BROKER’S GIN—PART 2!

My Fellow Inebriates,

I received the nicest message today from Julia, the Business Development Manager at BROKER’S GIN, commiserating with me over the absence of that wonderful crystal elixir from my neighborhood booze shop, and reassuring me that Canada has not in fact been cut off.

For those of you who haven’t met Julia Gale, she is the most delightful person. In fact, today she is my very favorite person, because she has injected some hope into my existence.

If you haven’t read my previous lament about BROKER’S GIN, I’ll fill you in on the crisis. About two years ago I purchased it out of curiosity and because I liked the hat/top. A couple of days later, the whole bottle was gone! Where did it go? It just went, because it was that good. Before discovering BROKER’S I’d been loyal to TANQUERAY (the original, not TANQUERAY 10 because it is too clean to be interesting), although honestly I’d try any gin once and many of them repeatedly. Long story short—I’d tried a lot of gin brands before encountering BROKER’S, and BROKER’S held its own against all of them.

So I was abject when I saw it had disappeared from the shelves. I think my fur started falling out.

And today lovely Julia visited my page and lit up my world again by telling me that there is BROKER’S GIN in Ontario.Ontario!

How far away is Ontario?! I immediately wondered.

Turns out it’s pretty freaking far away, my friends. I’d forgotten, because I so rarely leave the house or occupy myself with anything outside of liquor, that geography is very large and complicated. Not only is Ontario very far away; it is also full of polar bears like my friend Glen Bear, and obviously they are getting all the gin.

Now, I do have an aunt in Ontario, but she doesn’t believe in bears, alcohol-consuming or otherwise, and thinks my mum is a space cadet for humoring me by doing my typing. So I doubt very much that she’d do any liquor shopping for me. She certainly couldn’t be expected to send me a bottle, especially if I told her I needed it to take care of some tremors.

I started trying to convince myself that BROKER’S wasn’t all that. I reckoned that if I could find some ho-hum or even negative reviews of it, then maybe I could just gently forget about it and move on. But instead I found nothing but raves. And I had to admit that BROKER’S GIN is too magnificent to forget.

So I’m hoping Julia can tell me where to buy some product in BC. She has been very friendly, so my paws are crossed. Stay tuned, peeps.

Jell-O shot idea

Says one of my recent Facebook friend additions, Ian:

If you want yummy Jell-O shots — get Wild Cherry mixed with Amaretto — Fantastic!

I do want yummy Jell-O shots. Leaving this graphic aside…

…Jell-O shots are a plain-old great idea. I love all kinds, but this suggestion from Ian is a new one for me. When I think about it, it makes perfect sense, but I’m not sure why. The two flavors just seem to go together.

But almonds don’t taste like cherries. In fact, almonds don’t even taste like amaretto. Why is that? Am I just too wasted to know what I’m consuming?

Apparently the answer lies in the almonds. Amaretto, at least in its original formulation, was made with European almonds—bitter almonds. Whereas the almonds we eat here in North America are sweet almonds. It seems we are just too candy-assed to eat things like bitter almonds here. In fact, it’s illegal to cultivate them in North America. OMG, why?

It turns out bitter almonds contain laetrile, which contains two poisons: cyanide and benzaldehyde, the latter being the active ingredient that gives almond extract its well-known bitter aroma and taste. And all kinds of stone fruit contain laetrile–cherries, peaches, apricots. Most amaretto is made from apricots, not almonds, because they contain the same poison. Wow!

So, how much of this shit would I have to consume to die??

Well, thankfully a lot. Europeans eat bitter almonds all the time without keeling over, and by some dumb-ass contradictory bureaucratic food regulation we legally import bitter almond oil. So it’s okay, friends, you can eat that shit. Eat it, drink it, shoot it.

Yummly Jell-O shots

Checking out the inventory this morning, I realized we have a genuine booze emergency in the house. If you haven’t read my lamentations about the liquor cupboard being bare, here’s a list of what we have:

    • Bacardi Big Apple Rum—8 oz or so
    • Malibu—maybe 3 oz
    • Cusano Rojo Mezcal—2 oz, worm definitely dead
    • El Senorio Mezcal—4 oz, never opened, worm still hanging out in there
    • AppletonEstate Rum—2 oz

Needless to say, all are sealed tightly enough to defeat my furry, thumbless paws.

So I’d say that’s a crisis, wouldn’t you? These little remainders have been languishing for years. I’ve just about given up any hope of inspiring my parents to get into these rejected bottles. Just about…

Enter Yummly Nibbles & Bits, a gorgeous foodie website with pics that make even an alcoholic a little hungry. As you know, I don’t go in for solid food; I am all about liquor. But I’ll go as far as gels, and Yummly has a beautiful article on alcoholic Jell-O. They have some good ideas that might dovetail with our dreggish liquor cabinet.

But what is Jell-O exactly? Or more to the point, what is Jell-O made of? Well, hang on tight.

Phew! No bear parts. Unless they're included in "Other"???

Jell-O is gelatin-based, and gelatin is a “protein produced from collagen extracted from the boiled bones, connective tissues, and intestines of animals.” Whoa!

So what kinds of animals are we talking about? Just like you humans, I’m pretty good about compartmentalizing information, meaning I can shoot a Jell-O drink without envisioning the pigs, cows and chickens all jumbled up in its manufacture. But I’d have to draw the line if bears had any unfortunate part in gelatin production, just because I wouldn’t want to be a cannibal.

I googled “bear entrails vs gelatin” and was satisfied that bears are not used to make the stuff; however, gelatin is used to make gummi bears, which is cool. But you may want to avoid Jell-O shots if you’re concerned about them being kosher.

So what can we whip up using Jell-O and our meager booze rations?

From Bionic Bites

I want to make these very badly, but I have a few mods: I’m gonna sub Bacardi Big Apple Rum for the blueberry Stoli and leave out the actual blueberries. We have raspberry Jell-O so I’ll use that. The only hitch is that my mum says the kids will want it, so we have to leave out the rum.

From Bakers Royale

This one’s ingenious, but my mum will have to do all the work because I don’t have opposable thumbs or patience. You have to hollow out a bunch of strawberries…I thought we had some growing outside but it turns out they stop growing before November so we are SOL on that account. We can still make the Jell-O part because we have the right flavor (strawberry) and we have two kinds of Mezcal. I’ll use both and leave out the liqueur that we don’t have. Score!

Except my mum says we have to leave out the Mezcal so the kids can eat it. Oh, man.

from annie's eats

This one will work for sure.

Again, we have to scrap the orange liqueur, but it’s all good because we have Mezcal. We have to make sure the worm doesn’t fall into the lime Jell-O, though, because it might scare people. Now we’re all set.

Oh wait. My mum says we have to leave out the worm and the Mezcal. Sigh…

Why don’t you guys whip up some alcoholic Jell-O and tell me all about it?