Cocktail Hour: When Dreams Come True

"The cocktail symbolizes a well-being of the spirit, so dream all those dreams that are nearest to your heart. They can come true and at no other hour will their fulfillment seem so near. For this is the Cocktail Hour."

The above quote was featured in this book a friend of my mom's gave her once (I think as a joke?) called How to be Idle. There is a whole chapter on the cocktail hour which is introduced by this quote. Though I find it very cheesy, I also like it. It reminds me of this warm October night in Austin back in 2008 when my friend M. and I went to this great little bar called the Red Room to celebrate his 25th birthday. Amid stories about how his kitchen sink was broken and instead of just getting his landlord to come fix it he'd decided to do all his dishes in the bathtub, we started discussing his tangled love life which included his complicated feelings for his current girlfriend E., and his still everlasting love for our mutual friend H. Pointing to his drink M. said: "This stuff makes dreams come true." What dream of his alcohol made come true in whatever story he was telling now escapes me, but I still smile when I think about the rest of it. And some day I want to write a short story where one of the characters does their dishes in the bathtub :)

In high school I was not much of a drinker. In fact, I didn't get drunk for the first time until I was 19 and living in the dorms in Berkeley. But I still occasionally would have a drink at a party. At some high school party (I don't remember the who or where or when) someone introduced me to white russians (vodka, kahlua, milk) and even though I don't like milk plain I really liked it in that drink. I probably only had white russians a maximum of five times during high school, and then I can't remember ever having one after that. But I must have liked it and the taste must have stuck with me because last winter I was at Thompson House (this bar/restaurant in an old house on the McGill campus that grad/law/medical students can go to) with my friend K. and a few other people from the law school on a Friday afternoon. K. ordered cider (her favourite) and I think the others did too, and out of nowhere I found myself ordering a white russian. It tasted even better than I remembered and a few months later I had another one there. I haven't had one in a while but despite the drink being cold, I think it's well-suited to winter. I'll have to go for one soon.

In May 2006 L. and I had a joint graduation party at this Italian restaurant on College Avenue in Berkeley. Unfortunately, the restaurant had another big party coming in after us so we only had the upstairs area for two hours and then we had to go. Everyone was having so much fun that no one wanted to go home and instead we proceeded - en masse - to this bar called The Graduate a few blocks down College and across the invisible line that separates Berkeley from Oakland. There, S. and I had a conversation about what drink to order in bars. Despite my never having tasted one before that night, after S. recommended vodka tonics as a good drink to order when in doubt I wholeheartedly embraced her recommendation. For approximately the next seven months, every time I was at a bar, I'd order a vodka tonic, despite the fact that I didn't really like the taste. Are vodka sodas and vodka tonics the same? I'm not sure but I know whenever I ordered one it usually just felt like I was drinking Sprite and though I liked it as a kid, I don't really like the taste now. I'm not sure why S. and I didn't just order beers at a bar, especially S. who really likes beer. Maybe we thought ordering beer at a bar was boring? Or not sophisticated enough? That if you were going to go to a bar you may as well order something more interesting than beer? I don't know. I guess at that point in our lives neither of us had much bar going experience (not that I'm a huge expert now but definitely way more than then). Instead I had gone through most of Berkeley attending co-op parties where I did tequila and/or vodka shots before getting to the party, and then waiting in long lines for the keg (or if I knew the person serving cutting to the front). In any event, those seven months ended with me in Paris where I discovered kirs and have never looked back. I'm glad I've stopped ordering vodka tonics, no longer worry about what to order when out for drinks, and now just stick to beer or wine or kirs (or the very occasional white russian).

So I've mentioned kirs in passing on a few other blog posts (cafe culture, berries) but I've never gone into depth on them or why I love them so much. I love Paris/France/the French for so many reasons, one of which is their aperatif culture that I don't think we have here. I love how when you go to a restaurant or go to someone's house for dinner you always always get offered an aperatif before the meal. Sometimes people have hard liquor (whiskey, etc.) and sometimes just a glass of a different type of wine than they will be having with dinner. For me, my aperatif is and always will be a kir (or sometimes a kir royale - the same thing except substitute the white wine for champagne). Making a good kir is very simple. You need two things: 1. a bottle of white wine (the two best types for kirs are Sauvignon Blanc and Muscadet) and 2. a bottle of Creme de Cassis (see picture below), which is black current liqueur. I put in the Creme de Cassis first, and usually fill about a quarter of the glass. Then I put in the white wine. There is one very charming cafe in Paris near La Madeleine that I would go to semi-regularly and they always ask you there which flavour kir you want out of Creme de Cassis, or Creme de raspberry, peach or blackberry. I usually stuck with cassis, but I did try their blackberry and raspberry ones a few times and both were delicious. I can't actually remember which cafe I was in when I had my first kir, but it was love at first taste. It was a very exciting day for me, about a month after I had started having kirs, when I discovered that I could buy a bottle of Creme de Cassis and a bottle of Muscadet (the Muscadet sold for under 3 euros usually) at the grocery store down the street from my apt and make my own kirs every single night. Of course, there is something very pleasant about having a kir in a cafe. But going to cafes every single day sometimes isn't feasible or economical and it's nice to be able to have one at home too. When I lived in Paris I had kirs at least 4 times a week. It's much rarer for me to have them now, but that's okay. I know they are out there and how to make one if I ever really desire one. I love kirs for their taste, for their pretty colour, for how they're always going to be delicious and are available at absolutely any cafe in Paris (and probably in France), how they're enjoyable to drink alone or with friends, because they will always remind me of and symbolize Paris for me, and because they are the perfect drink to order in Paris, no matter where in that city you are.