The Bitter Truth...an interview with homemade booze guru Calvaleigh Rasmussen
- Apr 7, 2015
- 10 min read
Updated: Jun 4, 2024
The Bitter Truth...an interview with homemade booze guru Calvaleigh Rasmussen
I drink.
It used to be that a can of Hamm's and a shot of Beam would be a banquet for me. However, as I grow older and my liver develops more of a beef-jerky like patina, I find myself craving some of the finer things in life. Sadly the top shelf is set a bit too high for a daily drinker with a drummer's salary.
Luckily there's a clever trick to transform any beverage into a fancy artisanal cocktail without having to leave a $10 tip for a mixologist named Atticus with wool suspenders, a waxed mustache, and monocle.
The secret? Just add bitters!
That's right, it's that simple. Picture yourself at 9am at the corner bar with a fingerprinted shot glass of brown liquid poured from a bottle with a vaguely Irish/Polish name like “McCzajkowski's”. As you count out the nickels and dimes you found in the couch cushions to pay for this adventure, you may think that you've hit rock bottom and by gum, you may be right.
Now picture the same scenario, but tell that barkeep with the lazy eye to add a splash of bitters. Ah! Can you feel the light shining down? My friends, you're not drinking rot-gut from the well first thing in the morning. You're having a pre-power lunch cocktail!
You've transformed from amateur hobo, to international man of mystery before our very eyes. All thanks to that strange little bottle of arcane herbal concoction.
But why? And more importantly how can you make it yourself and drink it tonight?
To find out, I sat down with our local authority on bitters (and making your own) the multi-talented, strong liver-ed and ever charming Calvaleigh Rasmussen.
Calvaleigh, these days I love a splash of bitters in almost everything. For the uninitiated, what the hell are bitters anyway?
Calvaleigh: So, bitters are said to date back to the Ancient Egyptians, who, believe it or not, really liked booze. I suppose that this might account for some of their more exciting hobbies…like pulling brains out of the noses of dead guys. Weird shit. Anyway… bitters were also the original quack doctor medicine—purchased, and downed by the masses from the kind of slimy guy who shows up whenever the circus is in town. Sold under sundry names (bitters, tonic, tinctures, medicinal compound, etc.), they were intended to treat a variety of ailments—baldness, fatness, freckles, “humors,” and even…bitterness. As far as definition and execution goes, bitters are generally a mixture of alcohol and/or water, and botanicals. Ye Olde Egyptians would have used wine, Mr. Snake Oil…something a little stronger. The alcohol or water acts as a solvent and later, a vehicle for the volatile oils and juices in the botanicals, as well as a preservative. The traditional botanicals used can be pretty bitter in flavor, hence the name. One of the big medicinal uses for bitters is to ward off the effects of malaria. This requires some pretty tongue-curling stuff called cinchona—a really awesome source of quinine. That tonic water in your gin? Technically bitters. Of course, some additives were horribly addictive and these tonics ended up containing things like laudanum (ensuring that those quacks I mentioned earlier got lots of repeat customers.) Today, the unwashed hippy masses still use tinctures of all sorts to cure their various maladies, in a manner probably not so different from the Ancient Egyptians. However, today, around the world, bitters’ big claim to fame is…drinking! In many countries, people drink their bitters straight, as an aperitif or digestif, or even a hangover cure. Although some of the more high falutin’ hipsters like to mimic this habit as well, even they can’t deny the benefit of adding a little extra depth and complexity to a tasty libation. The practice of creating homemade bitters has become increasingly popular in the past decade or so. It even seems to be considered acceptable to put just about anything in your bitters these days. While perusing the legendary shelves of Ledger’s Liquors the other day, I noticed bitters claiming to be “barbecue flavored.” The fact is, that although the most common botanicals in bitters are things like gentian, cinchona, and orange peel, you can put nearly anything that has flavor in booze or water, and make bitters from it—great, and yet terrible.
When did the Moonshine on you? In other words, how did you get into making your own booze?
Calvaleigh: I suppose you could say that I’ve been doing this kind of stuff my whole life. I grew up in a very booze-friendly family. Not to say that my childhood was spent passed out cold on the floor with the bottle still in my hand, but, as a kid, I did spend as much time as possible in our family winery. When exposed to the bountiful delights of the wine mines, a person gets curious about all the other aspects and possibilities. Some of my favorite “family” projects involved fermentation and distillation. Some of these projects tasted like gifts bestowed by angels, and others are still sitting, many years later, at the back of a dark cupboard due to their turpentine-and-brimstone-like qualities. Although I certainly don’t think that I’d ever go into the family business, fermentation still fascinates me. Fermentation can take time, space, and patience though, and being of a somewhat impatient nature, projects like bitters are pleasing. They take remarkably little effort, and you still get to play with alcohol! I enjoy gardening, so I even try incorporating whatever’s growing out there into my hobby as well. Making bitters also allows me to play with cocktail recipes, (and who doesn’t love that?) and even to create cocktails based around whatever’s been steeping lately. After that comes the best part…I get to drink!
Aside from delicious, life affirming bitters, what tinctures and potions do you make in your cauldron? Also, are you a witch who serves the prince of darkness? If so can you introduce me? I've always wanted to meet Ozzy.
Calvaleigh: Wow—so, my big hope this year is that we get a super-great stone fruit season this year so that I can
make some peach wine. This was my goal last year, but then I had a drink or two and forgot…or something like that. A couple of years ago I made some awesome tangerine wine which was fantastic, and comparable with a nice Sauvignon Blanc—pretty pleased with how it turned out. I’ve made mead—which turned out to have a much higher alcohol content than your average glass of wine. Although I’ve never personally attempted any great feats, I think that this mead would have been the perfect thing to be drinking if you were Beowulf, and had decided to go out and take on Grendel. When you almost get ripped limb to limb, it would probably dull the pain, and then it would give you the balls to go back and tell the whole story with enough bravado that it gets eventually written down as an epic.
I have way too many hobbies, I love baking. I like to bake bread (“woot” for fermentation again!) I totally dig endeavoring to make the little yeasty beasties happy (there’s your answer about the real Prince of Darkness…ALL HAIL THE YEAST BEAST!) I mean seriously…these little creatures are awesome! They get to eat all this sugar, and then they are encouraged to (without any judgment) fart out C02! Anyway…baking is a favorite thing of mine—it’s like eating comfort food. Nothing is cozier than kneading bread, and surely anyone who comes to play music at our house knows that I generally try to provide unlimited scone refills.
My other “cauldron” type thing is dying. Yup, I’m dying. No, really-- I used to do tie-dye as a kid, and was always fascinated by the different things you could do with dye and with color. My mom was always super into the fiber arts when I was growing up. I certainly caught the bug, and got hooked on sewing, crochet, knitting, and spinning. Sewing and spinning certainly gives way to lots of dying, if you can’t get a color you like at the fabric store or woolery. It starts out with your basic Rit Dye. Once you go past that stuff, you are lost. You might as well sell your soul to Ozzy to buy all the cotton, wool, mordant, dyes, and scales that you might need to fuel your pathetic quest for the right shade of green. Currently, I’m learning to use “natural” dyes—made with plants (and we’re back to those botanicals!) and bugs. In the end, you should probably just dye yourself that color green so that you remember…for next time.
As a drunk and a musician, I find the two to be inseparable. I write songs with whiskey (and sometimes a pen) and a beer in my pocket is the only thing that keeps me in the pocket while on stage. As an aficionado of both the sauce and the song yourself, what's your relationship with hooch and harmony?
Calvaleigh: I feel personally, that whetting the whistle to while away whilst wending through waltzes is a particularly important part of the experience. We play for a lot of dancers. If you want the dancers to feel relaxed, peaceful, maybe a little flirtatious—and hey, even properly rowdy--it is important, as a responsible musician, that you take the time to, at the very least, imbibe in a beer, or two, or three, so as to allow the feeling to properly transfer from you, to them, through the music.
You are a multi-instrumentalist in a group whose very name is synonymous with drinking heavily, and having pagan dance parties deep in the forest in the middle of the night. Somehow you find the strength to be up the next morning, bushy tailed and ready to do it all again. I've seen it and it's inspiring.
This one is multiple choice. What nefarious booze demon did you sell your soul to in order to make this possible:
a) Pan
b) The ghost of Lord Byron
c) Charles Bukowski's liver
d) Jim Beam
Calvaleigh: Most definitely Lord Byron’s ghost. Not only is he a fancier of the arts, but I admire him for his constant striving for even more decadence and debauchery. I can only aspire to reach levels of infamy such as his—something on which he coaches me daily. His Bacchanalian habits are inspirational. I can only hope that I do him proud in the meantime.
Finally, I try to end all my interviews with a three part question. Let me set the scene: Imagine it's a fine spring afternoon. The bees are having their way with the flowers, without even buying them a drink first. The bunnies and other small furry animals are planning far worse at their annual equinox orgies. The sun is shining, the birds are singing and the poppies are poppin'. And there you are, reclining in your backyard with nowhere to be.
What food are you eating? What drink are you drinking? Finally, what song is wafting through the air like sonic hay-fever?
Calvaleigh: Sounds delightful! If I had my way with the world, at this very moment, I’d be eating the plumpest, juiciest, most amazingly tender, and fatty New Zealand lamburger that you can possibly imagine, on a homemade brioche bun, with nothing on it…except for LAMB. I love lamb. I would eat nothing but lamb if I could. It is truly the most superior of all the meats. Whilst dawdling, I’d dream that my groovier half, Kevin, might allow me to bask in his presence and share with him, this assumed, bright, and glorious day. Whilst twiddling my toes in the sunlight, I would be imbibing in a true classic of which I am lately fond—the Manhattan Cocktail, only with a little extra—added juice from the maraschino cherry jar, and several hearty dashes of that excellent recipe from the year 1830—Angostura bitters.
The tune my ears are sneezing in time with is the Cantiga de Santa Maria, #159. This song, written for King Alfonso X of Spain, is written in the Galician dialect; it’s main feature being a tale about the holy miracle of a dancing pork chop, and, believe it or not, it’s a pretty sexy-sounding tune! (No…seriously…it’s actually about a dancing pork chop—all ye wee, tasty lambs: be jealous.)
Basic, Boozy, Bitters Recipe
Ingredients:
--1 cup of neutral spirits*
--1 ½ cups of your botanical substance of choice.
Tools:
--1 jar with lid (a big Mason jar with a lid is perfect.)
--1 freezer
--1 medium-sized strainer
--1 glass storage container
Place your botanicals into the Mason jar. If your botanicals are large, or have a skin, chop them roughly before doing this step as it will give greater surface area for absorption, and will allow for better release of oils and juices.
Pour the spirits over the botanicals, and place lid on jar.
Shake vigorously.
Place jar in freezer.**
Leave for 1-3 weeks, shaking daily.
Remove from freezer, remove lid, pour through strainer into glass storage container.
Spend outrageous amounts of time trying to come up with the perfect cocktail to go with your bitters!
Enjoy cocktail.
* I like to use 190 proof Everclear, but you actually have to go over the California state line to get it. Something of a slightly lower proof is just fine. I know people who use vodka instead.
**You can, in fact, make these bitters without placing them in the freezer. However, I feel that the ice helps to break down the cell walls in the plant matter, and also yields better color in the finished product (chlorophyll makes this stuff gorgeous!) It’s probably a billion times more satisfying to make something that looks extra nice.
Note: As far as suggestions for botanicals go: Any non-toxic herbs, fruits, plants will do. I made done bitters that solely contain one item, such as lavender, or basil, however, traditionally, bitters would have contained more than just one flavor. You can even combine all the herbs in your garden, if they complement on another; if you are into medicinal herbs, you can make tonics and tinctures from those with this recipe. Just remember—don’t go overboard—we’ve all experienced the compost-like horrors of Jagermeister. If you want to try using fruit with this recipe, make sure that you remove all seeds. Hell, I suppose that if you really felt the need to poison your enemies, Socrates probably drank something brewed with a similar method, directly before dying. Have at it.
Shameless plugs:
If you like Morris Dancing:
If you like traditional music:
https://www.facebook.com/canthavearchaicandeatittoo
If you like massage:
Also, if you like food, booze, and bitters, my friend Alanna has this awesome blog: http://www.bojongourmet.com/
And if you love hard cider, and happen to be in the U.K., there are these awesome folks: http://www.welshmountaincider.com/
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