So it’s finally my offseason and I’m about to get a bit of time off. I’m working on a few things.

First off, as I mentioned here before, getting my fake lemon and fake lime juice bottled for bars that want to use it. I’ve been calling them Flemon and Flime for a long time as part of a joke, but I think I might just actually call them that. I’m notoriously bad at naming things though.

My ginger beer is my most popular item, and people are always asking where they can get it. I’ve literally not done a single event where someone didn’t. I’ve had someone tell me it’s the best ginger beer “and I love ginger beer,” they always say, pretty much every time. That’s the sort of sign you can’t ignore I suppose.

Turning that into a product you can get on a shelf is surprisingly difficult! I’m still figuring it out. There are all sorts of department of agriculture regulations, particularly where fresh juice is involved, that I’m still navigating. Thankfully Flemon and Flime don’t have those problems.

I’m also working (slowly, but I’m doing it!) on a book for batched cocktails. I hope to share some techniques, recipes, and equipment recommendations. I am trying to re-think, to some extent, how such books work though, because there are quite simply some things that are just better off as video, while some are better as text and images. I’m quite limited by the fact that I’m not a skilled video producer (or really even an unskilled one) and don’t have any equipment better than a GoPro. I suspect this book will sell 1,000 copies if I’m lucky, since the batched cocktail industry is nascent, so I can’t really afford a professional.

I’ll figure it out. Maybe just do the classic book technique of words and pictures, and then toss in a link to the video version.

I’ve also been playing around a lot with gum Arabic and emulsifying in flavoring oils in beverages. And doing alcohol-based extracts of various herbs. I like the idea of being able to mix one flavor at a time. Bitters are nice, but they’re all like 40 different flavors, and sometimes you just want some grapefruit peel.

I’ve been playing around more with savory cocktails as well. It’s a woefully un-explored area I feel like. You’ve got bloody maries, martinis. That’s about the extent of it. Why aren’t people doing more drinks without sugar in them? I hope to have more thoughts on that in the not-too-distant future as well, though with everything else going on it’ll probably be low priority stuff I just fool around with for home use. Whenever I do an event I have dozens of girls ask me “what’s, like, the sweetest fruitiest thing you have?” so savory cocktails are probably not high on the list of crowd pleasers.

Anyway, that’s what I’ve been up to.