Today is the birthday of Henry C. Ramos (August 8, 1846-September 18, 1928). Ramos was born in Indiana, but moved to New Orleans when he was 41, in 1887. There, he bought and ran several prominent bars and invented the Ramos Gin Fizz, which is named for him.
Here’s a biography of Ramos from his Find-a-Grave page:
Henry RAMOS should be listed here as “famous.” Ramos came to New Orleans in 1887 and took over the Imperial Cabinet Saloon at Gravier and Carondelet downtown. In 1907 he purchased the Stag Saloon, near Gravier and St Charles. In the city that literally invented the first American cocktails, Ramos moved things forward with his invention of the Ramos Gin Fizz. Frothy, citrusy, smooth-as-silk. Demand for it was so high he employed 35 “shaker boys” during Mardi Gras 1915. Prohibition shut him down, but the cocktail reemerged after his death in the Roosevelt Hotel in New Orleans in the 1930s. The drink is still served at places in New Orleans like the Bar UnCommon, the French 75 Bar at Arnaud’s, at Cure and at all the Brennan restaurants.
In perhaps the most ironic twist in New Orleans cocktail history, the Ramos Gin Fizz was invented by a bar owner who actually was not a fan of drinking: Mr. Henry C. Ramos, known to his friends as Carl. Ramos, originally born in Indiana, began his career in a beer saloon, called Exchange Alley, and worked the alcohol circuit in Baton Rouge for several years before deciding to invest in his own property in New Orleans with his brother as a partner. The pair purchased the Imperial Cabinet in 1887, a bar located on Gravier Street in what is now the Central Business District.
Ramos was widely respected in the community and was considered to be a gentleman of the highest quality; he ran his bar to reflect this. He closed his bar every evening at the decent hour of 8 o’clock to discourage all-night drinking binges and was open for a mere two hours on Sunday afternoons and only then because the community begged it. The Imperial Cabinet was upheld to strict standards of temperance and morality, accepting only the most well-behaved of clientele. Ramos was known to spend his time conversing with his patrons in order to keep an eye out for anyone who was toeing the line of tipsy. He hated drunkenness and ensured that any unruly patrons were pointed out to the bartenders so that no further drinks would be served. The 1928 New Orleans Item-Tribune states that “nobody could get drunk at the Ramos bar, not only because old Henry wouldn’t let them, but because drunkenness would take away their appreciation of the drinks.”
It was in this culture of quality over quantity that the Ramos Gin Fizz was created by Ramos himself in 1888. Originally called the ‘New Orleans Fizz’, the drink became an immediate hit and the Imperial Cabinet became busier than ever. Ramos’s original recipe included a sprinkling of powdered sugar and stipulated that the cocktail must be shaken for 12 minutes before serving, quite the undertaking for any skinny-armed bartender. Because of the rigorous shaking needed and the popularity of the drink, Ramos had up to 20 bartenders working at any given time. These gin fizz makers were called ‘shaker boys’ and often rotated in relay lines to share the burden of shaking the cocktail. The drink became so popular that during the Mardi Gras season of 1915 it was said Ramos had to employ 35 bartenders just to keep up with the number of New Orleans Fizzes ordered.
Ramos was said to have served his last gin fizz at midnight on October 27th 1919 as he became an avid supporter of Prohibition and firmly closed the doors of the Imperial Cabinet. Even after leaving the alcohol business, Ramos guarded the cocktail’s recipe up until his death, revealing it to the New Orleans Item-Tribune only days before he passed in 1928. He included in his recipe that “the secret in success lies in the good care you take and in your patience, and be certain to use good material.”
Today, there is even a brand of gin named for Henry Ramos, produced by the Sazerac Company.
I’ve made pancakes substituting beer for the water, I’ve enjoyed Kentucky Breakfast Stout, once with beer pancakes. And I’ve had beer that tasted rather sweet, like maple syrup, too. But it never occurred to me you could make the pancake syrup with beer. And it looks fairly easy. I recently ran across an article about The Art of Making Beer Syrup in Outside magazine, and apparently bartenders have been making them for years to use in special cocktails. Given that the only cocktail I almost ever order is a gin & tonic, hopefully you’ll forgive my cocktail ignorance. Apparently it’s just water (or any liquid) reduced, sugar added.
Outside’s recipe is so simple, even I could probably make it:
For best results, pour your favorite beer into a pan and slowly simmer over low heat until it reduces to two-thirds of its initial volume. Then add in an equal proportion of raw brown sugar and stir until the sugar dissolves completely. Pour liberally over your favorite breakfast food and wait for your insulin levels to spike.
The Good Booze blog suggests adding “a few whole cardamom pods” and “one small vanilla bean, split” to give it a little more flavor. It looks like any beer could work, although malt-forward beers seem better suited than hoppier ones, but certainly some experimentation is in order.
Allrecipes also has their own recipe, and a bar in San Francisco, The Fifth Floor (which is closed now, and reborn as Dirty Habit) used to make a drink they called Hops & Dreams, using a syrup made from Anchor Steam Beer.
And one entrepreneurial soul is trying to start the Beer Syrup Company to make commercial beer syrups.
For our 88th Session, our hosts are Jessica Boak and Ray Bailey, from Boak & Bailey, who I’m happy to say stepped up to fill in the void that was the June Session. For their topic, they’ve chosen Traditional Beer Mixes, and have suggested several options for participating in the June Session:
In his 1976 book Beer and Skittles early beer writer Richard Boston lists several:
Lightplater – bitter and light ale.
Mother-in-law — old and bitter.
Granny — old and mild.
Boilermaker — brown and mild.
Blacksmith –stout and barley wine.
Half-and-half – bitter and stout, or bitter and mild.
We’d like you to drink one or more from that list and write about it on Friday 6 June… and that’s it.
We’re deliberately aiming for something broad and accessible, but there is one rule — no ‘beer cocktails’! It’s been done, for starters. So, mix two beers, not four; and steer clear of syrups, spirits, flavourings and crushed ice.
If you need further inspiration…
Try ordering them in a pub — do bar staff still know the ropes?
Use your own sources to find a traditional mix not on Boston’s list, e.g. Ram’n’Spesh in Young’s London pubs.
Make the same mix with several different beers — are there rules for the optimal Granny?
Experiment — Blacksmith IPA with black IPA, anyone?
So start mixing things up. On Friday, June 6, D-Day will also be Mix-Day. Let them know when your post is up either by commenting on their announcement page, emailing them at boakandbailey@gmail.com, or tweeting your post.
Today’s infographics is a clever chart of beer cocktails rendered in colorful circles representing the proportion of ingredients. It’s part of a series of drinks posters by Fabio Rex.
Our 59th Session is something of a departure, as the topic could just as properly be about beverages other than beer as beer itself. Our host, Mario Rubio from Brewed For Thought was looking to branch out of beer and explore our other liquid passions. Seizing upon a suggestion I made regarding the Dos Equis pitchman — a.k.a. The Most Interesting Man in the World — who’s fond of remarking “I don’t always drink beer, but when I do….,” Mario turned it on his head, and is asking us to opine about the opposite, as in “I Almost Always Drink Beer, But When I Don’t….” But I’ll let him explain:
With the New Year looming and a month of Christmas and Holiday parties to enjoy there are plenty of opportunities to get into a different beverage besides beer, alcoholic or otherwise. It was with this in mind that I was reminded of a conversation I had one day with Jay Brooks. Looking for advice on how to squeeze some blood from this stone of beer blogging, Jay told me a lot of writers have to look outside of beer to help make a complete income. Upon bringing this up as a Session topic he even offered up a much better title than I would have thought up.
So as we are all incredibly interesting people, and almost always drink beer, let’s talk about what we drink when not drinking beer. Maybe your passion for coffee rivals that of craft beer, or it could be another alcoholic beverage such as scotch. My daughter being a root beer fan would appreciate her dad reviewing a few fizzy sodas. Maybe you have a drink that takes the edge off the beer, be it hair of the dog or a palate cleanser during the evening.
Beer cocktails, wines, ciders, meads, you name it as long as it’s not beer. Try to tie it in with craft beer in some way for extra credit. Be creative and I’ll see you guys in the new year.
This one was generally pretty easy for me. In addition to beer, I’m obsessed with a number of other beverages, though some are non-alcoholic. For example, I love unsweetened Iced Tea. Love it. It’s my caffeine delivery system of choice and I drink at least a liter bottle of Tejava — my favorite pre-packaged brand, hands down — each and every day, and usually more. I’m also rather fond of good lemonade, which is harder to find than one might suppose. I don’t really drink any soda — that stuff is really unhealthy — but I will have the occasional root beer or birch beer, which is a bit of nostalgia for me. A-Treat sodas from Philly were what we had around the house growing up, and apart from the Grapefruit Dry, root beer and birch beer were my favorites. A lot of the folk fairs my parents took me to had demonstrations of how they were made in the old days, which I found endlessly fascinating. I also confess to drinking quite a lot of water, especially when I’m also drinking a lot of beer.
But as for other alcoholic beverages, I am a self-avowed cross-drinker. I do like wine, though to tend to favor big reds and champagne, which I have a weakness for. The more delicate whites are usually lost on me, but I won’t dismiss them out of hand. I just don’t know a great deal about them, apart from what I like which I decide purely on sensory considerations and find wine ratings even more useless than beer ones. They’re perhaps a necessary evil, and one I have to live with, but they’re often so subjective that they’re often meaningless.
I like single malt whisky and many other spirits, but again my knowledge of them is rather thin. I’ve attended a number of whisky tasting events and dinners, and always had a great time, but find that I rarely reach for a bottle when I’m at home. I like tequila, but it does not like me. As a result of some bad experiences when I was younger, I never ever touch the stuff. I’m also not a huge fan of rum, ouzo, brandy or many other similar liquors and liqueurs. I like vodka and absinthe well enough, though usually only in small doses.
Hands down, my favorite non-beer, alcoholic drink — especially after drinking a lot of beer — is gin. I especially find that a gin and tonic cleanses my palette like nothing else can. I prefer Bombay Sapphire, of the common gins, and Anchor’s Junipero Gin, when I can find it; though in truth I’m not too picky as long as it’s not a rotgut bottom-of-the-barrel variety. There’s nothing quite like it after a day’s beer judging to reset my mind and body for the evening.
This month is our 27th monthly Session, a.k.a. Beer Blogging Friday. The topic this month is “Beer Cocktails: Beyond the Black & Tan,” hosted by Joe Ruvel & Jasmine Smith at Beer at Joe’s. By cocktails or mixed drinking that include beer as one of the ingredients, here’s what Joe has in mind:
Most people have had a black & tan, which is a combination of two kinds of beer and think it’s pretty tasty. Most people have heard of a Shandy, beer with lemonade or soda added, and think it’s not so tasty.
But beer cocktails go far beyond these two famous examples. Many countries have their own versions, and many new chefs and bartenders are getting creative with beer as an ingredient, not just a standalone drink.
What’s your favorite beer cocktail (and yes, despite the title of this post, it can be a black & tan or a shandy)? Find a recipe for that or a new one, try it, and tell us why you did or didn’t like it–even if you think beer cocktails are nothing but a good way to waste a beer. Have fun and try something new!
While I’d wager that the idea of mixing beer with other liquors and liquids strikes most as a bad idea, I’ve actually had some very good experiences with mixed beer drinks, though I suppose the majority of those are guilty pleasures. I have, for example, very fond memories of Spotie Oties (or possibly Spodie Odies), a drink I first learned about at tailgate parties at Penn State, where several good high school friends of mine went to college. A Spotie Otie is simply a mix of equal parts cheap beer and cheap Sangria. I know, I know. But it sounds much worse than it tastes. Its flavor actually reminds you a lot of a fruit punch and it’s very easy drinking, or in A-B parlance it had great “drinkability.” And don’t forget that this was at a time before craft beer so it was far more necessary than it might be today.
Another favorite beer cocktail is another very simple one, though I don’t now if it has a name. Take any dry Irish stout and add a few drops of Crème de Cassis. It just gives the beer a certain something, just a nice hint of fruitiness.
So I’m not opposed to mixed drinks with beer per se, but it seems it was a better idea when it was harder to find a decent beer.
Even when I wrote my guidebook to Silicon Valley, in 1991-92, it was often difficult to find a bar with anything different on tap. So having an appendix with Beer Cocktails made sense. If I wrote it again today, I might not include them, but looking back there are some fun recipes all the same.
I know that cocktails have their origin in the 17th century and the first mention of them in print was 1803, April 28th to be precise. And I know that the word “cocktail” itself was once a specific drink that included any distilled spirits mixed with sugar, water, and bitters. Over time it became a generic term for any mixed drink, but I think my original sense of it stems from Prohibition, when it took on a new importance to mask bathtub gin and other homemade alcoholic drinks’ imperfections. I’m probably wrong about this (Maureen? Bob?) and I’m in a field in Boonville — not the middle of nowhere, but you can see if from here — but I seem to recall that the number and creativity of cocktails exploded during that period precisely because the need was so great to cover defects in the homemade spirits served at speakeasies and elsewhere.
That was certainly my initial experience with beer cocktails, they always used cheap beer that was lacking in flavor as the base liquid for mixing. For that reason, I never felt too bad about mixing with them, since I wouldn’t want to drink those beers anyway. It always seemed like finding a home for an orphaned beer that otherwise would just be left alone to go bad. Effectively, it was adulteration with purpose. And that’s probably where it would have ended, an old idea whose time had passed. But recently my mind was changed by my friend Sean Paxon, the Homebrew Chef, who made me a special mixed beer cocktail for my birthday party in March of this year.
Whatever Sean named it (I can’t recall), it used Westmalle Tripel as the base liquid. I confess my first reaction at the time was revulsion at what I perceived was ruining such a fine beer. But that was before I tasted it. To the Tripel, Sean added a foam made with coconut, ginger and something else, and I think Mango juice may have been involved somewhere. I’m pretty sure we were all guinea pigs for an upcoming article in Beer Advocate magazine, so the full recipe will most likely be in the next issue. Whatever was in it, it was delicious, and it definitely changed my mind that a beer cocktail can use a decent beer without fear of death threats. So I obviously need to rethink my bias against the mixed beer cocktail. Cheers!