The Muddled History of the Old-Fashioned

The old-fashioned is a classic cocktail that likes to change its clothes. At its core, it’s a lightly sweetened whiskey-based lowball. Those who prefer a drier drink with a hint of spice will opt for rye, while others may prefer the sweet roundness of …

The old-fashioned is a classic cocktail that likes to change its clothes. At its core, it’s a lightly sweetened whiskey-based lowball. Those who prefer a drier drink with a hint of spice will opt for rye, while others may prefer the sweet roundness of bourbon. Some bartenders drop in a slice of orange or a cherry right before serving, and others will muddle the fruit into the drink; sometimes it’s served with no fruit at all. These myriad variations beg the question: Is there such a thing as a ‘right’ way to make an old-fashioned?

The drink has a long history, and it didn’t always bear the archetypical title. “The name on its birth certificate was Whiskey Cocktail,” Robert Simonson writes in his book The Old Fashioned, citing the original technical outline of any cocktail: spirit, sugar, bitters, and water. It’s hard to pin down exactly when and where the name “old-fashioned” originated, but sometime in the mid-19th century in the U.S. seems likely, as traditionalists snubbed newer takes on cocktails, requesting the “old-fashioned,” or pared-down versions of beverages instead of concoctions featuring newly available added ingredients.

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How Climate Change Is Hurting This New Mexican Coffee

In the sunny state of New Mexico, a handful of adventurous coffee roasters add piñons, small pine nuts that grow in the Southwest U.S., to give their coffee a local flavor, balancing coffee beans’ bitterness with piñons’ rich and buttery notes.

Indige…

In the sunny state of New Mexico, a handful of adventurous coffee roasters add piñons, small pine nuts that grow in the Southwest U.S., to give their coffee a local flavor, balancing coffee beans’ bitterness with piñons’ rich and buttery notes.

Indigenous communities in the Southwest discovered and ate piñon nuts from the Pinus edulis tree many years before Europeans arrived, as evidenced by cracked nutshells found at archaeological sites. Like other pine nuts (you may know the European variety from classic basil pesto), piñons are protein-rich and a good source of essential vitamins and minerals, plus they have a sweet, buttery taste. Native American tribes ground the nuts with a stone, sometimes turning them to a nutritious mush. Today, piñon nuts might be used in many other ways in cooking, such as sprinkled over salads, used to make desserts, or simply eaten as snacks. But now, climate change threatens to make this already scarce crop even harder to get hold of.

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