The Hops Scotch Cocktail
Sometimes I go on vacation. Sometimes I go on vacation and stay at my amazing friends, Laura and Dan's, gorgeous home in Reno, NV, and because that gorgeous home has no chickens (what even are they doing with their lives tho?!), sometimes those amazing friends heckle their other friends who DO have chickens into letting my weird ass come over and drink with them. That's why I love my friends. Well, that and the fact that they dutifully hunker down with a cocktail and a chicken and let me document it because IT IS VERY IMPORTANT WORK THAT WE ARE DOING.
Laura and a lap chicken.
One of the things that I really love about chicken people, is that usually they acquire said poultry because they've made a leap towards self-sufficiency. Typically, chickens come hand-in-hand with some sort of backyard farming, and so in most cases when I impose myself upon random people to drink with their birds, they also happen to have excellent fresh cocktail ingredients laying around (whether they realize it or not).
So not only did Laura have to awkwardly ask her friends if her special buddy Kate could come over and drink with their chickens--she then had to ask what they had growing in their yard that I could swipe for drinks. See? This is the rules of Drinking with Chickens. I come to your house. I steal things from your yard, I make drinks, we stare at your chickens while we drink. THIS IS COMPLETELY HEALTHY, NORMAL ADULT SOCIAL INTERACTION.
Not my chickens.
Amongst an abundance of other things, Katania and Jeff's garden featured some pretty glorious hops. Those really caught my attention. At least that's the way I prefer to remember it--because it probably was more along the lines of that was the thing that they had excess of so they were like: Sure. Go ahead and take some. But don't goddamn touch anything else, Chicken Lady. (I jest--Katania and Jeff were so lovely and accommodating!).
So we had those beautiful hops, and some fresh, local pears that Laura came home with, and we got to mad-scientisting a cocktail out of it all.
Hops + Pear Simple Syrup simmering on the stove.
T H E H O P S S C O T C H
Makes one cocktail.
.5 oz. Hops + Pear Simple Syrup (instructions below)
1.5 oz. hops black tea (instructions below)
1.5 oz. Scotch
fresh hops and pear slices for garnish
To make the Hops + Pear Simple Syrup:
1 cup chopped fresh pear
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
1 cup dried hops flowers
1 cinnamon stick
In a saucepan, add pears plus 1 tablespoon of water and 1 tablespoon of sugar of medium heat and brown pears for about five minutes. Then add the remainder of your sugar, water, and cinnamon stick and bring to a boil. Add your hops and stir to fully saturate. Remove from heat and let steep while cooling. Strain mixture into an airtight container and store in refrigerator until ready to use.
To make the hops black tea:
1 black tea bag such as Earl Grey
5 dried hops blossoms
Steep tea bag in boiling water as per manufacturer instructions, adding hops blossoms to the mixture. Strain and cool before using.
To make the cocktail:
Over ice, add Scotch whisky, simple syrup, and black tea. Stir and garnish with fresh hops and pear slices.
Me, a drink, a hen, and some glorious hops vines. Vacation at its finest.
So who's gonna come let me drink with their chickens next?!
*crickets*