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There was a plan walking into Whisky Live. A solid plan. A good plan. A tremendously sound plan. With a room full of master distillers, brand ambassadors and industry experts pouring over 300 whiskies, there needed to be priorities otherwise it could all go pear shaped very very quickly. As we walked in, I explained it to my friend G who was a Whisky Live virgin as it were: Taste things that are new, that are rare, that we can’t afford to taste any other way. Jack Daniels, you are lovely, but if I have you on my home bar, I will not be tasting you tonight. No other spirits, no beer, no wine. Just whisk(e)y.
We did a preliminary lap around the room and then things started to go south. About 10 minutes in to my first interview, I had tasted all the way through the brands entire range of 8, plus the secret and rare expressions that they had kept hidden under the table. I had seconds of my favorite whisky — Glen Garioch — which is on my home bar, and this was after I had tried all the new yet to be released expressions. Then I had to try this rum, and there was a new beer being released. By the time I got to the Widow Jane booth, all rules had gone out the window and so of course I tasted their Brooklyn distilled gin, aged gin, all the heirloom varietal bourbons and then the bottles from under the table came out. A yet to be released whiskey in which the NYS local grains are roasted with cacao. That’s chocolate and whiskey peeps. And it was lovely. Oh, and there were whiskey cocktails, which I hadn’t accounted for, so there were no rules about them, even if we were still following said rules.
I must emphasize that these were all genteel professional sips that were being taken, not shots, no chugging. But no matter how small the sip that you take, by the end of the evening it was the better part of half a dozen pints that had been drunk. All in all, not a bad way to spend a work evening, sipping rare and fine spirits while watching the sunset over the Hudson. But the next morning was not thrilling. I spent the day swilling carbs, rueing the fact that I no longer have the metabolism of a 22 year old and eyeing the office couch, wondering exactly how bad an example it would set for the intern if I curled up for a nap.
When I got home, I was still feeling a little feeble, in need of sustenance and succor. In the form of this chai spiced squash soup. I had a squash and a pomegranate in the vegetable bin, and those foods both always strike me as infinitely healthy, what with all of the potassium, folate, and carotenoids in the squash and the antioxidants in the pomegranate. Plus, delicious.
I halved the squash and drizzled it with olive oil, salt and pepper, and placed it on a baking sheet in a 400 degree oven, for half an hour. While that was roasting, I sliced up one small white onion, 2 shallots, and half of a very small fennel bulb, and sauteed them in the bottom of my stockpot with a generous pat of butter. Chai has become my soothe all in this never ending winter, so I wanted to incorporate those flavors and aromas. A good sized knob of grated ginger, 1/4 teaspoon of ground cloves, a dash of nutmeg, 1/2 teaspoon of ground cardamom and a few grinds of black pepper went into the pot. I stirred it up and then let it cook for a few minutes, until everything was fragrant. In went 4 cups of chicken broth, and the roasted squash, just scooped out of it’s skin and set to simmer. After about 20 minutes, it came off of the heat and got blitzed with an immersion blender, served with a scoop of crème fraîche and sprinkled with pomegranate seeds.
