Eat and Drink These Cocktail Week Specials

Special Cocktail Week Drinks

THE ASSIGNMENT: Create your own take on the first cocktail you ever drank or made.

Brick & Mortar: A Manhattan, Please & Thank You

Matthew Schrage, bar manager

I had just moved to Providence and had few, if any, new friends who I might celebrate my 21st birthday with. As such, I decided to go exploring through the city’s more interesting and elusive haunts, flying solo, with my newly street legal I.D. card. I settled on The Cheesecake Factory in the Providence Place Mall as the place where I would have my first legal drink. I thought long and hard as to what I should order and settled on something I could picture my grandmother drinking, one named for my family’s ancestral home, Manhattan. Makers Mark, shaken, without vermouth, and garnished with a neon red cherry — one with the telltale crisp snap of a fruit washed in formaldehyde.

It’s a Manhattan made properly...
2 oz Bulleit Rye Whiskey
1 oz Cocchi Vermouth de Torino
2 dashes Angostura Bitters
1 Luxardo Maraschino Cherry

Available on the menu throughout Cocktail Week. $12.

The Merchant: Gangster Squad

Michael Cottens, bartender

I feel like most people's first cocktail-making experience comes from whatever they can make taste halfway decent from what they steal from their parents' liquor cabinet. My best friend at the time, his father was an avid collector of guns, old model-T cars, and historical war antiques. The name of the cocktail comes from that experience and what we would try to make out of his liquor closet, which was primarily whiskeys and brandys. In addition to the whiskey base, I used the bitters and Campari to keep the classic feel, the Limoncello to brighten the cocktail, and the pineapple syrup to liven it up and add a little more balance.

1.5 oz Bulleit Rye
.75 oz Fabrizia Limoncello
.75 oz Campari
.5 oz Housemade pineapple syrup
2 dashes Angostura bitters

Available all week. $11.

Backbar: Grand Bocce

Sam Treadway, bar manager

Grand Ten Amandine liqueur, Grand Ten South Boston Irish Whiskey, fresh orange juice, and apple brandy. It's a local fall-flavored version of my first favorite cocktail, the Bocce Ball, which is just amaretto and orange juice! Oh college…

Casa B: The Villen

Taso Papatsoris, bartender

A cross between a daiquiri and dark and stormy with the feel of fall, The Villen has fresh muddled ginger, lime, simple syrup, Fee Brothers Old Fashion bitters and Brugal Anejo Rum served up in a cocktail glass with a maraschino cherry garnish.

Look for it on the cocktail specials menu this week. $12.

Ribelle: The Kamikaze Reboot

Sean Woods, bar manager

After the Screwdriver, the first cocktail I learned how to make with precision was a Kamikaze.

Request it during Cocktail Week. $11.

Drink: Black Hills of Dakota

Ezra Star, general manager

1/2 oz cinnamon syrup
1/2 oz lemon juice
1/2 oz benedictine
1 1/2 oz Lairds bonded apple brandy

Top with champagne; serve with a cinnamon stick floating inside the glass.

Based on the French 75, one of the first cocktails I ever had or learned to make.

Bondir: Us and Them

Alex Howell, bar manager

It features olive oil-infused Dolin Blanc vermouth, amontillado sherry, Cocchi Americano, and a house-made strawberry red wine shrub.

Available October 20-24 during dinner service at Bondir Cambridge and lunch and dinner service at Concord. $11.

The Tip Tap Room: Coffeehouse Pumpkin

Nick Giannotti, bar manager

2 oz. Sons of Liberty pumpkin spiced whiskey
0.5 oz. house-made BBC Coffeehouse Porter syrup
Few dashes walnut bitters
0.25 oz. simple syrup
Dehydrated, candied orange slice

Available October 20-24. $12.

BOKX 109: Apple Picker

Tom Dargon, assistant general manager

Mt. Gay black barrel rum, Stoli Vanilla vodka, apple cider, and lemon juice. Available all week during normal hours of operation (4pm-12am), $14.00. Ask for it by name.

Rosebud American Kitchen & Bar: The Beetnik

Ian Strickland, head bartender

A play on a Manhattan. Rittenhouse rye, beet licor, cassis, rhubarb bitters.

Available all week. $11.

Special Cocktail Week Desserts

THE ASSIGNMENT: Create a dessert version of a classic cocktail.

Wink & Nod: Hot Toddy

Kate Holowchik

Angel's Envy Bourbon gingerbread (made with the same molasses as Privateer Rum), burnt honey ice cream, spiced lemon apple marmalade, honeycomb crunch.

Available all week. $8.

Hungry Mother: Hot Buttered Rum

Rachel Sundet, pastry chef

I made a dessert inspired by a hot buttered rum cocktail. It appealed to me with the changing of the seasons, and as the weather cools off, a warm and rich drink seems especially enticing. The traditional drink incorporates warm spices and sometimes cider, so I tried to highlight these flavors along with the butter and rum. I also chose to use dark Cruzan rum because of its deep molasses and spicy notes. My dessert is a dark rum & butter tart with cinnamon & nutmeg iced cream, and cider reduction. The tart is served warm.

Available from October 20-24 as a verbal special. $9.

Burtons Grill: The Old Fashioned

Dan Greenough, food & beverage manager

The Old Fashioned dessert is a financier (orange-scented almond cake) with dark cherries, bourbon anglaise, and freshly whipped cream, served with a 2 oz. sample of a traditional Old Fashioned. (This dessert is a gluten-free.)

Available throughout Cocktail Week at all Burtons Grill locations in Massachusetts (Hingham, Burlington, Peabody, Westford, North Andover). $14.95.

Financier
1 cup almond meal
1 2/3 cup confection sugar
1/2 cup GF all purpose flour
.25 tsp salt
zest from 1 orange
6 egg whites
6 oz unsalted butter, melted

Place first 5 ingredients in the bowl of a Kitchen Aid mixer with whisk attachment. Turn on medium speed for 15 seconds to incorporate dry ingredients. Add egg whites one at a time. Turn speed to medium high and slowly add melted butter. Pour 4 oz of batter into 6 greased 4" tartlette pans. Bake at 375 degrees for 8 minutes or until firm. Set aside.

Dark Cherries
2 cups dark pitted cherries
1/4 cup sugar
1 oz juice from zested orange
1 oz sweet vermouth

Place all ingredients in a small pot and bring to a boil. Lower to a simmer and reduce by 1/2. Chill for service.

Bourbon Anglaise
6 egg yolks
1/3 cup bourbon
1/3 cup sugar
12 oz sweetened condensed milk

Place first 3 ingredients in a stainless steel bowl over a water bath on medium heat. Whisk constantly until thick and frothy. Be careful not to let the eggs scramble. Pull off heat and whisk in sweetened condensed milk. Chill for service.