Butterbeer

There are a lot of Butterbeer recipes out there. Most are terribly sweet.

This one is so effing fantastic I decided to share it with you Potterites. It's a little sweet, but not cloyingly so.

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Ingredients

• 2 oz good bourbon. I used Woodford Reserve and it was incredible.

• 1/2 oz Butterscotch sauce. The 15 minutes it takes to make your own are well worth it. In a pinch, you can use salted caramel sauce, or something similar.

• 4-6oz regular or diet cream soda, depending on how sweet you prefer your drinks

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Recipe

Add all ingredients except the diet cream soda to a mixing tin, mason jar, tupperware thingy, or whatever you have that has a lid.

Shake heartily and strain into a double old fashioned glass.

Top with 4-6oz cream soda.

Harry Potter cosplay and chug.

Butterscotch Sauce

Ho. Lee. SHIT I love butterscotch. And caramel. [And pronouncing it care-uh-mel, not car-mel.]

I've never made butterscotch before but decided it was going to be a key ingredient in a Harry Potter- themed cocktail this Halloween.

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Ingredients

Yields 2 cups

• 342 g brown sugar [a little over one cup]

• 114 g butter [1 stick, I don't care if it's salted or not]

• 114 g heavy cream [~1/2 cup]

• 34 g water [a few tablespoons]

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Add brown sugar, butter, and water to a small saucepan.

Heat to a boil over medium heat and boil for 10 minutes.You want the sugar to completely dissolve and the butter to brown a bit here. It may take less or more time. It'll smell a little nutty when it's brown.

Remove from heat. Add heavy cream.It may bubble vigorously for a few seconds. Do not panic. This is normal. But don't do something stupid like stick your face in there and get splattered on.

Let cool a bit and pour into glass jars. Eat this on top of ice cream [like me], in your Harry Potter-themed Butterbeer recipe [also like me], or by the spoonful in the middle of the night while no one's watching [...no comment...].

The Dirty Mela

Ohhhh... you so dirty.

This is the Dirty Mela. An Anthony LeDonne original. I'm probably not the first to mix these three ingredients in these ratios, but I AM the first to post it on my website. And, since my website is my world, I'm the first to make it. Ever. [No arguments.]

Applejack is a watered down version of apple brandy, and by "watered down" I mean "cut with 80 proof grain neutral spirits." You'd think that would make an inferior product. And you'd probably be right. But in this drink Applejack is better. And cheaper. Don't waste a delicate apple brandy in here... Your wallet will notice the difference more than your tongue.

The name Dirty Mela points to the drink's roots: mela, Italian for apple, and dirty... well I don't know why dirty was in there. But it felt right [translation: Wiff named it so it's not changing].

Ingredients

1oz Laird's Apple Applejack
1oz Noilly Prat Sweet Vermouth
1oz Campari

Directions

Add everything to a mixing tin/glass/jar/container full of ice. Stir for 60 seconds. Strain into a chilled cocktail* glass.

*Don't call it a martini glass. This isn’t Applebee's. Also, don't call cocktails martinis unless they are Martinis, made only with gin and dry vermouth (although a dash of orange bitters is acceptable per the original recipe). A "vodka martini" is called a Kangeroo. And yeah, you should feel weird saying that; that's the price you pay for drinking a "vodka martini". [Can you feel my judgement?]

Kale chi-... [I really don't want to write this]

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It goes against every part of my being to say I like kale.Why? [thanks for asking]Detoxers & Cleansers.They ruined it for me. Why? [thanks again, I owe you one]I hate them; they love kale; and, by the Transitive Property I should also hate kale. [I think that's right...]But I don't. I actually kinda like it. Not for any of it's purported health benefits. But because it tastes fucking awesome.When done properly.[That's good enough for a segue, yeah?]

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The Ingredients:

• 100g Kale [1 bunch, exactly 19 leaves]

• 20g Olive Oil [1/2 a shot glass full]

• 1g kosher salt [don't wuss out here; salt makes food taste good.]

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1

Go all Eve on that kale and remove the ribs. Use a knife and cut along either side of the rib. I grab each leaf by the rib end and hack downward along the rib.

2

Wash and spin dry the kale. Or not. Just don't blame me if you get the shits.

3

Put the kale in a large bowl. Add olive oil and salt. Get in there with your hands and mix everything up. If you scale this recipe up you may need to do this in batches. 

4

Dump that oiled up kale on a foil-lined baking sheet and toss in an oven at 400˚F. It's done when it's crispy and brown. Probably 15-20 minutes.

5

Tell me how many "toxins" you removed in the comments below.

Steak, Couscous, Spinach

Ingredients

Makes 2 Servings

• 1 12oz Strip Steak
• 1 8oz box couscous
• kosher salt
• spinach
• olive oil

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Recipe

1. Cook steak in a bag in a water bath at 133˚F for about an hour. This assumes you've got a steak that's 1 inch thick. If it's 2 inches it could take 3 hours. 
2. Remove the steak from the bag and reserve. [Reserve just means don't throw it away. Hopefully you weren't going to throw out the star of this show, but I wouldn't put it past you.]
3. Cook spinach like this. It's easy. I promise. 
4. Boil water for couscous. Remove from heat and add couscous. Wait five minutes for couscous to puff up. Find another reason to say the word couscous. [Couscous.]
5. Heat a pan over high heat until it's really hot. This is easiest with cast iron because it can take a beating. If you're not sure how hot "really hot" is, put the oil in the pan and add the steak as soon as the oil starts smoking.
6. Sear the steak for 2 minutes on one side [presentation side] and 1 minutes on the other side.
7. Plate prettily!

Pork Chop

Ingredients

Makes 2 chops

• 2 12oz Bone-in Pork Chops [doesn't have to be bone-in. Could be bone-out. We're equal opportunity here.
• A couple thimbles full of Canola oil. [You just need some on the bottom of the pan to conduct heat to the pork. Don't freak out over how much. 3 tablespoons? 10 grams? Why not?!]
• 2 Splashkies of white wine [this is a standard use of measurement in my home bar]
• One squirt dijon mustard [squeeze the bottle until it makes one fart noise]
• Small child's handful capers [or exactly 34]
• Half a stick of butter [but which half is up to you]
• Kosher salt

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Recipe

1. Cook the pork chops in a 135˚F water bath for about an hour for medium rare, 141˚F for medium. The exact time isn't important; aim for between 1-2 hours.
2. Remove the chops from the bag and dry with paper towels so it browns all pretty like. The hot oil has to evaporate the moisture before it can start browning the pork. The more moisture, the longer it sits in the pan, potentially overcooking it. [This is bad.]
3. Sprinkle on a liberal amount of salt. Like college student liberal.
4. Heat a pan over high heat. Add oil and heat until it starts to smoke.
5. Add chops and cook for 3 minutes on one side [the presentation side] and 1 minute on the other [the other side].
6. Remove chops from the pan and reserve [fancy for "put them on a plate"]. 
7. Deglaze the pan with the whine wine. Deglazing just means throw liquid in a hot pan and scrape the bottom to free all the brown bits [technically called "fond"]. This not only adds incredible flavor to your pan sauce, it aids in cleanup. #lazy.
8. Reduce until almost all the wine is evaporated.
9. Add dijon and remove from the heat. Stir in butter. Add capers. 
10. Plate the pork all fancy-like and spoon a few spoonfuls of the pan sauce over. 
11. Eat. 

 

Pulled Pork

Oh my god am I about to blow your mind. This is going to be one of the easiest things you ever make in the kitchen. It requires two ingredients, and no prep. If you can't throw two things into a pan and turn on heat please don't visit my site again [jk jk, I need the hits]. 

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Ingredients

• 1 Pork Shoulder. Preferably with skin on (look for picnic pork). 
• Water

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Recipe

1. Add the entire pork shoulder into the base of a pressure cooker. 
2. Cover with water.
3. Pressure cook for 2 hours. 
4. I let it cool overnight, first on the counter for several hours and then in the fridge. This helps the pork reabsorb some of the moisture [I think] but, more importantly, chilling it solidifies the pork fat that's risen to the top. You can scrape off the fluffy fat and reserve for use in any recipe that calls for oil. It's incredible.
5. Reserve the liquid. It will be jello consistency at this point. You've just made pork stock.
6. Shred the meat with your fingers. This is the pulled part of the pulled pork.
7. Toss it in your next pasta dish, risotto, or tacos. Or put some on a fluffy potato slider bun with BBQ sauce. 

Chicken Broth

This is going to be the most boring recipe you'll ever read. 

But it's also one of the easiest. 

And it'll produce AWESOME flavor-juice. And it's made from stuff you usually throw away. So why wouldn't you want to do this?!?

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Ingredients

• 1 Chicken carcass, parts, stuff [I use a leftover carcass after roasting and eating a chicken]

• Roughly 1.5L / 1.5 quarts Water

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Recipe

1. Put all chicken things into the base of a pressure cooker.

2. Add water.

3. Seal pressure cooker and cook for 2 hours.

4. Let the pressure cooker come back to room temperature.

5. Strain solids, reserving liquid. It'll keep in the fridge for a week or in the freezer until you move.

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Caramelized Onions

Caramelized Onions make everything better. Even caramelized onions. Throw this on a burger. Add it to soup. Eat it right out of the jar like a slob while nobody's looking except your dog who may or may not be judging you.]

It's so good. So brown and sweet. That sounds disgusting but you get the picture.

It's also ridiculously easy to make.

If you don't have a pressure cooker just throw everything in a sauté pan and sauté over medium-low heat. It will not take 15-20 minutes like all the Food Network recipes tell you. It will take 2 hours. I'm not kidding.

Don't get me wrong, I love me some Food Network [Hi, Giada!], but unless they've got a Rachel Ray-branded time machine they're lying to you.

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Ingredients

• Onions, julienned
• Butter

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Recipe

1. Divide onions among 8oz glass canning jars. Add the butter on top. You can use as many/few jars as you like, I don't care. Want to cram everything in one? Go for it. Spread it out among 5 little jars? Be my guest.
2. Pressure cook at 1 bar / 15psi (usually the second red line on most pressure cookers) for 45 minutes.
3. Transfer onions to a pan and simmer over medium heat until the liquid gets all syrupy.
4. You are done.

5 Minute Quinoa

I'm just gonna come right out and say it...

Quinoa tastes like grunt.

Which is expected since people who talk about quinoa usually fit into one of three categories:

1. health nuts who prioritize pseudoscience over taste [you know who you are],
2. people who claim to eat healthy but overeat whatever health food they're crazing on and,
3. Mexicans.

[One of those is false.]

I'm in the fourth category:

Culinary Geniuses.

“Quinoa tastes like grunt.” — Anthony LeDonne

I love quinoa not because it contains a ton of complex carbohydrates, or because it's a formidable intestinal pipe cleaner, but because it's super easy to cook in bulk and makes a great base for other dishes. [Translation: I'm lazy.]

I make a batch on Sundays and add it to dishes throughout the week.

For breakfast, I fry some quinoa in a little butter/olive oil, mix in some browned greens, and throw a few fried eggs on top.

For lunch, I'll top it with pan-fried salmon, blanched leeks, and beurre blanc.

For dinner, I'll eat a steak and just stare at the quinoa [a man can only take so much fiber].

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Ingredients

Makes 6 Servings

• 350g /  1 box of Quinoa
• 700g / 2.5 C Water/Stock/Broth
  We'll call this the "liquid" below. Get ready.
• Salt to taste
  Side note, the reason restaurant food tastes better is salt. Properly wielded it will make everything taste better. And if you're worried about your sodium intake, check the labels on all the prepared food you're shoveling down your pie hole before cutting salt out of a home cooked meal.
• 0-45g / 0-3 Tbsp Butter/Olive Oil
  We'll call this "fat" below. The quantity used it up to you. The more you use the better it'll taste.

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Recipe

1. Heat the base of a pressure cooker over high heat. Add fat.
2. Add quinoa.
3. Toast for a few minutes. Stirring occasionally. VERY occasionally. Go have a few sips of wine. Check Facebook. You're trying to brown this stuff, not just warm it up. It should smell toasted. This will probably take 5-10 minutes to smell toasty. It's okay if you under toast it. It's not okay if you over toast it [cuz then it's burnt, yo.]
4. Add liquid and salt. Seal pressure cooker and cook for 5 minutes. Start the timer as soon as pressure reaches 1 bar/15psi (usually the second red line).
5. Run warm water over the top of the pressure cooker to depressurize and remove the lid.
6. If there's residual liquid, put it back over medium heat for a few minutes without the lid. If not, you're done!

MEXTO [MEXICO+PESTO]

You know pesto. You know Mexico.

Now meet MEXTO.

Wiff and I were recently in New Orleans and went to Aarón Sánchez's restaurant, Johnny Sanchez. His food was so good and so flavorful that I was inspired to pick up one of his cookbooks, Simple Food Big Flavor. 

His Cilantro Cotija Pesto recipe inspired me to swap out the Italian ingredients in my pesto recipe for Mexican ones. 

This groovy green concoction es increíble [Spanish for pretty good]. It’s creamy. It’s green. It’s adorned with Nasturtium blossoms because that’s what you do in Mexico [it’s not]. It’s a Mexican-Italian inter/trans/hyper-continental Frankenstino that stretches the definition of latin love [that’s not even a thing].

And so I give you...

La Última Receta Del Pesto Que Usted Necesitará Siempre

Hola. Me llamo Mexto .

Ingredients

Use my other pesto recipe for ratios. I used one bunch of cilantro and it was enough for 8 smallish helpings of pasta.

• 8oz Cilantro [I was lazy and used everything except the bottom couple of inches of the bunch.]

• 8 garlic cloves [Put the garlic in a pan, cover with cold water, and bring it to a boil. Boiling it for 5 minutes softens the overpowering bite.]

• 2 cups almonds [Pumpkin seeds are more auténtico but they are 'spensive.]

• 2 cups cotija cheese [Common in decent grocery stores, hispanic food marts, and every bodega in NYC]

• 1 1/3 cups olive oil

• Lime juice, as needed [freshly squeezed, always]. Start with a tablespoon or two and adjust per your taste.

• Kosher salt, as needed.

• Jalapeño pepper, as needed. I removed the seeds from mine because someone [our dog] doesn't like spicy stuff. Add a little at a time until it’s spicy enough for you.

Recipe

1. Throw everything except the oil into a food processor.

2. Turn it on.

3. Pour in the oil.

4. Turn it off.

In the words of Ina Garten, "How easy is that?"

Hanger Steak, Asparagus, Peas, Shiitake, Pasta, Pan Sauce

Ingredients

Makes 2 Servings

• 225g Hanger Steak (about 8 oz, or 1/2 lb)

• 100g Pasta (about 1/4 lb)

• 75g Asparagus tips (roughly the tips from one bunch, about 1 cup)

• 75g Frozen peas (about 1 cup)

• 10g Dried Shiitake mushrooms (about 1 cup)

• 10g Olive Oil (about 1 tablespoon)

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Recipe

1. Preheat a water bath to 55˚C (131˚F). Put the steak in a ziplock or vacuum seal bag, remove as much air as possible, seal, and drop the bag into the water bath. [If you needed me to tell you to seal the bag, you have bigger problems to worry about.] Cook for an hour. It’s fine if it goes over and hour. It could be 2 hours for all I care… That’s one of the benefits of cooking in a water bath!

2. Remove the steak from the bag and reserve the juices and the steak separately. I swear to the gods I will find you and slap you if you discard the juices from that bag.

3. Bring a large sauté pan full of salted water to a boil. Taste the water BEFORE YOU ADD ANY INGREDIENTS. It should taste like the ocean. Don’t know what the ocean tastes like? It’s salty. Add the mushrooms and cook for 5 minutes. [You could also just pour a little boiling water into a bowl to rehydrate the mushrooms, but this way is simpler, less cleanup, and it flavors the pasta water! [Yay for lazy!] Remove and reserve the mushrooms.

4. Sprinkle kosher salt on every side of the steak. Heat 10g of olive oil (~ 1 tablespoon) in a large frying pan over high heat. Just as the oil starts smoking, add the meat and sear for about a minute on each side. High heat ensures maximum flavor from browning. We’ve already cooked the steak, but it looks absolutely terrible (see attached scatological mise en place photo) and needs some flavor.

5. Reserve steak to a warm area near the stove.

6. Reduce heat to medium. Deglaze the pan with the reserved juices from the steak. If you forgot to do that, you can use a few tablespoons of water and shame. Deglaze just means “add liquid to a hot pan so we can scrape the brown stuff (fond) off the bottom, which means more flavor in our sauce and easier cleanup.” [You can see why, for the sake of brevity, I prefer deglaze.] Add the reserved mushrooms. Don’t touch them. Do NOT fucking touch them. Just let them brown. They’re like children, the more hands off you are the tastier they get. [I don’t have kids.]

7. Add pasta to the water and cook for a minute less than the al dente recommendation on the package. About 5 minutes before the pasta finishes, toss the veggies in with the mushrooms.

8. Add pasta to the mushrooms and veggies (I just use tongs to grab and dump) and mix.

9. Plate with the steak. And eat.

Linguine alle Vongole

This is linguine alle vongole, which translates to...Linguine with clams [didn't see that coming, did ya].

I have no clue why we still use the Italian name. It's not as if anything is lost in translation. Linguine is Linguine. Vongole is Clams. Alle is with.

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Ingredients

Makes 2 Servings

• 100g linguine

• 1000g little neck clams (~2lbs)

• Olive Oil

• 20g crushed garlic (leave the skins on)

• 10g Italian Parsley, finely chopped

• 150g dry white wine. (e.g., Pinot Grigio)

• 50g water (don't make me explain this)

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Recipe

1. Steam all the clams (10 minutes total)

   1. Heat pan (large enough to hold all the clams) over medium high heat. Add oil and garlic. Simmer until golden brown. Tilt the pan to totally submerse the garlic to cook it faster. Remove and discard garlic.

   2. Add 150g (~1 cup) dry white wine and 50g water to pan. It should sizzle.

   3. Gently add clams. Cover. Adjust heat to medium-ish. [Do I need to say gently? Do people know not to throw stuff in the kitchen?]

   4. Once they're all open (~6 minutes), remove the clams to a bowl and reserve.

   5. Keep the liquid warm on low heat. Or, if you're a kitchen stud [like me] and timed the pasta and clams to finish at the same time, then leave the heat on medium.

2. Cook the pasta to 2 minutes under the package directions. That's called al dente which is Italian for "to the tooth". We're going to stick with the Italian here because al dente sounds WAY better than teeth. [You're a pro and probably started heating the water first thing, right?]

3. Grab the pasta with tongs or a skimmer and toss right into the pan cooked the clams. Add any liquid the clams may have spit up into their bowl. Turn the heat up to high. Cook the pasta for another minute or two. It'll help the sauce stick better.

4. Plate the pasta in bowls. Dump (gently) the clams on top. Grab some wine.

5. Eat.

Cold Pressed Coffee or How To Feel Like A Hipster Without [Ironically] Hating Yourself

The first time I had cold-pressed coffee it came from a 4' tall machine.

I use the term "machine" lightly here. It looked more like a medieval torture device.

It really didn't do anything except drip melting ice into coffee grounds and collect the runoff in a carafe. It featured a completely unnecessary spiral glass tube more reminiscent of an 9th century Arab alchemist's tent than a 21st century Seattle hipster cafe.

It tasted just like regular coffee except it was colder. And 3 times the price. 

But it was purchased with an expense account so I didn't care.

4 years later I found myself in a perfect storm: extra coffee beans, a new burr grinder, and boredom. So I decided to put the storm to use and tried making cold-pressed coffee.

My normal coffee routine:

1. Boil water in an electric kettle.
2. Measure and grind 40g Starbucks Cafe Verona beans. [Yes, I'm a Starbucks fan. I know, they're a giant and I should support local roasters out of some irrational sense of localvorian solidarity, but I can't stand most of "the little guys'" coffee and also don't want to pay triple the price for some hipster to roast when Howard has never let me down.]
3. Add ground coffee beans and 600g just-boiled water to a french press.
4. Wait 4 minutes. [I use this time to play Boom Beach on my iPad.]
5. Press.
6. Pour.

My cold-pressed coffee experiment:

1. Measure and grind 100g coffee beans. (Grind setting 14 instead of the normal 28.)
2. Add ground beans and 1500g water to a plastic tupperware container.
3. Wait 24 hours.
4. Press in a french press.
5. Pour.

1 less [fewer?] step. Score 1 for laziness.

I like hot coffee in the mornings and cold pressed coffee is cold. See the problem?

But I also like cold coffee in the afternoon, and pouring hot coffee over ice dilutes it [almost as bad as Dunkin]. 

It won't be replacing my normal routine, but it will be increasing my options for coffee consumption throughout the day. 

My favorite way of drinking cold-pressed coffee (which, by the way, doesn't taste magically different than normal coffee) is on ice, with a tablespoon of mint simple syrup and a tablespoon of heavy cream.

Give it a shot.

Asparagus Risotto w/ Mint, Brussels Sprouts

This was a spur-of-the-moment "hmm, I need to use that asparagus up" creation. What better way to feature the flavor that purée it and add to rice, butter, and oil? 

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Ingredients

recipe in progress

• 3 tbsp Olive Oil
• 2 tbsp Butter
• 1 small Onion (weight?)
• 1 small Shallot (100g?)
• 2 cloves garlic (10g?)
• 150g Carnaroli risotto
  not arborio
• Kosher Salt
• Broth
• Asparagus
• Cheese
• Mint

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Recipe

For the asparagus:

1. Cut off the tips. Then cut them in half length wise. You want them to be easy to eat. And if you're cooking for your girlfriend/wife, you should know they have smaller mouths and also don't like to eat like a caveman at a Brazilian steak house. Reserve the tips.
2. Cut off and discard woody ends. How much? I don't know, depends on how long your asparagus is. [Don't make it dirty.] 1-2 inches is a good rule of thumb. You're trying to remove the really fibrous stuff that tastes like shit and feels like chewing bamboo shoots.
3. Roughly chop the rest into pieces 1/2 inch long. They don't have to be 1/2 inch long. They could be an inch. Or 2. I don't care. Don't be difficult.
4. Blanch the pieces until they're soft. Not flaccid. Just until they lose their vegetable rawness. Probably about 5 minutes. Blanching is a fancy word for boiling. So put a pot of water on to boil. Salt it until it tastes like the ocean. Haven't tasted the ocean? That's normal. In fact, I don't know how people know what the ocean tastes like. When the hell are you actually tasting the ocean? Mm mm... Yummy ocean.
5. Remove the asparagus from the boiling water and throw them in a blender. Blend until completely puréed. Does it look totally puréed? Blend for 5 minutes more. Add a little broth if you need to loosen it up.
6. Reserve this purée.

For the Brussels sprouts:

1. Cut crosswise into 1/4 inch slices. I used a mandolin for more consistent slice sizes, but use a knife. Just don't cut yourself. 
2. Toss in a bowl with olive oil and salt. 
3. Spread on a baking pan lined with foil. 
4. Roast in the oven at 350 until they're just about burnt. Some will be burnt, that's okay. They'll taste awesome. Plan on ~45-60 minutes for this step. Just use your eyes and nose to tell when they're done. You want these bad boys crunchy. They're a topping after all. 

For the risotto:

1. Add 2-3 tbsp olive oil and 2-3 tbsp butter to a large and deep pan and heat over med-high heat. I use a Le Creuset. Use something that has deep enough sides that things won't splatter when you're stirring for 30 minutes. Also make sure it's wide enough that you can easily access everything. Also make sure you've got the arm strength/endurance to make this. Also, be drinking wine. 
2. When the oil/butter-heaven-mixture is just about smoking, add onion, shallot, and garlic. Stir. Do not stop stirring. You don't want it to burn. If it starts getting too smoky/burned, lower the heat to medium. I like med-high. I also like walking on the wild side.
3. Once the onion/shallot/garlic is soft and translucent, toss in the risotto.
4. Stir. We're looking to toast the risotto a little. But keep stirring so it doesn't burn.
5. Once it's toasted, hit it with about a 1/2 cup of broth. And 1 tbsp kosher salt. Yeah, it seems like a lot but you're seasoning a lot of risotto. If you're stingy with the salt this dish will taste like shit. You want your food to be like restaurant food? Salt more. Want to be a better person? Salt more. Want 1000 more followers instantly on Instagram? Sal-- never mind.

Roasted Radishes (aww...aren't they cute?)

Ingredients

• Radishes
  Yeah, radishes. What were you expecting based on the title?
• Olive Oil
  Doesn't have to be fancy.
• Kosher Salt
  always use kosher salt

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Recipe

1. Toss radishes in a bowl with olive oil and salt. Use more salt than you think you'll need. You should SEE salt crystals on the radishes.
2. Put on a foil-lined baking pan.
3. Roast at 350 until done. I don't know you or your oven so I can't guess at how your oven cooks. [I could, but I'm doing a bit.] 45 minutes is probably a reasonable estimate.
4. Eat.

The Negroni

A red Negroni on a white marble tabletop.

Ahhhh, the Negroni. I love this drink. It's so bitter and Italian [just like me].

It has equal parts gin, Campari, and sweet vermouth. No OJ, no bitters, and everything is in equal parts. But bartenders hose this up all the time. I have no idea how or why; the recipe is on the back of the friggen Campari bottle!

I've had bartenders make up stories about how this is a "riff on a Manhattan" [it's not] and that's why they just used gin, sweet vermouth, and bitters [I'm looking at you Purple Restaurant, Bellevue, WA].

Or that it's "just a gin martini with a splash of Campari" [ahem, Sheraton Hotel in Parsippany, NJ].

No other drink has its recipe printed on the bottle of its one irreplaceable ingredient!

Ingredients

C'mon, really? Did you miss the whole "equal parts" thing at the top of this post?

• 1 oz gin. Every time you use a craft gin in a Negroni a hipster's beard grows an inch. Craft gins are too flavorful and not dry enough for a Negroni. Plus they're way too expensive for mixed drinks. Gordon's, Beefeater, and Tanqueray are fine.

• 1 oz Campari. Don't use anything else except Campari. And don't you dare use Aperol. If any bartender tells you Aperol is a more approachable Campari punch him in the waistcoat. They are owned by the same company but are different. Campari is 24% abv, Aperol is 14%. Campari is bitter. Aperol tastes like watermelons.

• 1 oz Sweet Vermouth. Here's where you can be fancy. Carpano's Antica Formula is my favorite. I also like Punt e Mes but only use half as much because it's sweeter. Noilly Prat and Dolin are fantastic. Cinzano, Martini & Rossi, and the other shitty vermouths work perfectly fine too.

The Recipe

1. Put all ingredients in a glass with ice. Sure, you can use a fancy crystal mixing glass but you can also use a pint glass. Or any glass. Hell, you could use a plastic jug for all I care. The whole point here is to chill and ever-so-slightly water down the cocktail.

2. Stir for 30-60 seconds. (I don't need to explain how to do this.)

3. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. I use a julep strainer. You can use two forks. The goal is to separate ice from the liquid. Get creative.

4. Garnish with an orange twist. (Not a slice, a wheel, or wedge. And definitely not lemon. A twist can be as simple as taking a vegetable peeler or knife and peeling of a strip of orange peel, and then expressing the oils into the drink. If "expressing" is too fancy for you, then replace it with "squeezing". This is NOT just for decoration. The oils in the peel are flavorful and aromatic and complement the drink nicely.)

The Last Pesto Recipe You'll Ever Need

Last updated: February 18, 2026

Step up your game and try making pesto. Trust me. It's easy. If you can't throw 6 ingredients into a food processor and turn it on, you have much bigger issues than needing to find a pesto recipe.

Pesto means "sauce" in Latin. Or maybe it means "pounded" in Italian. I’ve heard it both ways.

The cool thing is this is a formula. You can use whatever greens, oil, nuts, garlic, and hard cheese you have on hand. Pretty cool, right? I know. You came here looking for a pesto recipe and I'm teaching you to fish. Don't make me explain that. Also, I’ll give you both the formula AND the recipe, so those of you with little kitchen experience and a lot of anxiety will be okay. Calm down, pop a Xanax, and let’s cook.

A note about ingredients: For greens, the default is basil, but I used spinach and Italian parsley recently and it was awesome. Try cilantro for a Mexican version. For oil, stick with extra virgin olive oil or any nut oil. Canola is flavored but I guess you could use it. For nuts, pine nuts are traditional but super pricey. I've used almonds and cashews together and alone. They're great. For cheese, stick with hard cheeses. True DOP Parmigiano-Reggiano is king, but try Pecorino Romano for a 🐐 twist. DO NOT buy Kraft “Parmesan.” It’s not real parmesan. For acid, use freshly squeezed lemon juice, white wine vinegar, champagne vinegar, etc.

Makes: 2 cups

Ingredients

If you prefer volumetric measurements instead of weight, use my dad’s recipe below.

GREENS | 450g
OIL | 300g
NUTS | 150g
CHEESE | 150g ACID | 30g e.g.,
GARLIC | 30g
SALT | (to taste)

Notice anything interesting about those numbers? Specifically how they relate to each other? They're all divisible by 30, which leaves us with a wonderfully clean ratio. That means you can easily scale this up or down. Translation, using just a wee bit of math, you can make a lot or a little pesto. And feel like Einstein in the process.

The Ratios:

GREENS | 15
OIL | 10
NUTS | 5
CHEESE | 5
ACID | 1
GARLIC | 1
SALT | (still to taste)

My Dad’s Recipe

8oz basil
8 garlic cloves
2 cups pine nuts
2 cups Parmigiano
1 1/3 cup olive oil

Directions

Okay, I don't meant to insult you, but this should be simple. It's two steps. Two. Steps.

Put everything except the oil into the food processor and blend or process. Add oil and blend some more.

[All other recipes say to slowly drizzle the olive oil in. Some sciencey shit about creating an emulsion. I used to do that. And then I stopped. Because I got lazy. And you know what? ZERO DIFFERENCE.] Bravo. You just made pesto. Toss it with some noodles, slather it on your steak. Eat spoonfuls of it while no one's looking [my fave].

Extra Credit

If you're so inclined, and I highly recommend that you get yourself inclined, I'd recommend blanching the greens and the garlic before blending/processing. Why? Because I said so, that's why. But If you need another reason besides blindly following the advice of someone you've never met [and hopefully never will], the other reason is that it will make your pesto stay a bright beautiful green instead of turning into that muddy-green-baby-poo-after-Indian-food color. Also, blanching the garlic tempers its bite, so you get garlic flavor without the burn.

To blanch:

1. Bring a pot of salted water to boil. It should taste like the ocean. [Salty.]

2. Toss garlic in.

3. Remove after about 5 minutes. I don't know exactly how long. It could be 4 minutes, or 8. Probably shouldn't be more than 10.

4. Toss greens in.

5. Remove once they turn bright green and lose their crunch. Around 5 seconds for basil. Around 20-30 seconds for parsley or cilantro. No, I'm not giving you the exact time to blanch. It depends on what greens you're using. Use your judgement. You're not a complete fool [despite what your spouse screams at you after she gets her Cosmo Confidence going].

6. Squeeze as much of the water out as you can. If you've never squeezed warm wet greens before, shit's about to get weird. It's uncomfortable, but just think of it as a sponge you're wringing out and are about to pulverize into a sauce.

Anthony LeDonne Weighs His Pesto Like A Drug Dealer

Strawberry Gin Smash

This is a strawberry gin smash. It has strawberry. It has gin. It has the ability to get people smashed in warm weather.The smash is large category of cocktail. More of a formula really. You need ice, a fruit or herb or, if you really want to go wild, then fruit AND herb, or fruits or herbs, something to sweeten it, and something to stiffen it. (We’re not just drinking this for our health now, are we? If you do want to drink this for your health, put the ingredients in a blender, add four handfuls of kale and, right before you blend it, kill yourself.)You don’t need to a skilled home bartender to make this. You don’t need to be skilled at anything, really. If you can follow directions and put four things into a glass, you’re in good shape.

Ingredients

Makes 1 drink

• 2 oz Gin

• 3/4 oz Lemon Juice

• 3/4 oz 1:1 simple syrup

• 4 strawberries3 big, 5 small, don’t get bent out of shape if it’s not 4)

• Good tonic water, or regular club soda, or shitty tonic water.Again, don’t worry if you don’t have “the good stuff”.

• Ice

Recipe

1. Put the strawberries into a glass. Any glass. Chances are the glass you’re thinking about in your cupboard, the one with the fading logo of your alma mater and a chipped rim, yeah, that’s okay too. If you want to be all Martha Stewart about this then you’re probably on the wrong site. Get a fucking glass, put the strawberries in it, and muddle them. Don’t have a muddler? Find something to smash them. That’s all muddling is. Smashing. Some might say “smooshing”, in which case I’d probably want to punch them in the mouth. But people are people. That’s why we’re drinking these in the first place. To enjoy the sun and forget about the fifth wheel who found out you were having a little get-together on the patio and is hitting on the only other unattached gal your wife invited.

2. Add the rest of the ingredients. (Yes, that includes ice. That’s why I listed ice as an ingredient.)

3. Stir.

4. Drink.