1891 Cocktail Botthby's American Bar-Tender

VALUABLE SUGGESTIONS.

When helping a CUBtomer to a tJtillwine of any dewription, fJet"ff''Dfftk, a liqueur or any plain drink with which you do not 'Wish to serve ice, a very nice and tasty way to cool the beverage is to hold a piece of ice over the serving glass with a pair of ice tongs, and pour the dr.ink over it. For the benefit of the novice, I will state that a jigger (which is ordered used in many of my recipes) is a little silver measure shaped like and having the same capacity as a sherry glass. It is supposed to hold an average drink of any liquor, and I would advise any inexperienced person to use either a jigger or a sherry glass until they accustom themselves to meuuring correctly by practice with the eye. Always use thin gla11811JMe if you wish to have your drinks appreciated; for there is an old adn:;e known to all club-men and lovers of good things that "A dr.ink of beer tastes as good out of a thin glaBB as champagne does out of a cup." In drawing a corlc .from ll bottk of any ejferuescenJ, liquid, always hold the bottle in an oblique position, as near horizontal as poBBible, without getting the mouth of the bottle below the surface line of the contents. Hold the bottle in this position for a few moments before standing it up, and no waste can pos– sibly occur. The principle of this little trick is that the bubbles formed by the sudden contact of the heavy oxygen with the lighter gas contained in the bottle rise perpendicularly ; therefore, when the bottle is held in a vertical positi.:~n, the first-formed globules of air containing quantities of the valuable liquid are forced through the neck of the bottle by the succCI!Sivc formation of others, causing loss, damage and inconvenience; but, when the bottle is held obliquely, the bubbles, still true to the same law of nature, continue the same upward course; but, instead of escaping through the opening, they are arrested by the slope of the bottle, and the gas which must necessarily escape through the only vent to relieve this pre&!ure is not in the form of bubbles; therefore the desideratum is acquired. The proper way of opening a bottle of effervescent wine is to carefully re– move the capsule covering the cork, break with a twist of a wine opener, or cut with a pair of wire nippers, the wire which holds the cork, wipe the neck of the bottle and the cork with a napkin 80 that no dirt can drop into the glll88 which you are about to serve the wine in, and keep the thumb of the left hand firmly over the cork during these preparations so that no accident can possibly hap– pen; then firmly grasp the bottom of the bottle with the right hand, and hold the cork fast between the thumb and forefinger of the left hand, twist the bottle a few times backward and forward 80 as to loosen the cork, and then allow the pressure of the gas within to do the rest, taking pains to not let it do too much, and never allow any noise to be heard as the cork leaves the bottle. By hold· ing the bottle in the position spoken of in the preceding suggestion, no danger · of an overflow need be feared. In opening cha1npagne the preceding hint is invaluable, although a cork– screw is never used for this purpose.