Mystery Found Fragrance

While hunting for bottles on the beach last month I came across this tightly capped mysterious bottle filled with liquid.  I opened it right then and there and smelled a faint floral fragrance amidst the brackish seawater.  I tucked it in my bag and proceeded to scavenge and only opened it later when I was home and sorting through my finds.  In the comfort of my home it smells more like dirty seawater than heavenly floral but still a faint trace of its original contents remains.  The sediment on the bottom could be fragrant matter that separated from the alcohol once water was introduced.  Or it could simply be debris from the ocean floor.  The bottle has no markings and is such an industry standard design that it could be almost anything.  Mystery indeed.

Beach Bottles

I had some good luck collecting bottles on the beach this year.  Most of them get scrubbed clean, sterilized and bottle up my cologne experiments.  Some of them end up as spice jars, medicine jars, liquor bottles and some are just for the love of collecting bottles.  These are some of the treasures I found this summer.

The Bitters Experiment

After macerating for over six weeks I finally decanted my bitters and have been enjoying them in seltzer and cocktails.  I recently had a delicious Manhattan using Woodland Bitters, the brew adding a woodsy complexity to the libation.  I think the Cherry Hazelnut are my favorite and I look forward to another Manhattan using it.

Cherry Hazelnut Bitters

1/2 cup lightly toasted and skinned hazelnuts
1/2 cup dried tart or sour cherries
2 tablespoons devil's club root
1/2 teaspoon schizandra berries
1/2 teaspoon wild cherry bark
1/2 teaspoon cinchona bark
1/2 teaspoon cassia chips
1/4 teaspoon chopped dried orange peel
3 star anise
2 cups 101-proof bourbon, or more as needed

Macerate six weeks and decant.   The original recipe (taken from Brad Thomas Parsons wonderful book, "Bitters") suggests decanting after two weeks and retaining the solids to be boiled in one cup of water over high heat and returning the filtered water into the original brew.  He also suggests adding 2 tablespoons of rich syrup.  I found these extra steps tedious so just left it to macerate longer and I'm quite happy with the results.

Making Bitters

Edible Brooklyn, in their recent alcohol issue, said that everyone in Brooklyn has to make bitters, it's one of the rules.  It's true that I know an inordinate amount of people who make bitters (and beer, mead, hot sauce, play the ukelele, the accordion, etc.).  Bitters are a Very Big Thing in these parts and they're taken very seriously.

Traditionally they're considered medicine and used as a digestive tonic for the occasional upset of overeating.  In the Victorian era they found their way into cocktails.  Once the Manhattan was invented they were assured their place in every bartender's arsenal.

After doing a bit of research online I found a few recipes I wanted to try.  I was recommended to try the Dandelion Botanical Company for my bittering herbs and flavoring agents (I would also recommend Mountain Rose Herbs).  My intention was to follow a few recipes and then continue to experiment on my own.  The primary bittering herb is gentian root, the stuff that made Angostura so famous.  I also purchased chinchona bark, the principal ingredient in creating tonic water (another experiment for later), sarasparilla, devil's club root, black walnut leaf and wild cherry bark.  (The catalog had other things I just couldn't resist ordering including sandalwood powder, patchouli leaf and osmanthus flowers - yet another project).

The recipe I settled on, amongst others, was Woodland Bitters.  I loved the idea of the earthy devil's club root with wild cherry bark and toasted nuts.  I also made a classic Angostura style bitters as well as Cherry Hazelnut Bitters.  If I didn't think I'd be inundated with bitters for the rest of my life I'd be experimenting with many variations (figs, citrus, cranberry, wormwood, etc.), and it's nowhere near Christmas where I could at least hand them out as presents.

              Woodland Bitters

1. 2 cups overproof bourbon (such as Wild Turkey 101)
2. 1 cup pecans, toasted
3. 1 cup walnuts, toasted
4. 4 cloves
5. Two 3-inch cinnamon sticks
6. 1 whole nutmeg, cracked
7. 1 vanilla bean, split
8. 2 tablespoons devil's club root
9. 1 tablespoon cinchona bark
10. 1 tablespoon chopped black walnut leaf
11. 1 tablespoon wild cherry bark
12. 1/2 teaspoon cassia chips
13. 1/2 teaspoon gentian root
14. 1/2 teaspoon sarsaparilla root
15. 3 tablespoons pure maple syrup

1. In a 1-quart glass jar, combine all of the ingredients except the syrup. Cover and shake well. Let stand in a cool, dark place for 2 weeks, shaking the jar daily.
2. Strain the infused alcohol into a clean 1-quart glass jar through a cheesecloth-lined funnel. Squeeze any infused alcohol from the cheesecloth into the jar; reserve the solids. Strain the infused alcohol again through new cheesecloth into another clean jar to remove any remaining sediment. Cover the jar and set aside for 1 week.
3. Meanwhile, transfer the solids to a small saucepan. Add 1 cup of water and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer over low heat for 10 minutes; let cool completely. Pour the liquid and solids into a clean 1-quart glass jar. Cover and let stand at room temperature for 1 week, shaking the jar once daily.
4. Strain the water mixture through a cheesecloth-lined funnel set over a clean 1-quart glass jar; discard the solids. If necessary, strain again to remove any remaining sediment. Add the infused alcohol and the syrup. Cover and let stand at room temperature for 3 days. Pour the bitters through a cheesecloth-lined funnel or strainer and transfer to glass dasher bottles. Cover and keep in a cool, dark place.

So far my bitters have been aging for a little over four weeks.  I think I'll skip parts 3 and 4 and just let them macerate for four weeks and strain thoroughly before adding a bit of water and maple syrup.

Bayberry

As soon as I moved to New York I started going to the local beaches.  I'm not one to sit still for very long and as soon as the SPF was applied I'd go exploring.  Walking along the beach I'd look for shells and pretty rocks, but further up along the dunes were some other treasures to behold.  Beach roses, or beach plum, were the first discovery.  Even tho they're not a showy rose they have a wonderful rich fragrance.  The rose hip, or plum as they're called in this case, are much larger than your average hip and many people make jam with them.  I also found horsetail, a very old plant that's been around since prehistoric times.  Horsetail is loaded with calcium, so much so that one has to be very careful not to take too much for fear of calcium crystals forming.  There's plenty of bittersweet, too, and in the autumn the dunes are a sea of orange.

The best thing I've discovered on the beach, tho, are the bayberry bushes.  They're so huge yet inconspicuous that they could easily be overlooked.  Northern bay, Myrica pensylvanica, has leaves with a sticky spicy aroma and the waxy berries were used by American colonists to make clean burning candles.

The herb is astringent and stimulant and emetic in large doses.  A decoction is good as a gargle for chronic inflammation and is an excellent wash for the gums.

Culinarily the leaves can be used dried as in traditional bay leaves.  In that case harvest them in the fall when they've matured and turned leathery.  Leave them to dry completely and their flavor will intensify.  I use them in soups and stews all winter long.  In season I like to chop them up fresh and use them to season pork and chicken.  I haven't had a chance to see what they do in vodka yet but I'll be trying that soon.  I hear they did wonders in a bottle of gin according to Edible Manhattan.

My special interest in making botanical colognes got me thinking of using the leaves to try my hand at making Bay Rum.  I read many recipes and bought myself a few bottles (most notably Dominca and Ogallala, the reputed best available) and set to work experimenting.  Like all of my colognes they are a work in progress and the formulas will be tweaked and improved upon until I find just the right recipe.  I made mine with fresh bay leaves, allspice, cinnamon, dried orange zest, vodka and white rum.  The scent wasn't quite accurate so I admit to adding a couple of drops of bay essential oil (Pimenta racemosa), the optimal variety of bay leaves used in making Bay Rum.

My colognes, including Bay Rum.

Beach Glass Bottles

Green glass vials from the beaches of Brooklyn.

I've been very lucky this past summer finding bottles on the beach.  I seem to have hit the motherload.  Clear, amber and green glass bottles in all shapes and sizes are finding their way into my collection.  Some of them take on a frosted patina which makes them glow in the light from being rolled and tumbled in the ocean.  I can't help wondering where they originated and what was their original use.

Two perfume bottles

Cleaning them up and getting them ready to be used has been a big job.  They spend a lot of time soaking in soapy water in between scrubbings.  I've collected a vast array of bottle brushes to help with the job.  Once they're squeaky clean they're sterilized in a boiling water vat before they can be used.

Amber vials

A collection of tiny vials

I live my life in a very "green" way, long before anyone called it green.   I deplore waste of any kind so to find these bottles and be able to give them another life is a joy.  I've been collecting caps from broken bottles for ages so spent some happy days sorting through the collection and finding the proper cap.  Some of the bottles will be filled with the colognes I was producing this past summer but some are for sale on my Etsy store.  I love that each bottle is a one of a kind treasure.

Beach glass bottles put to use for my cologne collection.