Tahoe Trio

We recently returned from a trip to Tahoe City, California – where we spent a week hiking, enjoying the beautiful blue water of Lake Tahoe, and attended a lovely family wedding. We rented a cozy (and well equipped) mountain cabin – which was perfect for our family in almost every way. The kitchen had all the culinary tools we needed to prepare meals, but upon our arrival, we found that there were absolutely no cocktail supplies. Being located in California, there were plenty of wine glasses (and champagne flutes) but no cocktail glasses, no mixing glass or shaker, and no measuring jigger. We had considered packing some of these items, but when push came to shove, we needed the space in the suitcase for those shoes for the wedding.

Being a resourceful group, we were able to manage just fine. We didn’t want to purchase more liquor (and other ingredients) than we could use during our stay, and we needed to keep the cocktails simple enough to eyeball the measuring. We came up with a drink menu that was varied enough to satisfy the five of us staying in the cabin (and the occasional guest for cocktail hour), and at the end of the week all we had left were a couple of extra limes and some bitters. Our drink menu contained a classic daiquiri, a gin and tonic (using a nice California-made gin), and an Old Fashioned.

The daiquiri recipe is already on our blog – and it’s a good one for a pared-down liquor cabinet because it only requires white rum, fresh lime, and simple syrup. You can mix up simple syrup with sugar and water, so we just had to purchase limes and a half bottle of rum. We had to squeeze the limes without the help of our citrus juicer tool, but this isn’t so bad if you: 1.) Make it a group activity, and 2.) Keep the limes at room temperature, roll them on the kitchen counter, and then cut them in quarters. We used a reusable water bottle as a cocktail shaker, strained the drink with a spoon into a champagne flute, and finished with a lime wheel as garnish.

For our gin and tonic we used St. George Spirits Terroir Gin. Being in California we made the choice to go with San Francisco area distiller’s gin – and the Terroir, with its juniper, laurel, and pine notes, was the perfect choice for a mountain gin and tonic. No real bar tools required for this one, mix it in the drinking glass (we used a wine goblet), add some lime for garnish, and pass it to the nearest thirsty person! Even though a Gin and Tonic is a simple drink to prepare, you can screw it up by doing either of the following: using inferior gin and/or tonic water; or over-diluting (by using too much tonic). Our preference is for a 2 to 3 ratio of gin to tonic, and our preferred tonic water is Fever Tree Indian Tonic Water.

We didn’t need any fancy bar tools for an Old Fashioned. We used Angel’s Envy Port Finish Bourbon, simple syrup, Angostura bitters, and an orange twist. We had some over-ripe peaches – which can be worked into an Old Fashioned by muddling them into the drink and straining the pulp. It probably would have been a good idea to pack a travel-sized bottle of cocktail bitters, but we’ll plan better next time! One of our favorite Old Fashioned recipes (the Old Thyme Cocktail) is on our blog.

The Cocktail Artist had plenty of time to sketch and paint during our week in Tahoe, and we've paired his painting of Emerald Bay with our cocktail trio. The rest of the family took heaps of photos of the gorgeous scenery and we've added a few to this post.

Cheers!