holiday cheer

Frankly, I'm talking about liquor, and good liquor at that.

A couple of weeks back, Allan and Paul hosted their annual holiday party. Always a good time, this year it was further enlivened by Angie, a bartender hired for the evening. She was whipping up a few special cocktails and keeping us all entertained and cared for. In short, she rocked.

Angie had with her some business cards and a small advertisement for an event at the catering company she's with, Cooking Fools, down in Wicker Park. I looked at it, showed it Conrad, and said, why not? And hey, who do we know who is not a wine drinker but prefers hard liquor. Rachel, of course!

Merry Christmas Rachel! Happy Hanukkah! This past Thursday night the three of us met at Cooking Fools and joined some thirty other folk for finger food and drinks. Angie (not a flattering shot, I know, sorry) was whipping up two special cocktails - a refreshing lemon gin drink that was garnished with cucumber and dill, and a sweeter drink made with a Tahitian vanilla infused vodka. The spirits she used were from North Shore Distillery, a small boutique operation in the northern suburbs (exurbs?). Sonja, one of the distillery co-owners was there to offer tastings of two gins, two vodkas, aquavit, and absinthe.

It was such a great evening. We escaped our little shells and found ourselves enjoying conversation with several of the other guests. We also tried pretty much all the spirits and engaged Sonja at length in chat. We'll look for these for ourselves and for friends - I really recommend the gins especially, the non-flavoured vodka was smooooth, and the aquavit made me want to go back to Sweden and share it with Conrad's cousins there. On the way out, we made sure to stop and buy a bottle for RAS to enjoy over the holidays.