Refining Protocol

As a Southern in such Northern climes, I occasionally have gustatory cravings that are hard to satisfy.  Sweet tea, biscuits and gravy, barbecue, fried chicken.  Granted, a few restaurants here and there are satisfactory, but they are certainly few and far between (emphasis on "far").  Thereupon, I resolved to find a remedy in my own kitchen.  I have long made sweet tea at home, but the other items would prove more challenging.  Alas, barbecue requires an outdoor space wherein a smoker can be utilized for hours at a time, and I have no such space.  Thankfully, my friend Dan would rig up his charcoal grill as a smoker for barbecuing purposes every now and again to excellent effect.  Thus, as I was recently struck by a rather powerful yen for fried chicken, I decided to embark upon this new project.

Understand, Southern though I may be, I have never needed to fry chicken at home, nor did I have a grandmother who could teach me the secrets of frying chicken (albeit, I am indebted to my grandmother for other such culinary arcana).  On the other hand, it has become a family tradition of frying a turkey at least once a year for Thanksgiving, and often once over the Christmas holiday as well.  Therefore, frying fowl was nothing new to me, but I did want to try and refine my chicken frying methods as much as possible.

Having brined the family fried turkey on many occasions, I knew that brining was important in producing a succulent end product.  I read on a couple of occasions that the chicken should be brined for no more than 12 hours or else the meat would become too salty.  However, practically speaking, if I wanted fried chicken for dinner, then I would have to wake up at 4 am or so to start the brining.  Simply put, an incredible inconvenience.  On the other hand, other recipes have suggested using salted buttermilk to brine, and yet others describe a method of brining first in salted water, then transferring to buttermilk.  Additionally, the importance of having dry chicken to fry became apparent as all recipes either suggested air drying or patting dry with paper towels.  Having only so much space in my fridge and a desire for only so much chicken, I decided to pick 3 methods to test.

1) Brine for 20 hours, then air dry for 2 hours;
2) Brine for 12 hours, rest for 8 hours in buttermilk, then air dry for 2 hours;
3) Brine for 12 hours, pour over boiling water*, and then air dry for 10 hours;

[*The method of pouring boiling water over the chicken before air drying comes from the traditional method of making Peking duck whereby the whole duck is submerged in a pot of boiling water for a mere moment for a day of air drying.  The logic behind this treatment is that the boiling water will tighten the skin and quickly render some of the subcutaneous fat to allow for a crispier skin.]

Clockwise from right: (2), (1), (3)

For now, there are several variables that I decided to keep constant.  I used only chicken thighs with bone in and skin on.  The last 2 hours of air drying was done as room temperature to allow the cold chicken to warm up before frying.  The oil temperature was to be kept as close to 330˚F as possible, and the frying oil used was corn oil.  The frying was done in a cast iron dutch oven that contained oil about 2 inches deep.  I could fry 3 pieces at a time with my setup.  For my first experiment, the brine was closely mimicking the brine recipe from Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc at Home cookbook.

Frying chicken

The one that immediately stood out was condition (3), which was a bit drier than the other two.  Conditions (1) and (2) seemed to me to be equally moist.  However, condition (1) was certainly saltier and had taken on more of the flavors of the herbs and spices present in the brine.  There may have been a slight glimmer that (2) had a bit more of a buttermilk tang.  To me, though, the brine I used was almost too fragrant compared the the fried chicken to which I am accustomed.  I saved one piece of each to be eaten several hours later after the chicken had cooled down to room temperature.  My observations were largely the same.

The last variable before frying was how to dredge: 1) No dredging; 2) Buttermilk, then flour; 3) Flour, buttermilk, flour.

No dredging

Buttermilk, then flour

Flour, buttermilk, flour

The results of the three dredging treatments came out thus.  Visually, there was a quite noticeable difference in the three methods.  The first yielded crackling skin much like what I am used to on a fried turkey or a Peking duck; it was delicious when eaten immediately, but became more leathery as the chicken cooled.  The second method yielded an extremely thin and crispy coating that almost had a texture of very thin potato crisps, but it also did not stay this way by the next day.  The last method resulted in a noticeably thicker, audibly crunchy crust, which did stay crunchy through the next day.  Thus, I decided to stick with the latter method of coating the dried chicken in flour, then dipping in buttermilk before flouring again.

As a result, I decided to go with the method of brining first, then transferring to buttermilk with the double flour dredge.  A human trial of a second batch of chicken made with this preferred method was brought to a potluck where it was well-received.  Notably, I did not try the salted buttermilk method, and there is certainly room for more tinkering.

The Aftermath

My recipe follows below:

L'Entente Cordiale

A few weeks month* ago happened to be not only Bastille Day, but also the First Night of the Proms two days in a row.  Thus, in order to celebrate the occasion, I threw a little bash with a Franco-Anglo theme.

Invitation

 I must thank Felicia immensely for her wonderful artwork and the effort she put into designing both the invitation seen above and the menu seen below.  For the invitation, I had simply asked for something along the lines of Alphonse Mucha's recognizable art nouveau style.  Since Mucha invariably had female figures in his posters, I suggested Britannia and Marianne as symbolic figures.

Menu front

Menu back

As is obvious on the menu, half the drinks were inspired by the Union Jack and the other half by the Tricolore.  There are number of classic cocktails on the menu, including the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club, Lion's Tail, English Rose, Blue Train Special, Absinthe Frappé, Boulevardier, Vermouth Cassis and the French 75.  In addition, I included a couple drinks from the local bar scene: the Parisian Orchid from Green Street and the Thames River (which I misremembered as the River Thames when writing my menu) from Fred at cocktail virgin slut.  Lastly a couple drinks are variations of my own.

The cucumber gimlet is an idea that I've seen floating all over the place, but I think my method is slightly unique.  To be more correct in my nomenclature, the drink is rather a sweetened rickey rather than a gimlet.  At the time I wrote the menu, my intention was to use cucumber juice to make a syrup to sweeten the fresh lime juice in a gimlet rather than using Rose's lime cordial.  However, I drifted away from this idea in favor of making a cucumber-infused soda because I wanted more subtlety.  The soda was made by first shredding a whole cucumber and letting it steep for 4 hours in 1 L of water.  Then, I transferred this cucumber flavored water into my iSi soda siphon along with 4 thin wedges of cucumber, seed removed.  I proceeded to carbonate, borrowing a trick seen at Clio and Drink of flash infusing the liquid inside.  The resultant soda had a noticeable cucumber taste, but one that was more subtle and fragrant.  This flavor was not lost when used in the rickey, and provided a refreshing, herbaceous background that flitted in between the gin and lime.

The second original drink on the menu is the Stone of Scone, named after the legendary Scottish stone upon which the monarchs of Britain are crowned.  As should be obvious from the name, the drink uses scotch as a base.  I was thinking about the use of tea in a number of punches and cocktails, and while the tea is usually brewed separately as an ingredient or turned into a syrup, I wanted to use tea without the dilution.  Thus, I decided to infuse the scotch with tea, using Earl Grey in particular because I wanted the rich citrus fragrance of bergamot in addition to the tannic tea.  For the infusion, I used 4 Earl Grey teabags in 2 cups of scotch and allowed it to infuse for 2 hours.

To balance the tannins and the scotch, I added lemon juice to the mix.  During this thought process, I also saw a guest post in cocktail virgin slut about damson gin.  I rather like the idea of damson gin and was about to start from scratch to make a cocktail featuring it instead of scotch, but I was sadly unable to procure a bottle in time, so I found the next best thing to be Japanese plum wine.  As the plum wine is quite sweet already, only a dash more grenadine was needed to round it out.  I also used a dash each of Angostura and orange bitters.  Lastly, the Famous Grouse I used for the infusion was not smoky enough for my tastes, so I decided to rinse the glass with a bit of Bowmore, the only Islay I had on hand.

Stone of Scone
2 oz Earl Grey-infused scotch
3/4 oz plum wine
1/2 oz lemon juice
Dash grenadine
Dash Angostura bitters
Dash orange bitters
Shake and strain into a glass rinsed with an Islay scotch. Lemon twist.

Stone of Scone

 As for the name, there's an extra bit of wordplay.  The stone is so named because it was kept at Scone Abbey in the village of Scone near Perth.  However, the word scone is also often associated with afternoon tea.  Pronounced differently despite the identical spelling, perhaps, but I thought the idea of Earl Grey and plums also hearkened of afternoon tea.  The next step would be to somehow incorporate some clotted cream..

Overcoming sickness

As some of you may know, I was stricken down with some nonsense midsummer's illness for a couple weeks in June that really put me out of commission.  After my initial fever subsided, I was still struggling with a particularly bad sore throat and persistent coughing, which still bugs me a little even now.  Since benzonatate, codeine, pseudoephedrine and guaifenesin failed to really help, I turned to home remedies: salt water gargles, hot tea and Chinese loquat syrup.  Oh right, and a touch of bourbon.

For instance, adding a touch of bourbon to Korean yujacha (citron tea) was quite soothing for my sore throat.  However, as my cough became the biggest issue, I decided to ratchet up the intensity a bit.  First, I made a Frisco Sour, but I quickly realized that my taste buds were shot, making the Benedictine taste quite bizarre.

Frisco Sour

2 oz rye

1 oz Benedictine

3/4 oz lemon juice

Next, I decided to just focus on therapy, combining bourbon, lemon juice and honey to get what I euphemistically called my cough medicine for a few days.  You'll note in the picture below that its not too dissimilar in appearance to the Frisco Sour above.  Having tasted it again after having recovered, its actually quite overpowering.  Note that I didn't dilute the honey at all.  However, when sick, it didn't taste too bad and actually let me sleep for a bit before it wore off and the coughing started again.

Cough Medicine

2 oz bourbon

2 oz 1:1 syrup of lemon juice and honey

Happily, despite my lingering cough, I can sleep fully and taste properly again.  Moreover, for me, this impromptu cough medicine worked better than the prescription codeine, so I might as well save it in my back pocket for future ailments.

Patience rewarded

Sometimes patience is required in more abundance than I typically possess.  Waiting is not my forte, especially not when waiting for something delicious.  However, stashing things in the back of the linen closet, out of sight and out of mind, does help the process along significantly.  Along with curing meats, infusing liquor is one of a class of projects that demands willpower.  In this particular case, I speak of my limoncello project.

Back in March, when Meyer lemons were approaching the end of their season, I could not resist buying a few (read, a dozen).  While I could not help myself to some immediately, I did save the majority for making limoncello.  The first challenge was deciding how to make the limoncello, as there are many methods described.  One major division is the decision to use peel only or use the whole fruit.  As my understanding of limoncello is that it should be neither bitter nor sour, I opted to use just the peels.  The next question is whether to infuse with zest or with strips of peel.  In this, practicality had a lot to do with my decision.  As my zester is not particularly good, whereas my knife is quite sharp, I opted for the latter.  Additionally, pictures I have seen seem to indicate that zest yields an opaque product whereas strips produces a transparent liqueur, and I slightly favor the clearer result.

Thus, several months ago, I began the arduous task of peeling the lemons and then filleting the peels to remove as much of the pith as possible. After several hours hunched over the cutting board, I had the peels of 8 Meyer lemons in the jar, and I proceeded to cover them with 100 proof vodka that I had lugged over from New Hampshire.  For the first few days, I would swirl the jar daily, but then I stashed it in the back of my linen closet to make it easier to age without tempting my impatience.  After a couple months, I then made approximately 400mL of 1:1 simple syrup and added it to the jar, giving it another swirl and hiding it away again.

 

Limoncello after 3.5 months of infusion

Sadly, I forgot to take a time initial picture, but the above is a picture of the jar right before I bottled, about 3.5 months after the infusion began.  Part of the reason why I infused for so long was because I simply forgot it for awhile; putting it in the back of the linen closet really did work.  One thing that is not immediately apparent from the picture is that the color of the peels had really leached, leaving the peels a very light, whitish yellow and the liqueur a goldenrod, if not amber color.  After straining out the peels by pouring it through a handkerchief and strainer, I bottled the concoction and placed it in the freezer.

 

Limoncello, bottled and chilled

For a first attempt, its actually pretty tasty.  There is a lot of lemon fragrance, not just lemon oil, but also some floral aspects to it as well.  Additionally, since it is made with Meyer lemons, it does not seem as bright as regular limoncello, but with more honeyed sweetness instead.  A certain herbal quality is also present, thyme perhaps.  One detractor though is the presence of an alcohol burn that is rather unpleasant and probably caused by the high proof vodka I started with, although I didn't try the vodka on its own before using it.  Alas, I am not sure whether a bit of dilution would help or whether the vodka taste is irremovable.  Perhaps next time I make a batch, I will try with a cleaner tasting vodka.  Burn aside, the taste is quite pleasant and leaves a sunniness on the tongue for some time after swallowing.  Perfect for a nip after a long summer day.

Derby Day

Ahh, the summer social season begins.

Last year's Derby Day happened to coincide with the BGSO formal, and consequently, I was not able to celebrate appropriately.  I didn't even have the chance to watch Super Saver and Calvin Borel take the trophy after slogging through all that mud.  However, for this year's 137th running of the Kentucky Derby, I was fortunate to have a pretty decent turnout in the evening after Animal Kingdom stole the show.

After flying back to Boston that afternoon from a quick trip to see my parents and grandmother, I rushed to set up and have everything arranged in time for the party.  Thankfully, a friend picked me up from the airport, and bottles of bourbon had already been scheduled to be delivered.  After printing menus, picking up supplies at the grocery and arranging the bouquet of roses (red, of course), the stage was set.

Not wanting to cut corners, I began the evening by making each mint julep "à la minute", a mistake given the volume I later faced.  Its certainly quite the dilemma for next year: traditionalism or convenience.  Fortunately, the other drinks on the short menu, the Seelbach, the Jockey Club, Tom Collins and the Aqueduct, were more straightforward, relatively.

One quite pleasant surprise was how fashionably dressed everyone was: ladies in lovely hats and gentlemen sporting blazers.  While I was the only one in white linen yet again, this year's result at least lets me think that there's hope yet for these yanks.  Everyone even indulged me as we collectively serenaded the neighborhood with a rousing rendition of "My Old Kentucky Home".

Last, allow me a quick mention of a drink I was tinkering around with throughout the evening as inspired by the Derby.  The week prior, I had been playing around with rhubarb, and after making a lovely compote, a spiced rhubarb 'vermouth' struck my fancy as a good use for the remaining stalks.  Not a true vermouth perhaps, but a delicious concoction nonetheless, made by simmering rhubarb and spices in chardonnay, straining out the solids to further steep in gin and combining the syrup and infusion with a touch of orange liqueur.  Reminded of the classic strawberry rhubarb pie, as well as my previous success combining rhubarb and rose, I came up with something very similar to a drink Bob McCoy at ICOB had made.

Run for the Roses
1.5oz gin
0.75oz rhubarb 'vermouth'
0.5oz lemon juice
1 large strawberry muddled
Dash of rose water
Dash of orange bitters
Shake, strain, top with a bit of champagne and garnish with a slice of strawberry

A light and refreshing drink that went over well with the few ladies that tried it, and something that would certainly be altogether too easy to drink on the porch on a hot summer's day.

A little experiment

There has been so much buzz of late surrounding the idea of pairing food with cocktails, and by "of late," I mean the last few years.  The wonderful cocktail dinner held at Lineage several months back that featured Berkshire Mountain Distillers' spirits was really quite sublime.  I was amazed at how well each drink paired with each course, especially given that the talented bunch of bartenders (Joy Richards, Bob McCoy, Kevin Martin, Jackson Cannon and Ryan Lotz) had never tasted the course before crafting the drink with which to pair it.  While I cannot even approach their level of expertise or skill, I wanted to proverbially get my feet wet with the idea of pairing cocktails with food.

As a starting point, I came to the conclusion that it would be easiest to pair cocktails to cheeses.  Admittedly, this is partly because of my laziness in not wanting to prepare hors d'oeuvres as well as mix drinks.  However, my, I think good, rationalization was that I could pick three cheeses, each with a distinct flavor profile and with a somewhat canonical set of pairings with wine.  Using that foundation, I picked some cocktails that I thought fit along the lines of what has already been done in terms of wine pairings, but to offer these flavors in a new way.

That said, I invited a small group of friends over for this little experiment:

 

The menu

Each category had two cheeses (except for the cured duck breast) with one cocktail paired and one wine paired.  The wine pairings are perhaps boringly standard, but I wanted to serve the wine alongside as something of a baseline.  As for the cocktails, the Thorough General is one that I've made before, but the other two were newly developed for this concept.

I wanted to play the sweetness of the Thorough General, and its touch of floral and citrus, with the saltiness and pungency of the Fourme d'Ambert and the duck breast.  I thought it was good, though not revelatory.  Perhaps an idea that should not be dropped altogether, but may work with a bit of tinkering.

The Fifteen cocktail is actually what really got me motivated in the cocktail-cheese pairing, as the quince preserves therein really struck me as reminiscent of the classic combination of manchego and dulce de membrillo.  Indeed, this cocktail really complemented the manchego wonderfully.  On the other hand, the play with Nancy's Camembert was not unpalatable, but certainly less successful.  As for the name, it is a little play on words; the Spanish word for "fifteen" being "quince".  Incidentally, amaro Ramazzotti was also first produced in 1815.

Fifteen

2 oz brandy

0.5 oz lemon juice

0.5 oz Ramazotti

0.5 Tbs. quince preserves

Dash Angostura bitters

Lemon twist

The last set was pairing a fresh chevre and a goat triple cream from Coach Farm to a cocktail I've dubbed the Daitoku-ji, so named in honor of the Daitoku-ji temple in Kyoto, Japan, known for its zen gardens and for its connection to Sen no Rikyū, one of the most influential Japanese masters of tea.  I truly love the toasted thyme and have to thank Shingo at Angel's Share again and again for his inspiration.  In fact, his fingerprints can be seen throughout this cocktail.  I thought it matched the chevre better than the triple cream, for which it lacked the acidity and sparkle to stand up to the richness of the triple cream on the palate.  The gustatory commerce between the Daitoku-ji cocktail and the chevre, though, got better as the drink evolved, the thyme donating a heavier presence over time.

Daitoku-ji

2 oz shiso-infused gin

0.75 oz grapefruit juice

0.5 oz Longjing green tea syrup

Dash Boston Bittahs

Toasted thyme

 Finishing a round of cocktails

While I think the concept of pairing cocktails with cheese, and food in general, has many more miles in the tank, I certainly think it could use some refinement on my end.  Nothing was stridently conflicting, but aside from the Fifteen with manchego, nothing seemed sublime either.  Of course, the best part of the evening was the thoroughly delightful company, which could have sweetened even the bitterest of pills.

Turn of the Century

Grocery shopping over the weekend turned up two ingredients that combined fruitfully in this riff off a classic cocktail.  First, I bought some fresh thyme because I needed some for the dinner I was making and had some left over.  Second, there was a gorgeous assemblage of Meyer lemons, and since they are in season, I couldn't resist getting several.  As I was looking through various recipes to decide what to do with my lemons, I saw a recipe for Meyer lemon and thyme truffles.  While the bulk of my lemons may get turned into preserve or limoncello, I decided to juice one for a cocktail, instant gratification and all, to try out what seemed to be a rather fortuitous combination.  As a starting point, I remembered the 20th Century cocktail in Ted Haigh's Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, which calls for:

1.5 oz gin
0.75 oz Lillet Blanc
0.75 oz lemon
0.5 oz crème de cacao
Shaken, lemon twist.

I then remembered a brilliant thing that Shingo at Angel's Share does with thyme in his Tennessee Waltz cocktail.  He brulées the thyme with a kitchen torch to use as a garnish.  However, its not a mere garnish, as the heady aroma of roasted thyme accompanies each sip.  Thus, I combined the two ideas in this remix.

1.5 oz gin
0.5 oz Cocchi Americano
0.5 oz Meyer lemon juice (generous)
0.5 oz crème de cacao (scant)
Dash orange bitters
Meyer lemon peel
Shaken, roasted thyme.

I wanted to capture the idea of the Meyer lemon and thyme truffle that had served as the inspiration.  The nose was heavy with the scent of roasted thyme with a touch of lemon oil.  The cocktail itself certainly was on the confectionery end with a brief initial impression of gin and lemon quickly giving way to the sweetness of the crème de cacao.  However, the lemon's acidity certainly lingered on the palate after the notion of bonbons subsided.  The Meyer lemon did make the cocktail less sharp than I remember the original made with lemon being.  Also, despite being merely the garnish, I could swear that a tint of roasted thyme appeared somewhere in the swallow.  All in all, a pretty delicious nightcap.  Perhaps a dish of fish with thyme, lemon and cocoa is in the not too distant future?

Infused Rickey

After infusion both vodka and gin with shiso leaf for a couple days, I was excited to see how they tasted.  Perhaps I let the infusion go for too long, as both were quite potent.  To balance the shiso out, I turned to a recipe that Shingo Gokan of Angel's Share gave me for inspiration.  He calls for the shiso infusion plus kabosu juice and tonic water.  Unfortunately, the only tonic water I had was flat, and I'm not even sure where to begin looking for kabosu, a Japanese citrus fruit rarely found outside of Japan.  Instead, I basically made a rickey with my shiso-infused gin.

1 oz shiso-infused gin
0.25 oz lime juice
Topped with soda
Stirred and served over large cubes.

A rickey is always refreshing, but the infusion lent an extra dimension, an herbal quality.  I love the shiso, and it is certainly quite distinct from your average rickey. However, the shiso flavor was quite strong, so perhaps lengthening the infusion with an equal part of plain gin would make the shiso appear more subtly.  While this rickey was certainly a simplistic application for now, I certainly am looking forward to playing with this infusion in the future.

Deulkkae

I love the taste of shiso.

It is magnificently clean and fresh with hints of mint, anise and pepper.  However, fresh shiso is nearly impossible to find in Boston.  At least, so I thought.  My friend pointed it out to me in the hole-in-the-wall Korean market across the street from Blanchard's in Allston, and I was absolutely ecstatic.  My understanding upon internet research is that Japanese and Korean varietals of perilla/shiso differ slightly in flavor, and I do get a bit of that sense after nibbling on a bit.  Nevertheless, I find it similar enough to call it a successful find.  I've been hooked on shiso ever since stumbling across shiso with sushi, and all the cocktail forms of shiso I've had, particularly at Angel's Share in New York, have been fantastic.

While the bulk of my shiso bunch from the Korean mart went into infusions, one vodka and one gin (the results of which will have to wait for another day), I just couldn't help myself with a bit of instant gratification.  Saving a lone shiso leaf, a fairly large one at that, I decided that something simple and straightforward would be best.

Shiso julep
1.5 oz Four Roses bourbon
Dash of agave nectar*
1 Shiso leaf
Muddled. Crushed ice.

*I didn't have any simple syrup on hand..

Ahh, refreshing.  Shiso works well as a mint substitute, but definitely brings its own identity to the mix.  Despite being somewhat of a purist (I would never make a shiso julep on Derby Day), I really enjoyed this variation.  Probably another shiso leaf would have been ideal, but the lonely leaf employed was sufficient for a nice redolence of shiso.  Another idea that just struck me was the possibility of pairing shiso with applejack, given the slight green apple dimension that shiso can take on.  As with the previous pair of rosewater cocktails, this one was decidedly summery as well.  Alas, the mind cannot but dream.

A rose by any other name

After allowing myself to sleep in yesterday afternoon, I had what I thought was a brilliant idea for a cocktail shortly after waking up.  Discarding the unbearable thought of letting such an inspiration slip away, I headed straight to the kitchen to experiment.  In hindsight, some breakfast (lunch?) would have been a more prudent move.

The Thorough General
2 oz Plymouth gin
0.5 oz lime juice
0.25 oz Cocchi Americano
1 heaping tsp. yujacha*
Dash of orange bitters
Dash of rosewater

(*Korean preserved yuzu. Marmalade could be a decent substitution.)

Spurred on by this tasty experiment, I had the idea of pairing the rosewater with rhubarb.  Then remembering the rhubarb vermouth that Bob McCoy at ICOB had recently let me try, I headed over to see if Bob could make anything of the rhubarb-rose pairing.  When I put him up to the challenge, he came up with:

1.5 oz gin
0.75 oz rhubarb vermouth
0.5 oz lemon juice
0.5 oz St. Germain
Dash orange bitters
Dash rosewater

It really did taste a whole lot like late spring, early summer.  The floral notes from the St. Germain and the rosewater combined well with the rhubarb in the vermouth.  Sweet, but refreshing.  Could be dangerously approaching the territory of cloying, but doesn't quite cross the line for me.  Though for drier palates, it may be too much.

All in all, I really like the pairing of gin, citrus and rose, perhaps all the more now because of the glimpse of spring that can be felt just beyond the horizon.  I definitely think that some iteration of a cocktail featuring the rosewater will make it onto some future menu in the coming warm-weather months.  Moreover, I'd be interested to try more cocktails with the rosewater; perhaps a rickey or collins of sorts.  I like the idea of effervescence with rose.  Ah, a rosé sparkler would be all too apropos.