Tag: traditional chinese medicine

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August 2018 Cocktail Events Round-Up

Your August 2018 cocktail events guide is a bit abbreviated because I didn’t find that many events on offer this month.  Apparently you should be vacationing.  (May I recommend Maine, where I visited last month and came up with this take on the Scofflaw.)  For those who, like me, will be spending most of August in the District working, here are some things to put on your calendars, along with National Rum Day (August 16th) and National Whiskey Sour Day (the 25th):

Medicine Making Class: Herbal Vinegars, Cordials, & Cocktails at Smile Herb Shop.  The Smile Herb Shop in College Park has specialized in herbal products since 1975.  This month, herbalist Besty Miller will teach you to make herbal vinegars like “fire cider,” strawberry rose shrubs, and herbal cordials with elderberries and fruits.  These ingredients can be used to make “delicious and healthful herbal cocktails,” and cocktails, we are assured, “can be medicine too.”  (This brings to mind the Traditional Chinese Medicine cocktails at Tiger Fork, which you can read about here.)  Tickets are $100; more information here.  4908 Berwyn Road, College Park; August 18 from noon to 3 p.m.

Cocktail Class: Make Your Own Gin at Via Umbria.  As past round-ups reveal, Via Umbria has been conducting monthly cocktail-making classes.  This month it mixes things up slightly by showing you how to make your own gin at home.  Continuing this month’s herbal theme, Via Umbria tells us that gin’s first use was as an “herbal medicine” (but also its current use, am I right?).  Via Umbria also explains that the heart of gin is the juniper berry (which is not actually a berry but can be found in abundance in Maine, so one more reason to visit).  Playing host to District 209 – maker of several gins – Via Umbria will show you how to mix those (non)berries with “sugar, spice, and ice” to craft your own home gin.  1525 Wisconsin Avenue; August 29 from 7:30 to 9 p.m.

Class: Cocktails 101.  If making gin is not your thing there is another option at basically the same time:  a cocktail-making class for “the novice and intermediate home mixologist” at Benjamin’s on Franklin at Tastemakers in Brookland.  Benjamin’s promises to teach you how to make three classic cocktails and educate you on the history behind them.  2800 10th Street N.E.; August 29 from 7 to 9 p.m.

That’s all I have this month.  As always, please send me any events you’d like to see featured here!

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Drinking D.C.: Traditional Chinese Medicine Cocktails at Tiger Fork

I finally got over to Tiger Fork last week, when I met up with some friends there for dinner.  I had read about Tiger Fork’s novel Traditional Chinese Medicine (“TCM”) cocktails in the Post’s Going Out Guide, and I was excited to try them out myself.

Reservations are recommended here, but for what it’s worth there was ample room for walk-ins at 6 p.m. on a Thursday, the time of our reservation.  (It was more crowded when we left a few hours later.  I realize no one dines at 6 – I’m old – but it is a reasonable cocktail hour, so if that’s your focus you probably can walk in.)  Tiger Fork’s interior has great vibe – cozy with warm lighting, like many of its Blagden Alley neighbors.

There is no question that the TCM cocktails are the feature here.  The menu hits you with them first off:

Tiger Fork drink menu

I immediately noticed two things.  First, Tiger Fork’s drinks are listed not merely by name but also by intended medicinal effect.  The 8 O’clock Light Show, for example, addresses fatigue.  Nathan Road aids – perhaps counter-intuitively, for a cocktail – detox.  (At last, vindication that alcohol is the cure-all I always knew it was.  Also, this statement is not remotely FDA-approved; uh, always consult your physician.)

Second, in a warning almost certainly calculated to get you to order at least three of these cocktails, the menu advises that because of the holistic “nature of the recipes we recommend no more than 2 of these cocktails per visit.”

But I’m a rule-follower so this Jedi mind-trick does not work on me, and I order just two.  The first was the Bird Market (immune system):

The 'Bird Market' TCM cocktail at Tiger Fork

This one ended up being my favorite of the two.  It had a pleasant citrus and earthy flavor combination (the TCM ingredients definitely have an impact here).  The second was the Peruvian Chef in a Chinese Kitchen (anxiety):

The 'Peruvian Chef in a Chinese Kitchen' TCM cocktail at Tiger Fork

This one was harder to peg flavor-wise.  As with the first drink there were herbal and earthy flavors that I didn’t recognize and presumably were attributable to the TCM ingredients.  For what it’s worth, I did feel the stress of the work day lifting about halfway through this drink.  But I acknowledge confounding factors (second cocktail, more time since the end of the work day) potentially were at play.

I will certainly be back to try the two I missed.  And if you haven’t been already, you should go too.  No one else is making cocktails like these in D.C., and the novel ingredients should entice you if nothing else does.  And in fact something else does (or should), in that you will also be rewarded with very good food if you decide to stay for dinner!