Normally I’m a red wine with dinner guy but every once in awhile I like a good cocktail. In the summer months a super ice cold Martini with a monster green olive is my go-to cocktail. In the winter, it’s bourbon.
Bourbon is an elegant spirit with flavor notes that are as complex as a good wine. One of those flavor notes is vanilla. I’m a big fan of vanilla. In my opinion, the greater the vanilla hit the better the bourbon experience.
Now top shelf bourbons will set you back anywhere from forty to fifty dollars a liter – or more. But I have a little trick that will elevate a decent bourbon into a great bourbon for only a few pennies. But before we get to the recipe, I want to make another point about cocktails.
You’ll probably think it’s strange what I’m about to say but the very first ingredient in a great cocktail is the glass. I would never drink a Martini out of anything other than a three inch diameter martini glass. Likewise, I don’t like to drink bourbon out of anything other than a low-ball rocks glass with a heavy weighted bottom. If you don’t have the right glass, forget the cocktail and pour yourself a Pepsi.
How to Turn Jim Beam into Jack Daniels
Need This
1 – 750 ML bottle of Jim Beam Kentucky Straight Bourbon (White Label)
Vanilla extract (imitation is fine)
1 small eye dropper
Ice cubes
Do This
Add 3 – 4 ice cubes to a heavy bottomed rocks glass.
Pour 3 fingers of Jim Beam bourbon into the glass with the ice.*
Fill an eye dropper 1/4 way with vanilla extract and zotz it into the bourbon.
Stir twice gently.
Wait 5 minutes to allow some of the ice to melt.
Sip.
Happy New Year!
*I have fat fingers. If you don’t, just add enough bourbon to reach the bottom of the very top ice cube – but don’t cover the ice over completely. GMN.