French 75

Regular readers might know that we met in French class, so it was great that Pam a creative way for us to celebrate when National Cognac Day and National Bubbly Day fell on the same day. It was a day off four us, as well, making it all the easier to celebrate the occasion responsibly.

As with many National Day celebrations, there is often a good chance of us finding requisite items in our larder, but we were out of both cognac and sparkling wine this Saturday. What do do?

We wandered the aisles of a local liquor store where we find an ever-changing selection of our favorite wines -- Malbecs of Mendoza. It has quite a selection of spirits as well, but we passed many kinds of "brandy" before finding just a couple of cognacs. And even though Courvoisier VSOP is not as expensive as some items in the store, we did have to ask a manager to unlock the glass case it was in.

Image: Kazzit

Next, we drove to our favorite vineyard, which we needed to visit anyway because our latest wine club selection was available. While there, we picked up a chilled bottle of Brut -- not French grapes, but French-inspired processing.

We returned to our weekend Whaling House ready to prepare a mid-day cocktail that librarian had found just in time to save the day! French 75 is a very simple, elegant cocktail that is well regarded from New York to Paris but is named for a restaurant in the French Quarter of New Orleans.

Verdict: this was quite simple, delicious, and a good thing to enjoy after we were done with our automobile for the day!

Lagniappe

Whenever I think of cognac, I think of two stories from the past. One is that in my previous job (in which adult beverages could be purchased with a work-related meal), one of our VPs always ordered a glass of Courvoisier. It was from him that I got the idea it was fancy.

The other is that on the former Brazilian airline Varig, cognac was always offered as part of the ordinary beverage service, for no extra charge. I only ever saw one passenger abuse this -- he went from drunk to drunker in a short flight. For the rest of us, it was just a nice extra touch. It may or may not be a coincidence that this airline eventually went bankrupt.