Wednesday, July 22, 2015

La Mûre Printemps

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La Mûre Printemps. Oil on panel, 12" x 12".

While talking with Ruins bartender Crystal Bertholic one night about some recipes for the upcoming book, I received a recommendation for another talented bartender: Suzie Bertholic, Crystal's sister. Teya and I immediately headed down to find her at Boots. Suzie stood alone behind the bar, inventing drinks on demand for adventurous customers. Though busy, she did not hesitate when I made my request. She left for a few minutes, then returned with her personal notebook of cocktail inventions and a handful of old-school recipe cards. She proceeded to hand-write two recipes for me on the cards.

One of the drinks involved a hard-to-find liqueur that I have not yet found. La Mûre Printemps, however, made clever use of easily-accessible ingredients like vanilla soda, mint leaves, lemon juice and fresh blackberries (six per drink!). The following Wednesday, I made the cocktail for my notoriously not-into-sweet-stuff cocktail crew, who eyed the drinks suspiciously as I passed them around. Shockingly, La Mûre Printemps was in instant hit! The tartness of the lemon and blackberries balances the sweet ingredients perfectly to make a refreshing drink that really does taste like spring.

About the painting:

I think my obsessive Etsy vintage glass hoarding paid off here. The base of the purple collins glass took on the color of blackberries with the addition of the surprisingly red liquid. Special thanks to my mom for passing on her old William Morris fabric-pattern calendar. I think this page (oddly, the image for December) captured the essence of spring.

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