Anthony: Welcome to Art of the Drink. My name is Anthony Cappereli and we are back down in Loreto, Kentucky at the Maker’s Mark Distillery working with Natalie. How are you?
Natalie: I am great. How are you.
Anthony: Good. Natalie works here at Maker’s Mark and she has agreed to help us out in making a drink that I get a lot of request for. People are always writing and saying, “Anthony, how do you make a classic Manhattan?” My favorite Manhattan recipe uses Maker’s Mark so I figured that this is the best place in the world to make a classic Manhattan. We are in her beautiful new bar in her tasting room. This is what you do, right?
Natalie: This is what I do.
Anthony: Fantastic.
[Music Playing]
We are going to make a Maker’s Mark Manhattan and we are going to make it up. So that means that I am going to build it in a tin and I am going to set my martini glass first.
A big scoop of ice in the tin and two ounces of Maker’s Mark is going to get us started. And too, I am going to add a half ounce of sweet birth. And finally, two dashes of beers. I am going to shake this whole thing up so the tin frosts. I will get it nice and ice cold.
Alright. Now, A lot of people write all the time saying, “Anthony, I do not have all the bar tools that I see you use on a podCast, can I still make drinks the way that you do?” And I said, “Yes, absolutely.” And today, what we are actually going to do is that we are going to use—this is called a Boston shaker set. We are going to use it without the strainer because a lot of people do not have strainers. This is just a shaker tin and a pint glass. And what you do is, you just break the seal a little bit and pull the pipe glass just a little bit. This is most easily done with cube ice because I am going to actually use the shaker tins that strain the ice. And what I am going to do is just hold this right over the glass and rock it back and forth until I get all the liquid out of the tin and into the glass.
Alright, and then I am going to top this off—normally, I would use two cherries on a pick. But, Dave Pickerell, your master distiller showed me this trick. Actually, I am using a Maker’s Mark marinated cherry and I am going to go ahead and squeeze this right into the drink. And you can see, I get some nice cherry juice in there and release some of the oils and then I am going to drop back right in the drink. And, that is may classic Maker’s Mark Manhattan. Do you want to give it a try?
Natalie: Absolutely.
Anthony: Alright.
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So, we are here at Keeneland Racetrack for the Maker’s Mark mount and I ran into Mark Galesbi of Whiskey Cast Fame and I figured that I got to take a couple of minutes and sit down with him and talk about Whiskey Cast and how it got started.
Mark: Basically, I started Whiskey Cast in the Fall of 2005. Apparently, 39 weeks later, we are still doing it. There is a complete archive. All 139 episodes, there are interviews with some of the real industry veterans who had been distilling for 50 years or more.
Anthony: What do you look for in a whiskey?
Mark: What I want in a whiskey is a balance. I cannot judge a bourbon to a scotch because there is completely a different taste. So, it has to be consistent with what I would expect from the region.
Anthony: What is your favorite whiskey?
Mark: I have not found it yet.
Anthony: (Laughing) Great answer.
Mark: Part of the problem with being based in the US is that we do not get all of the whiskeys. So, because of that, I cannot say that I have a favorite because I am still looking.
Anthony: You are widely recognized as the number internet guru for all things, whiskey, scotch, bourbon and all kinds of stuff. So, congratulations on that.
Mark: One of the things that I have always tried to do is help other people join in my learning experience because I am still learning many things about this by talking to master distillers and the guys who had been around the profession a lot longer than I have. That is the whole idea behind the show which is to pick their brains so that the listeners can listen alon
