News-Press – Page 21

DRINK OF THE WEEK: Cadiz’s Red White and Blueberry Fizz

June 26, 2014October 2, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

Hooray for the red, white and … blueberry? This week we turned to Cadiz’s bartender, Sean Sepulveda, who appreciates a challenge, for a new twist on July Fourth. For this, he decided to make a drink in a pilsner glass, but you could use a Collins glass in a pinch. He muddled some blueberries in the bottom of the glass, then made a middle foam out of the delicious liqueur Cocchi Americano, poured some sparkling wine on top — he uses Saint-Hilaire Brut, but any dry sparkling brut will do — and on top of that he added the red with some Peychaud’s bitters.

Mr. Sepulveda garnished the drink with sugared blueberries and orange twists but he suggests using a sparkler, a U.S. flag and the like, “because this is America! And freedom!”

That’s the spirit, Sean. You can do whatever you like this holiday — but we do recommend you try our Drink of the Week.

RED WHITE AND BLUEBERRY FIZZ
1 ounce blueberry puree (see recipe)
2 ounces Cocchi Americano semi-foam (see recipe)
2 ounces Saint-Hilaire Brutdry sparkling wine
4 dashes Peychaud’s bitters

In pilsner glass, add blueberry puree to bottom, top with semi-foam carefully, gently add sparkling wine and top with bitters. Garnish with blueberries and orange twists.

To make blueberry puree, muddle 5-6 blueberries and a rich simple syrup (2:1 sugar/water ratio).

To make Cocchi Americano semi-foam: Combine 2 ounces Cocchi Americano (a liqueur), 1 ounce rich simple syrup and 1 ounce lemon juice. Chill and dry shake. Add ice when ready to use and shake again.

Cadiz
509 State St.
(805) 770-2760 or www.cadizsb.com

DRINK OF THE WEEK : TRATTORIA VITTORIA’S CONTORTO COLLINS

June 19, 2014October 2, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

Bartenders shuffle jobs often, and we were halfway through our introductions at Trattoria Vittoria when we realized we’d met our bartender before. Erica “Sparky” Sparks has a name you don’t forget, and we met her at Stella Mare last year. Because she once helped make drinks for a family gathering when she was a kid (and got tips!), Ms. Sparks likes to say she’s been bartending since she was 9 years old.

There’s so much on Trattoria Vittoria’s cocktail menu to go through, but one we really wanted to try was the Contorto Collins. Our main reason: Nobody orders Tom Collins (and variations) that much these days. It’s fallen out of fashion, taken over by its closest cousin, the gin and tonic. But the Contorto Collins replaces the lemon and sugar with apple schnapps and St. Germain, and soda water with tonic. If you love the elderflower taste, then this is the summer drink for you. It’s fruity and fresh and it’s also our Drink of the Week.

CONTORTO COLLINS
1 1/2 ounces gin (preferably Beefeater)
1/2 ounce DeKuyper Apple Pucker
1/2 ounce St. Germain liqueur
Squeeze lime juice
Tonic water, to top

Combine gin, Apple Pucker, St. Germain and lime juice over ice. Shake and pour into Collins glass filled with ice. Top with tonic. Garnish with lime wedge.

Trattoria Vittoria
30 E. Victoria St.
(805) 962-5014 or www.trattoriavittoria.com

DRINK OF THE WEEK: Relais de Paris’ St. Germain Champagne cocktail

June 12, 2014October 2, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

Dustin Garnett has been tending bar for a few months at Relais de Paris after leaving The French Table and has one of those Horatio Alger tales of working hard – a dishwasher, then a busboy, then a server, then a bartender, and now a bartender with his eyes on his own place … one of these days. In the meantime, he’s busy during their happy hour (4 to 7 p.m.) and mixing up weekly (well, regular at least) cocktail specials, and that’s what we wanted to try: the St. Germain Champagne Cocktail.

It’s a very popular cocktail for summer, even with June Gloom in full effect, according to Mr. Garnett. It’s a mix of the elderflower liqueur known as St. Germain, grapefruit juice and a top of champagne (they use Michelle Brut). Simple, but the mix of tart and sweet, coupled with the bubbly, is just the right balance on the tongue. Even though it’s a weekly special, it’s not going anywhere as long as people are ordering it, so check out our Drink of the Week.

ST. GERMAIN CHAMPAGNE COCKTAIL
2 ounces St.Germain liqueur
Splash grapefruit juice
1 ounce Michelle Brut champagne

Mix St. Germain and juice over ice, shake and strain into cocktail glass. Top with champagne.

Relais de Paris
734 State St.
(805) 963-6077 or www.relaisdeparis-santabarbara.com

DRINK OF THE WEEK: The Press Room’s Bloody Mary

June 5, 2014October 2, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

With Father’s Day around the corner, it’s always a good question: What makes a good cocktail for Dad? Are we talking about something manly? Something nostalgic? Something that smells like Old Spice? We here at Drink of the Week come from a background of our dads drinking beer and maybe a shot of Jameson, and that is far from the world of mixology. They may be old-fashioned, but they’ve probably never had an Old Fashioned. You know what I mean?

Anyway, a stop by The Press Room sorted it out. Chris Rodriguez, bartender here for many a year, has a drink that dads love, and one that he brought back from a stay in Austin, Texas. It’s simple but effective: Combine Guinness with a bloody mary. No, the stout does not replace the vodka in the usual recipe … it adds to it. And it magically takes the bite out of the vodka, while leaving the spice. How is such a thing possible? Mr. Rodriguez testifies to one girl calling up her dad to get him to come down and try the drink. (He did.) It’s also a cocktail that, once someone orders it, the rest of the bar suddenly wants to try. So, treat your father to this clever cocktail when you see him. No need to special order the drink at The Press Room: It’s just known as the Bloody Mary here.

THE PRESS ROOM BLOODY MARY
3 ounces pepper-flavored vodka (preferably Absolut)
1 ounces tomato juice
Dash horseradish sauce
Dash salt
Dash celery salt 1/2 lime, squeezed
Dash pickle juice
1 1/2 ounces Guinness

Add ingredients except beer over ice in shaker. Top with beer, then shake. Pour contents into pint glass and garnish with pickled beans and olive.

THE PRESS ROOM
15 E Ortega St.
(805) 963-8121

Left gets it right: SBMA SHOW HIGHLIGHTS RECENT CONTEMPORARY ACQUISITIONS

May 30, 2014September 28, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

'Mr. President,'Llyn FoulkesSanta Barbara Museum of Art photos — ‘Mr. President,’Llyn Foulkes

Santa Barbara Museum of Art photos

The work of a museum is done behind closed doors, away from the public. We see the austere, carefully considered, hung and lit works in echoing galleries. Nothing of the work that is done during installation is shown to us, nor is the bureaucracy, paperwork, and deal-making that happens in the simple act of accepting new works into a permanent collection. (Not that we’d want to see this anyway.)

The benefit of all that work is on display now through Sept. 14, at Santa Barbara Museum of Art’s “Left Coast: Recent Acquisitions of Contemporary Art.” Curated by Julie Joyce, it’s a grab-bag of mostly California-based artists, mostly living, and shows the breadth not just of our particular brand of art, but the eclectic nature of Ms. Joyce’s curatorial eye. From painting and drawing to photography and sculpture, there’s a lot represented here, and a lot of work that has not been seen until now.

Buried Truths: ‘IDA’ IS A SPARE, BEAUTIFUL POST-WAR TALE

May 30, 2014September 28, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

Agata Trzebuchowska as Ida, in IDA. Courtesy of Music box Films

Agata Trzebuchowska, the actress making her debut as the title character of “Ida,” has dark eyes that burn like coal when shot in black and white. Playing a novitiate nun in 1960s Poland, she doesn’t speak much at all, the camera is always gazing into her eyes and as we watch and keep watching, there’s a lot going on behind them.

However, her character is going to be tested in this quiet but wrenching little tale from director Pawel Pawlikowski, best known for 2000’s “The Last Resort.” She receives a letter from an aunt and travels out into the great big world to find her. When she does, they are quite opposite: Wanda (Agata Kulesza) smokes, boozes it up, and sleeps around. But we also learn that she used to be a detective for the state, hunting down “anti-socialists” and she has called Anna from the convent to tell her a few shocking things: her name is actually Ida, and she was actually born a Jew. And the reason she’s brought her out is to join her in hunting down the Nazi sympathizers who murdered Ida’s parents back in World War II.

DRINK OF THE WEEK: Olio Crudo Bar’s Balsamic Martini

May 29, 2014September 28, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

The Olio e Limone name continues to spread on its little corner of Victoria Street. At one point, it was only its namesake restaurant. Then it took over the space next door and started busting out delicious pizzas as Olio Pizzeria. And a few months ago, it moved into a third business on the other side of its door, now called Olio Crudo Bar. This place features small plates of seafood and meat and, most importantly (for us anyway), a lovely collection of cocktails designed by owners Elaine and Alberto Morello and prepared by bartender Tim Delaney. The focus here is on Italian-themed drinks, with a range of familiar and unfamiliar flavors.

We dived right in first with an Aperol Spritz, a simple aperitif of Aperol, prosecco and soda, and that whet our appetite for more. The Milano cocktail, very popular already, is the bar’s version of a Manhattan, with ri brand whiskey, Antica Formula Vermouth and Peychaud’s Bitters. The rye makes this as complex and as sweet as you’d want a classic whiskey cocktail. Moving on, we tried a favorite that’s also over at the original Olio e Limone, the Martini all’Olio, with drops of the family’s olive oil in the drink, as well as Stoli vodka, simple syrup, basil leaf and pink grapefruit juice. The result is smooth and basil-forward, and that oil is almost an afterthought.

Mr. Delaney, who was making all these drinks for us, kept the best for last, though: the Balsamic Martini. We’ve had drinks that mix balsamic with strawberry before, but nothing like this flavor sensation: Bacardi rum, strawberry puree, simple syrup and Bevivo Drinking Balsamic. Sweet and sour in one sip, on top of a fruity tongue. Immediately we knew this would be our Drink of the Week.

BALSAMIC MARTINI
2 ounces Bacardi rum
1 ounce strawberry puree
1 ounce Bevivo Drinking Balsamic
3/4 ounce simple syrup

Combine ingredients in shaker over ice, shake and strain into coupe glass. Garnish with strawberry.

Olio Crudo Bar
11 W.Victoria St. 899-2699 or www.olioelimone.com/olio-crudo-bar

Artists put finishing touches on their works at I Madonnari

May 27, 2014September 28, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

Artist Jessea Gay Marie created a 12-foot by 16-foot chalk work of a Chumash cave with art on the walls

A misty morning turned to a sunny afternoon as thousands celebrated the final day of Santa Barbara’s 28th annual I Madonnari Italian Street Painting Festival at the Mission on Sunday.

With the smell of barbecued chicken wafting through the stalls of the Mission’s front lawn, visitors wandered around the margins of the hundreds of chalk artwork covering the 30,000-square-foot asphalt space below the bell towers.

Colorful drawings recreated old masters and family photos. Others were original works drawn large.

Chalk full of arts: I Madonnari returns to the Santa Barbara Mission

May 24, 2014September 28, 2014 tedmills Leave a comment

Space is ready for the I Madonnari Italian Street Painting Festival to begin today.STEVE MALONE/NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS — Space is ready for the I Madonnari Italian Street Painting Festival to begin today.

STEVE MALONE/NEWS-PRESS PHOTOS

The 20,000 square feet of dark asphalt surrounding the Santa Barbara Mission will bloom into a rainbow of colors today as hundreds of chalk artists join in the 28th annual I Madonnari Italian Street Painting Festival.

Artists from Santa Barbara and beyond will turn the usually utilitarian surface into a patchwork of art works, created lovingly in chalk over the next few days, with the finished works presented on Monday.

Lightning Strikes … again and again: FROM HUMBLE ORIGINS TO MAJOR FESTIVAL PLAYERS, LIGHTNING IN A BOTTLE IS BACK

May 23, 2014February 3, 2021 tedmills Leave a comment

Just look at the top three headlining bands playing at this Memorial Day Weekend’s Lightning in a Bottle and you can get some sense of how this once-tiny festival has matured. There’s electronic duo Phantogram, Swedish popstars Little Dragon, and one of the godfathers of EDM (that’s electronic Dance Music to the uninitiated) Moby. From a tiny birthday celebration in the forests of Los Angeles, to up above Santa Barbara County in our own hills, to the mountains of Santa Ana, this verdant, pocket-sized Burning Man-like festival has been a victim of its success, moving on to another location as attendance threatened to spill over the boundaries.

Though it started as a private party in 2000, it was really the 2006 move to Live Oak Campground off of the 154 freeway that got the three Flemming brothers, who go by the event name of DoLab, imagining the Festival as bigger than its humble beginnings.