed as 'whisky, cocktails and candy', it's a themed bar that actually works – something we're not too to, sadly enough.  It's situated in the upstairs room of Callooh Callay, which I understand has been being used by Callooh Callay for some time now for specialist pop-up cocktail bars – a bit like one of those artists' studios, with different folk 'in residence' every couple of months, but a lot, lot cooler.  The upstairs room has to be reached through the backroom, which in turn has to be reached by walking through a big, mirrored wardrobe.  I'll confess something: my heart sank a little at this point.  Too much, way way way too much, has been put into the whole prohibition-era, hidden away, secret bar thing, and it's really beginning to hack me off.  I had a horrific experience with this at The Evans & Peel Detective Agency last year, so the moment I saw this method of entrance, I balked. 

 

In keeping with the name the entire place is done up like an old fashioned sweetshop, from the red and white striped wallpaper to the countless jars of penny chews dotted around the place – all of which you're invited to help yourself from.

The drinks themselves are pretty impressive too, but then that's sort of what you'd expect from a cocktail bar with the pedigree of Callooh Callay behind it – remember, this is a place that has been named amongst Time Out's best bars in the Capital. 

 

I kicked off proceedings with the charmingly named Love You Lots Like Jelly Tots (a bit of a mouthful, but what do you expect from a place that gives you unlimited free gobstoppers with your drinks?).  It was fantastically well done on every count – the perfect blend of sweet and salt (another of my favourite combinations) with the smoky, savoury flavours of the Royal Lochnagar cutting through the fruitiness of the lime and sweetness of the briottet coquelicot (a liqueur made from poppies – honestly!). The jam is wonderful too – who knew that jam and whisky made such good bedfellows?  That it was served in three little snifter glasses – like individual jelly tots – didn't hurt one bit.

My friend and partner in crime, Victoria (GrubsterGirl is, sadly, rather adverse to whisky of any kind), ordered up the Berry Jelly Collins – a medley of Speyside, Chambord and other lovely stuff, served with a little shot glass of raspberry and prosecco jelly on the side.  I like drinks with stuff served on the side – it's nice to have a bit extra.  As for the drink?  Equally superb.

 

 

Between courses (booze courses, that is) we had a couple of snacks.  Sadly, their beer battered chips had come off the menu – apparently (according to our server) because they were "just too intense".  Whether that meant too greasy or that they just said really awkward things that weren't even meant to be a joke we shall never know.  The chips we did have were a little disappointing, in that there were exactly five of them and they were about two inches thick both ways, and four inches long.  Genuinely, carry that thing on the street and you're liable to be arrested for carrying an offensive weapon. 

 

We also had onion rings, however, and they were bloody marvellous.  I basically had to restrain Victoria from eating the lot. 

 

 

Also (although we didn’t have them but did see them) they had a trio of sliders going with some interesting toppings.  Definitely looked like they'd be worth a try if you wanted something a touch more substantial.

 

But wait, I'm leaving out the most exciting bit of food – the menu!  That's right.  They whole thing was made of rice paper and edible.  So we ate it.

 

 

Victoria particularly enjoyed the eating of it.

 

 

Back to the drinks then, we decided on another round.  I hit up the Tipsy Dipsy, whilst my collaborator had the Davey Dee’s Delightful Dream.

 

 

Mine was, sadly, a bit of a disappointment.  You throw lemon juice and prosecco into a glass and give it a sherbet rim you're going to end up with something pretty tart, regardless of how much poppy liqueur you throw in there.  For me it was just too tart – it should have been called something like Sherbet Sourz (a la Haribo Sourz).  But pause a minute here: because my associate adored it.  Absolutely loved it – specifically, the intense sourness of it.  So I'm not going to write it off like that. 

 

 

The Dream was similarly a touch disappointing – although still nice, in my view.  It was billed as an alcoholic Parma Violet, and laced with violet liqueur, but sadly failed almost entirely to deliver on the promised violet essence.  Still, a good drink in itself; if its only crime is not living up to the magic of our childhood rememberings, then we can hardly criticise – if we did, they'd be hardly anything we can look at with pleasure now we're grown-up. 

 

 

If you like whisk(e)y at all then do go, it's a great little place.  Make sure you book, though – we saw people turned away and there's only a half dozen or so tables.  Also, it's a bar in residence – so it's only there for a little while longer.  We went shortly before it was due to close, but you've all been very fortunate: given its success, Callooh Callay are keeping the Candy Store open until the beginning of next year.

 

 - GrubsterBoy -


Credit: Photos 1, 2 and 12 taken by Victoria Tills, my most excellent friend and generally good egg who confesses that her photo-taking skills post whisky imbibition are not up to much, but I think are still pretty damn good.  She got a photo on the BBC too, so she's, like, well talented, innit.