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Damned If You Do

Monday, March 1st, 2010

Damned If You Do

1 oz.           Black Velvet Canadian whisky
1/2 oz.        DeKuyper Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps 

Pour into shot glass. Enjoy !

Today we have a somewhat basic shot, although it does call for a brand of Canadian whisky that we have not yet tried in any recipe.

Black Velvet whisky is a Canadian brand owned by the Diageo people (who are linked to the Guiness label) up there. It is a “whisky mix” meaning that it is a blend of various whiskies and is known for having a pretty strong taste. It’s been on the market for about 60-65 years now and you may have to look around a little bit to score a bottle. One of the unique things about Black Velvet whisky is that they employ a Black Velvet Girl in their marketing and advertising. Former Black Velvet Girls include Christie Brinkley, Cheryl Tiegs, Kim Alexis, and Cybill Shepherd.

You should be able to get a bottle of Black Velvet somewhere in the $14–17  range. And if you want to do a legitimate Damned If You Do shot, you have to use Black Velvet. As a shot with only two ingredients, they are both vital to the originality of the shooter. So you don’t really want to substitute for either the Canadian whisky or the Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps. If you do, the taste may still resemble a Damned If You Do, but really you’d be drinking something entirely different (that likely has a name all its own).

This shot wasn’t bad. We’ve tasted a number of whiskey/cinnamon schnapps combinations such as in the Kick Me in the Jimmy shot (Jack Daniels and Firewater among other ingredients) and the Cowboy Up shooter (Crown Royal and Firewater among other ingredients). So in order to really stand out for us, the whisky component has to play a big role.

The Black Velvet Canadian whisky really held its own here. It was allowed to stand out whereas in the other shots mentioned, they were part of a four or even five ingredient recipe. But with the Damned If You Do shot, it’s just the whisky and the schnapps. And they did work pretty well together. Both ingredients were at room temp and the shooter is a bit “hot” going down. The cinnamon flavor reared its head more in the aftertaste rather than immediately on the tongue/palate.

And after our third round, you could feel the punch that this shot can deliver. It’s the type of shot where the more you throw down, your forehead starts to warm up and your cheeks can get a tad flushed. Which is a good thing……not a bad thing….a good thing ! The type of shot that keeps one warm in the winter.

ShareMyShot.com gives the Damned If You Do a 3 on a scale of 5. It is a good tasting shooter. Then again, it only has two ingredients with those being a somewhat simple whisky/schnapps combo. So we had to deduct a point for limited creativity. All-in-all, a rock solid 3 on our scale.

You may be Damned If You Do, but we do recommend it. Cuz you’re really damned if you don’t.

Cheers !!

Posted in 3 Star Shots, Aftershock cinnamon schnapps, Black Velvet whisky, Canadian whisky, cinnamon schnapps, comfort shots, Crown Royal, DeKuyper cinnamon schnapps, DeKuyper Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps, Evan Williams whiskey, Firewater cinnamon schnapps, flavored schnapps, Goldschlager, Hiram Walker cinnamon schnapps, Hiram Walker schnapps, Jack Daniels, Jim Beam, Knob Creek, schnapps, whiskey | No Responses »

Cowboy Up

Monday, January 25th, 2010

Cowboy Up

1 oz.             Crown Royal Canadian whisky
1/2 oz.          Absolut Peppar vodka
3/4 oz.          Firewater cinnamon schnapps
3/4 oz.          DeKuyper vanilla schnapps
1 oz.             Hpnotiq liqueur 

Shake ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice. Strain into large shot glass. Enjoy !

I was turned on to this recipe by a friend of mine over the weekend. While not currently behind a bar, he has done some bartending in the past. But we were watching a stand-up routine by Arte Lange; the comedian who has been a regular on the Howard Stern radio show. He was doing a bit on the movie Brokeback Mountain about a couple of gay cowboys. And his punch line was that ” Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhal are NOT gay cowboys. “ 

” Tony Romo……now there’s a gay Cowboy ! ”

As avid football fans who hate the Dallas Cowboys, the joke drew a chuckle from me and my friend. And a few minutes later, he asked if I had ever tried the Cowboy Up shot ? I replied that I hadn’t, but was perfectly willing to try. Unfortunately, he didn’t have any Hpnotiq in his house. Nor Absolut Peppar. Nor DeKuyper vanilla schnapps.

Hey ! I said he was an avid football fan and an out-of-work bartender…….not a liqueur connoisseur ! He did have some Crown Royal on-hand, so we settled for a couple of those on the rocks.

But I brought the recipe into the office and the team was totally up for giving the recipe a sampling. We didn’t have any Hpnotiq on-hand either. It is a rather expensive liqueur. So we sent office lackey Keith down to the liquor store once again to procure a bottle of this fine libation.  Hpnotiq is a liqueur made from vodka, cognac, and tropical fruit juices. It has only been around for about 9 or 10 years. But it is a very fine tasting drink and quite popular on the club scene.

The rest of the ingredients were in the corporate liquor cabinet, so with the addition of the fresh bottle of Hpnotiq, we were ready to Cowboy Up. We had the part-time bartender that performs other duties here at ShareMyShot mix the shooters for us. The drink has a nice combination of fixings and we wanted to make sure it was prepared correctly. The shot sounded like it had a lot of potential.

The taste team’s opinions on the shot were rather divided. I thought it was pretty good overall, but I could definately see the point that others made that the shooter was just a bit too busy. It was hard to distinguish a number of the ingredients. The cinnamon schnapps was noticeable as was the Hpnotiq. But the vodka and even the Royal Crown elements were a bit muted. And there was the slightest suggestion of the vanilla schnapps, but it took two or three rounds to conclude we did indeed taste a trace of that component.

ShareMyShot gives this rootin’ tootin’ shooter a 3 on a scale of 5. It did pack a punch after we sampled four rounds. Any more and we would have reached a higher “buzz” plateau. And it is a creative and eclectic array of ingredients. But overall, it didn’t quite measure up to the more delicious and elite shots we have awarded higher grades to. As more than one team member said, ” It’s not bad at all. But it’s just too busy. I can’t really tell what part I like and what part I’m not even tasting. “

So if you have a bottle of Hpnotiq behind the bar, feel free to rustle up one of these shots. But if you don’t, just settle for a Crown Royal on the rocks.

Cheers !!

Posted in 3 Star Shots, Absolut, Absolut flavored vodkas, Absolut Peppar, Aftershock cinnamon schnapps, Canadian whisky, cinnamon schnapps, Crown Royal, DeKuyper vanilla schnapps, Firewater cinnamon schnapps, flavored liqueurs, flavored schnapps, Hpnotiq, liqueurs, schnapps, vanilla schnapps, vodka, whiskey | No Responses »

Mrs. Santa Claus

Friday, December 18th, 2009

Mrs. Santa Claus

1/2 oz.      chilled Firewater cinnamon schnapps
1/2 oz.      chilled Tequila Rose strawberry cream liqueur 

Pour the Firewater into a shot glass. Top with the Tequila Rose liqueur, and serve.

Today we have a fairly simple shot. And I’ll tell you why.

Last night we had the ShareMyShot company Christmas party. Everyone had a fantastic time and the shots were flowing. You see what we drink during the day in the name of research. But at a holiday party with everyone in a festive mood……yikes ! There’s quite a few people moving around very slowly and low-key today. The kind of day where you pass someone in the hall and say “Good morning” and you get a semi-audible grunt in return.

It was a great party, though. Thank you to the higher-ups here at ShareMyShot for giving the employees a wonderful, generous party to end this difficult year for so many.

Which brings us to today’s rather “easy” shot. When we say easy, we mean it is easy to prepare. And it’s easy to toss down. You wouldn’t expect Mrs Santa Claus to be a raving bitch of a shot, would you? It’s my understanding the woman is very nice.

So you basically have a shot of Firewater cinnamon schnapps and you top it off with a sweet, creamy topping of the Tequila Rose. Now while I do drink tequila, I’m not a regular consumer of the Tequila Rose. A handful of the girls I know drink it. At one of the bars I hang out at in the Chicago suburbs {Georges Too in Lyons, Illinois}, I throw down a few shots with the bartender whom I’m friendly with. And she drinks the stuff. It is very creamy and has a very pink hue to it. It does look kind of delicious. But it’s a bit too “foo-foo” for me.

As a topping on a shot of Firewater cinnamon schnapps however, I can tolerate it. And it really lent something to the shot. The strawberry cream took some of the bite out of the Firewater. Is that a good thing? I’d normally say that muffling the strength of the one ingredient meant to ‘pack the punch’ in a shot is a negative. But in this shooter, the strawberry blended well with the cinnamon flavor. And with both of the ingredients served chilled, it went down a lot smoother than the normal warm and “burny” flow of Firewater.

ShareMyShot can still only give this shot a 2 on a scale of 5. While it tasted pleasant enough, it was nowhere near the level of the top shots we have shared. And it’s simplicity was another thing going against it. Finally, there is the lack of punch. If we deducted a point each for all three of these shortcomings, you get a 2 out of 5.

Mrs Santa Claus is a sweet woman. She really is. What she really needs are some balls.

Cheers !!

Posted in 2 Star Shots, Christmas, cinnamon schnapps, Firewater cinnamon schnapps, flavored liqueurs, holiday shots, liqueurs, schnapps, tequila, Tequila Rose strawberry cream liqueur, Uncategorized | No Responses »

Screwin’ around with the egg nog

Monday, December 14th, 2009

Screwin’ around with the egg nog

One of the things I and a few others at ShareMyShot.com really like about Christmas is that it’s egg nog season.

Some people don’t like it. It’s very rich and the thickness of it can be a turn-off to some. But to the people who work at a company such as ours, egg nog = opportunity. The opportunity to try a bunch of new egg nog mixes that most of us are unfamiliar with, as well as the opportunity to indulge in the more popular egg nog “bombs”.

You can keep things extremely simple by taking a double-size shot glass and filling it 3/4 with egg nog. And top it off with 1/4 of Captain Morgan rum. Maybe even drop a pinch of nutmeg on it for good measure. The famous Rum n’ Egg Nog. I’ve already had several of those this season at home. Good stuff.

And you can take a similar glass of egg nog and add a shot of peppermint, cinnamon, or butterscotch schnapps. All go pretty well with the egg nog. We’ll call these Egg Nog Bombs.

But those are the basic recipes that people have been drinking since the elusive ”nog root” was first discovered in the jungles of Peru over three centuries ago. OK….that’s total bullshit. I have no idea where egg nog originated. Nor does anyone else on the sample team. We have sent that question to Research and Development to answer. Those are the most basic of egg nog combinations, though.

So let’s sample a few other concoctions and see how they fare.

Here’s a recipe to serve several people:

Very Merry Egg Nog

This is a great “adult” version of the popular holiday beverage. It does not taste potent, but really packs a punch if you drink enough of ‘em!
 
12 oz.      Bacardi dark rum
4 oz.        Southern Comfort peach liqueur
4 oz.        creme de cacao
1 cup             berry sugar
1 quart                milk
1 quart            ice cream
12                   egg whites
12                     egg yolks
1/8 tsp               nutmeg 

Combine the ice cream, milk, sugar, egg yolks, and alcohol together in bowl and beat with electric beaters (you can also use a blender and do it in increments). Fold in the egg whites. Chill and serve with a sprinkle of nutmeg. Enjoy.

This recipe tasted wonderful. One of the women on the sample team is quite familiar with this recipe as she prepares it for her relatives every Christmas. The alcohol within is very subtle and hard to detect. The blend is very creamy and distictly different in taste (on the positive side) from the cartons you buy at Jewel or Wal-Mart. This is a fine holiday egg nog.

Here’s another recipe we researched:

Egg Nog – Country Style

1 cup           Applejack brandy
2 cups               sugar
1 pint              whole milk
1 pint            heavy cream
6                         eggs 

Mix the eggs and sugar together until they are well blended. SLOWLY add the brandy. (If added too fast, the eggs will break) Add in the whole milk. Add 1/2 of the heavy cream.

In a seperate bowl, whip the other 1/2 of the heavy cream until stiff (soft peak stage will work as well). Fold whipped cream into mixture.
Chill and enjoy!

 This too was enjoyed tremendously by everyone on the taste team. As with most foods/drink, homemade recipes just seem to taste better than the brand-name crap we all buy at the store. The difference is totally worth the effort….especially once or twice a year. The creaminess that the milk, cream, and eggs combine to create–plus the apple brandy resulted in a unique taste that I’ve never gotten out of a cardboard carton.

So give one of these recipes a try or just toss down a couple of Rum n’ Egg Nogs after you get home from work in one of those sloppy grid-lock snowstorms. Just take advantage of the one month per year where it’s OK to gorge on egg nog and other holiday treats……….

Like hot chocolate and Bailey’s. But that’s for another day.

Cheers !!

  

 

Posted in Applejack brandy, Bacardi dark rum, Bailey's Irish Cream, Bols peppermint schnapps, BOMBS, brandy, butterscotch schnapps, Captain Morgan Spiced Rum, Christmas, cinnamon schnapps, cream, DeKuyper cinnamon schnapps, Dr McGillicuddys peppermint schnapps, DuBouchett peppermint schnapps, egg nog, Hiram Walker peppermint schnapps, holiday shots, hot chocolate, milk, peppermint schnapps, rum, schnapps, Southern Comfort peach liqueur, Uncategorized | No Responses »

Kick Me in the Jimmy

Thursday, December 10th, 2009

Kick Me in the Jimmy

1/2 oz.     Jagermeister herbal liqueur
1/2 oz.     Jack Daniel’s Tennessee whiskey
1/2 oz.     Jose Cuervo Especial gold tequila
1/2 oz.     Firewater cinnamon schnapps

Combine in cocktail mixer with ice. Shake and strain into a double shot glass.  Try to enjoy !

Here’s a shot that screams Merry Christmas, doesn’t it? It’s not exactly what I asked Santa for Christmas last year, but………

We’ve tried some shots recently that were more dessert shots and thought it was time to try another ass-kicker. At least on paper. This one has been on our “to do” list for over a month. It’s amazing how few people wanna experience a no-holds barred Kick Me in the Jimmy. I don’t know if it’s bad memories from a childhood fight or everyone racked themselves on their car door coming to work. But you don’t have to ask me twice for Kick Me in the Jimmy.

I’m down. Totally down if you wanna Kick Me in the Jimmy.

If you look at the ingredients, this shooter is meant to make men out of boys. It’s an all-star lineup of heavy hitters. You have my personal favorite brand of whiskey in the Jack Daniels. Toss in the most recognized brand of tequila in the world with the Jose Cuervo. And for shits and giggles, why don’t we pour in a splash of good old fashioned Jagermeister too?

Finally, we have a new label of cinnamon schnapps to play with today. Yes, we’ve monkeyed around with Aftershock and Goldschlager and some of the other big boys in this niche. But we do believe this is the first recipe we’ve shared utilizing Firewater cinnamon schnapps. This is an elite brand and is 100 proof. You can probably secure a bottle anywhere from $17-22 at a decent liquor store that carries it.

Don’t change up any of the ingredients if you can help it. Other than the Firewater schnapps, you should have a bottle of the other three ingredients on-hand. If you don’t, you need to build up a more diverse stock of booze, chief. But stick to Jack Daniels because it has a bite that we feel is required to give you the full Kick Me in the Jimmy experience. And don’t deviate to Aftershock or a weaker label of cinnamon schnapps. Like we said, Firewater is 100 proof and it has the taste/kick to back it up. When you accept a Kick Me in the Jimmy, you want to feel it, right?

Drinking this reminded me of throwing down a shot of my buddy’s homemade Yugoslavian moonshine—except it tasted better than gasoline. Which is what my friend’s moonshine tastes like.

It’s like sticking a lit match on your tongue. It tasted like I took a gulp of that liquid fire that pranksters put in a guy’s jockstrap. Imagine you drank a liquid habanero pepper.

The taste is hard to describe other than what I have tried to express here. You swallow it fast and there isn’t exactly a plethora of tasty sensations. Just a burning one on your freakin’ tongue. We at ShareMyShot.com give this flamethrower a 2 on a scale of 5.

A couple of people on the taste team said they’d rather take a real Kick Me in the Jimmy than do a second round of the shot. I actually participated in a second round.

I should’ve just taken a foot to the nuts and called it a day.

Cheers !!!

Posted in 2 Star Shots, cinnamon schnapps, Firewater cinnamon schnapps, herbal liqueurs, Jack Daniels, Jagermeister, Jose Cuervo gold, schnapps, tequila, whiskey | No Responses »

Bob Marley

Thursday, December 3rd, 2009

Bob Marley

 
1/2 oz.     Midori melon liqueur
1/2 oz.     Jagermeister herbal liqueur
1/2 oz.     Goldschlager cinnamon schnapps 

Layer in a large shot glass in the order listed. Enjoy.

After being pleasantly surprised by the Ray Charles shot that the new kid in the office suggested, we thought we would continue the “cool musician” theme with today’s shot.

It’s a somewhat simple shot in that it is comprised of three liqueurs that we have dealt with here before. We often hear of recipes that involve the combination of Jagermeister and Goldschlager. In fact, we have shared recipes for the Classic Oatmeal Cookie and the Closed Coffin that have utilized those two brands. But this shot threw in an interesting third party. We hadn’t heard of that initial combination being joined by a melon flavored liqueur. So we thought we’d give it a try.

ShareMyShot.com is proud to present……..the greatest reggae voice ever……..Bob Marley !!!!

Jah man !!

When I was a younger man and prone to have an occasional smoke in the same vein as Bob Marley, I had a little thing I did with my shots. I used the toke as my chaser. I would take a pull on a one hitter and hold it in. Then I would throw down whatever shot I was doing. And then I would release the one-hit. Often times, it would soothe my throat a little bit as I exhaled if the shot was an especially harsh one. Like Old Grand-Dad whiskey or something “burny” like that.

I don’t partake in that indulgence anymore. And here in the ShareMyShot office, we want to experience the true, raw taste of the shots we sample so that we can best rate them and discuss them. So despite the name of today’s shot, I didn’t share my little trick with my colleagues. Only here in this forum.

The shot tasted…….different. That’s about the only word that seems appropriate. It wasn’t wonderful. It wasn’t a party for the tastebuds. And it wasn’t terrible. It wasn’t anything that made you do a bitter, sour-puss face. None of us on the tasting team stopped at one. We all did at least two to try and get a good feel for the flavor and the smoothness of it.

With the Goldschlager on top, you get the chill of that libation along with its cinnamon-y blast. But very quickly you also get a tempered sense of the licorice of the Jagermeister. The Midori melon liqueur announces its arrival more in the aftertaste. Because it’s added first, it’s at the bottom of the shot. So it is the last flavor remaining and you taste it the most as you are putting your shot glass down and doing the post-shot swallow.

If anything, you taste the Midori combined with the Goldschlager the most. The Jagermeister is the most subtle of the flavors.

We gave this mellow blunt of a shot a 3 on a scale of 5. It was nowhere near as inviting as the Ray Charles shot yesterday. But it was lip-smacking enough to garner a 3 among our scrutinizing staff. We would say that if you have Midori melon liqueur on-hand, definately give this shot a try. If you don’t have it in-house, don’t rush out special to get it.

Cheers !!!

Posted in 3 Star Shots, cinnamon schnapps, flavored liqueurs, Goldschlager, herbal liqueurs, Jagermeister, liqueurs, melon liqueurs, Midori melon liqueur, schnapps | No Responses »

Rumple Shock

Thursday, November 19th, 2009

Rumple Shock

1 oz.    Rumple Minze peppermint liqueur
1 oz.    Aftershock Hot & Cool cinnamon schnapps

Pour the Aftershock into a shot glass. Add Rumple Minze on top. Serve.

This is one of your more straight-forward shots. No fancy frills. No crazy marraige of four or five different ingredients. No Caribbean or tropical fruit flavored slant. Pure and simple; the name says it all. A combination of Rumple Minze and Aftershock.

When someone on the ShareMyShot staff suggested we try this pairing, I was slightly reluctant at first. Not because I was intimidated in any way…or that I thought it was a bad combination that would taste bad. It actually reminded me of the shot we posted a few months ago called the Dead Nazi. In that recipe, Rumple Minze was combined with Jagermeister. It wasn’t bad. We gave it a 3 on our scale.

My thought was that this shooter is somewhat similar to that one in its simplicity and the fact that Rumple Minze is again one of the two ingredients. But I was swayed that this would be a good recipe to post by the simple argument that the more shots we share, the more they will resemble one that we have tried/posted before. There’s really no getting around it. So just drink it, stupid.

Besides, it doesn’t take much arm twisting to get me to throw down a shot of any sort.

Prepare this shot using only these two labels. Otherwise, quite simply, you are not making a Rumple Shock. If you use any other brand of peppermint schnapps or any other type of cinnamon schnapps, it isn’t the real thing. So adhere strictly to the recipe on this baby.

The shot tasted decent. The blending of peppermint schnapps and cinnamon schnapps is not a huge leap in the mixology game. They go together well. We were trying to think if there are peppermint/cinnamon candy canes in the winter. Or at least peppermint/cinnamon hard candy sticks like you buy at a Stuckeys in the Southern US or at a large truck stop with a huge snack section.

The shot reminded a few people of comfort snacks like that—particularly a piece of peppermint hard candy. The peppermint was slightly more dominate than the cinnamon flavor.

We keep both of these libations in our freezer. So there is absolutely no need to mix these in a cocktail shaker with ice or anything. It is ice-cold from the start. I would imagine if you happen to store one of these brands out at room temp behind your bar, hopefully the other component is in the fridge or the freezer. If not, start storing your Rumple Minze in the freezer. By itself, it is much better cold than warm.

ShareMyShot.com gives this toxic-twin shooter a 3 on a scale of 5. Like the Dead Nazi, it is a simple combination. It doesn’t utilize any of the really top-shelf specialty ingredients. But it goes down rather easy thanks to the coolness of it (temp-wise). It’s refreshing.

Cheers !!!

Posted in 3 Star Shots, Aftershock cinnamon schnapps, cinnamon schnapps, liqueurs, peppermint schnapps, Rumple Minze, schnapps | No Responses »

Classic Oatmeal Cookie

Monday, November 16th, 2009

Classic Oatmeal Cookie

1/4 oz.    Goldschlager cinnamon schnapps
1/4 oz.    DeKuyper Butterscotch liqueur
1/4 oz.    Bailey’s Irish cream
1/4 oz.    Jagermeister herbal liqueur

Shake all ingredients in a cocktail shaker half-filled with ice cubes. Strain into a shot glass, and serve.

I think I first came across an oatmeal cookie shot a good 15 years ago or longer. There were actually two places I frequented that served up a decent oatmeal cookie flavored potation. The first was at my regular watering hole; the Clipper Ship Lounge in Brookfield, Illinois. Sadly, it is no longer there. But there was a cute bartender who worked there and she introduced myself and a few buddies to the oatmeal cookie shot. It really did taste like its namesake.

However my more lasting memory was a little later that year. I had Chicago Bears season tickets at the time with a friend and they were scheduled to play our arch rival, the Green Bay Packers one Sunday in December. I woke up and there was a solid eight inches of freshly fallen snow on the ground. I called my partner and told him I would be a while digging out and getting to his house. He wasn’t happy that I wouldn’t be there for some time. He was rarely happy about anything. He claimed I should’ve gotten up earlier. So in his usual manner, he gave me a one hour ultimatum. If I wasn’t there in an hour, he was just going to head out without me. My reply was probably something like, “Whatever you need to do, dude.”

So after I finally dug my truck out and was on the road, he had already left for Soldier Field. Snow was falling heavily again and I knew that there was no way I would even make it there for kickoff. So instead, I went to a warm, cozy sports bar nearby where I knew some of my other buddies watched the games from. I spent the rest of the afternoon watching a blizzard fall on what looked like a very cold crowd at the football game. And drinking shot after shot of oatmeal cookie shooters. They were delicious and we toasted my smart-ass partner on every round.

When prepared correctly, this is one yummy shot. It’s funny how people have uncovered various liquor formulas that taste so close to a delicious food. I think the butterscotch schnapps is probably the key to this one. The schnapps combined with the Bailey’s Irish Cream make the texture slightly thicker than most shots. And served slightly chilled, it all adds to the illusion of oatmeal cookies. Very smooth.

Don’t deviate from the recipe ingredients except for perhaps the brand of butterscotch schnapps. There is some flexibility there. But the other components should adhere strictly to the recipe. This is actually a quite popular shot that we’re sure many readers have tried in the past. You may have your own little twist to preparing the shot. I know one guy who adds a little sprinkle of nutmeg on the top. Not enough to make you inhale it and sneeze into the shot glass. But I admit, it does further add to the savory illusion.

ShareMyShot.com gives this tasty pick-me-up a 5 on a scale of 5. It has always been one of my personal favorites when it comes to flavored shot creations.

And not just because of the image of my buddy sitting by himself in a blizzard at Soldier Field watching the Bears lose to the Packers. The Bears did lose that day. Which never makes me happy. But my buddy getting his come-uppance while I threw down some awesome shots in a warm bar with some laughing friends is a memory I cherish.

Cheers !!

Posted in 5 Star Shots, Bailey's Irish Cream, butterscotch schnapps, cinnamon schnapps, DeKuyper Butterscotch Liqueur, dessert shots, flavored liqueurs, Goldschlager, Jagermeister, liqueurs, schnapps | No Responses »

Dragon Sweat

Thursday, October 29th, 2009

Dragon Sweat

2/3 oz.   Everclear alcohol
1/2 oz.   DeKuyper Sour Apple Pucker schnapps
1/3 oz.   DeKuyper cinnamon schnapps 

Pour ingredients into shot glass and serve.

I was intrigued when a bartender friend told me about this one. There’s a lot of shots out there with one combination of schnapps or another. And they’re usually not too bad. I’ve seen the apple and cinnamon schnapps pairing before {see previous recipes for Apple Jacks and Granny’s Apple Pie}. But those shots utilized a completely different third component as compared to the ass kicker that is Everclear.

At first I didn’t see any connection between the shot and its name. But then when it was poured, my Pavlovian dog training kicked in. Any time I’m about to do a shot with Everclear, my mind almost psyches me out. I have to work my way up to it. Loosen up my neck muscles a little bit. Rub my hands together a few times. Take a deep breath. It’s kind of like preparing to walk into a dragon’s lair. But that’s not everything that helped me to connect the name to the shot.

I drank three of these over a 50 minute period. They’re pretty tasty actually. Like we said, the apple and cinnamon schnapps combo is a somewhat popular twosome. Together they suggest an apple pie type of taste. So my curiosity was about how the Everclear would influence the taste. And as one might suspect with Everclear, it didn’t really change the taste much at all. It just provided a whopper of a kick to the normally staid schnapps. Everclear is like vodka at its roots. Pretty odorless. Pretty much tasteless. Simple pure-grain alcohol. So I didn’t expect it to have much of an influence on the taste and my suspicions proved correct. But it was noticeable.

After having had three of them in just short of an hour, I made the final connection to the name. My damn forehead was sweating a little bit. Everclear is one of the highest alcohol content libations legally available. But it reminds me of my buddy’s homemade moonshine he brings in from Yugoslavia. The kind of shit that you can pour a little splash on the bar and light it on fire for a while. Between my pre-ritual exercises just to do a shot with Everclear + the sweating forehead after downing a few, the name seemed more appropriate.

The only ingredient you can play around with is the brand of cinnimon schnapps you use. My bartender friend said he doesn’t see why you couldn’t use a different label other than DeKuyper. He even conceded that you might get away with Goldschlager or Aftershock. But at the bar, they use regular DeKuyper cinnamon schnapps. Otherwise, they “might have to charge an extra dollar or more for it”  if they used a higher-class brand.

ShareMyShot gives this fiery beast a 4 on a scale of 5. It has the tamer components to offer up a good tasting shot like the Apple Jacks shooter. But it takes it one step further by making it more of a manly shot that will give you a zing. Like any shot with Everclear or a higher alcohol content ingredient, just use your brains. Don’t go overboard.

Cheers !!

Posted in 4 Star Shots, Aftershock cinnamon schnapps, Apple Pucker, apple schnapps, cinnamon schnapps, DeKuyper cinnamon schnapps, DeKuyper Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps, Everclear, Goldschlager, Hiram Walker cinnamon schnapps, Hiram Walker schnapps, schnapps | No Responses »

Hot Chicana

Wednesday, October 28th, 2009

Hot Chicana

1/2 oz.    Bacardi white rum (aka light)
1/2 oz.    DeKuyper Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps
4 drops   Tabasco sauce

 
Pour the Bacardi rum, the DeKuyper Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps, and Tabasco sauce into a shot glass. Make sure you only use 3-4 drops of Tabasco sauce. Stir with a toothpick and serve. Enjoy !

I’d hope I can speak for most men here when I say I’ve always had an appreciation for a hot chicana. Or a hot Latina or seniorita. Really, just a hot girl in general. Oh who are we kidding? For me and the other guys in the ShareMyShot office, we’ll pounce on anything with a pulse. But if we can’t land a hot chicana at the club, at least we can indulge in a few from our shot glasses.

Unfortunately, it’s not quite as good as the real thing.

When making this shot, adhere to the directions pretty closely. Don’t use anything other than the best-selling, most popular rum in the world, Bacardi White (or as many people call it: Light). DO NOT deviate to Malibu or Captain Morgan or any other brand of rum. Stick with the Bacardi White. Sure people can experiment with those other labels, but you won’t be making a true Hot Chicana. We didn’t even try other types of rum. It just doesn’t seem like a flavored rum or a dark rum would work here. It would be trying to make the shot a little too fancy.

It’s unique enough as it is. You can slightly alter the cinnamon schnapps element. The recipe calls for DeKuyper Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps. We encourage you to stick with that. However, DeKuyper does offer their “regular” cinnamon schnapps as well. If you are really short on funds and could stand to save the $2-4 price difference, you could go with the regular bottle. And if you are going to go that route, you could even use Hiram Walker cinnamon schnapps for that matter. But this is only if you can’t swing the DeKuyper Hot Damn label.

If you really have to be creative and don’t want to use the Hot Damn brand, you could try Aftershock cinnamon schnapps. We did not pursue that, but we identify Aftershock as the hottest cinnamon schnapps that might rival the DeKuyper Hot Damn brand. Without getting into specialty import brands, etc.

And when it comes to the Tabasco sauce, follow the recipe ! This is only a regular sized shot and you don’t want to tip the Tabasco bottle and pour even a little splash in there. You’re not making a spicy Bloody Mary here. You’re just sprucing up a 1 oz. shot. So let 3-4 droplets fall into the shot and then give it a tiny, little stir with a toothpick. We really do encourage you to stir it so that you have a nice blend of the flavors and have a legitimate Hot Chicana.

The only thing is……it wasn’t that tasty. It was hot. That’s for damn sure. The drink’s name does not lie. But I’m more for a good tasting shot than one that leaves my tongue burning for a few minutes. If I want that, I’ll get some super hot wings. I do like Tabasco—just not in my shot glass very often. Between the sauce and the cinnamon schnapps, it’s a pretty spicy/hot shooter. I guess the rum provides the kick and helps thin out the shot. Otherwise it would be a little syrupy thick.

We at ShareMyShot give this hot tamale a 2 on a scale of 5. It is creative and I do like all of the ingredients. I just don’t like them together. Both me and the other guys on-staff would rather drink some bombs and meet a real, live hot chicana. Now that would be tasty.

Cheers !!

Posted in 2 Star Shots, Aftershock cinnamon schnapps, Bacardi white/light rum, cinnamon schnapps, DeKuyper cinnamon schnapps, DeKuyper Hot Damn cinnamon schnapps, Hiram Walker cinnamon schnapps, Hiram Walker schnapps, rum, schnapps, Tabasco sauce | No Responses »

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