Browsing Tag

creme de violette

Celebrities & Champagne, Drinks
Sip a Sparkling Viola Cocktail: Inspired by Viola Davis

For the first time in a few years, I’ll be tuning into the 88th Academy Awards on Sunday. I’ll be watching because I really want to see Viola Davis with the award for Best Actress. This amazing actress, wife and mother is getting her long-overdue star turn for her work in The Help, a movie about a group of maids in 1960s Mississippi. She may seem like a late bloomer, but Viola Davis has been practicing her craft for years, giving deeply moving portrayals of people who were often in some kind of pain. One of my roles favorite was on the show “Without a Trace.” She played a mother grappling with the disappearance of her son, and the fact that TV news blasted the story of a missing blond girl, while ignoring her son’s plight. Davis is making the most of her star turn with gorgeous awards-show ensembles, which…
February 24, 2012
Cocktail Recipes
The Bubbly Girl Drink of the Week: The Aviation

Aviation has been on my mind. Both the kind that you sip and the kind that involves checking in and taking off your shoes. I guess that’s probably because I’m getting ready to travel to my hometown Chicago for Bubbly Bar book parties on October 1, 2 and 3. But Chicago was also the first place I tasted the Aviation. It was on an election night — that momentous election night of 2008 — visit to The Drawing Room in the Gold Coast area. Scanning cleverly written menu, I spotted an Aviation, which included gin, maraschino and violet liqueur — I was in. Since it was a quiet night, head mixologist Charles Joly brought the custom-made bar cart to the table and started making our drinks. As he worked, he told the story of the Aviation. I’d never understood why the clear combination of gin, maraschino and lemon labeled an Aviation…
September 20, 2009
The Bubbly Girl’s Drink of the Week: Angel Eyes at La Puerta

With spring turning into summer — at least in San Diego — it seemed the perfect time for a fresh floral cocktail. I love the complexity and hint of mystery that floral flavors add to cocktails. When they’re used with champagne, the bubbles take those wonderful scents into the air and add another dimension to the experience. Rosangel is a new hibiscus infused tequila by Gran Centenario that has a subtle floral flavor and just happens to be a gorgeous shade of pink. Jennifer Queen, the head bartender at the hip Mexican restauant La Puerta in San Diego, uses Rosangel and a vintage liqueur called Creme de Violette to craft a seductive champagne cocktail she calls Angel Eyes. If pink, hibiscus flavored tequila strikes your fancy, then check out the gallery of Rosangel recipes like a Rosangel Ruby Fizz from Julier Reiner and other top mixologists from around the nation.…
April 24, 2009