Halloween Fun: Mad Scientist Bar
Halloween is by far one of my favorite holidays for throwing parties – Halloween Parties are all about creating entertaining spaces that are as much about setting the stage and putting on a show. Which, by the way we should be doing throughout the year –minus trying to scare and gross-out our guests!
I am fascinated with mixology and I am known for my WOW tables; so as a frightful focal point to my Halloween party I created a WOW bar, The Mad Scientist Bar. (evil laugh)
[Watch my Mad Scientist Bar on Better!]
I’ve used some everyday items, classics beverages and foods, along with some of my Hollywood-style special effects to create a laboratory entertaining space. Put on your lab coat and goggles and follow along as I show to make creepy concoctions and powerful potions that will surely be a scream at any Halloween party.
Mad Scientists collect all kinds of specimens to do their experiments on. With that inspiration, I created Specimen Punch. This is a lot of fun to put together and I am using a three-tier beverage jar with a spout. In my first tier are my specimens – guts and a brain glowing in a purple Formaldehyde (cauliflower, cellophane noodles and glow lights in purple colored water). For the punch in the center of the tier I have frozen cadaver hands keeping the Radio Active Punch frightfully chilled (colored water frozen in latex gloves). Finally on top, I have a collection of nasty, but tasty gummy bugs, worms and eyeballs to garnish each drink with! A mad Scientist Bar would be complete with out specimen jars of failed experiments (canning jars filled with everyday food items in colored water; boiled eggs, white asparagus, cooked spaghetti, mushrooms, ginger roots.)
Halloween doesn’t always have to be scary or gross… it can be down right manipulative as well (another evil laugh)! To create my Secret Potions… I took the essence of classic champagne and wine, and boiled them down in to liquid spells that with a little dropper full, transforms these mild mannered glasses of champagne and wine into liquid spells for infatuation, mind control and sedation.
These cocktails are based of iconic cocktails that I dissected down to the very essence, then recombined them, fortified and more powerful then ever to create The Antidote! – I have found the cure to a boring Halloween Party. With the Antidote, I can transform these unsuspecting glasses of soda water, ginger ale and orange juice into new creations – The Cape Fear, Creepy Old Man and Ta-Kill-Ya Sunset!
I’ve taken my signature Alien Secretion cocktail created for this year’s Oscars and recalculated composition to turn them into cocktails that are truly out of this world for Halloween. These three unique cocktails have pose an very interesting dilemma when drinking… you have to eat the Alien Skin (flavored gelatin discs) off of the top in order to access the secretion below; classic alien secretion, galactic serpent, Martian sunrise!
Find more great ideas for a killer Halloween party here.
Recipes for Mad Scientist Bar below…
Specimen Punch
· 1 part Midori Melon Liqueur
· 1 part Dark Rum
· 1 part Light Rum
· 2 part White Cranberry Juice
· 1 part Unfiltered Apple Juice
· 1 part Simple Syrup
- Ice Hands – To Make Frozen Hand:
Add food color to water until you reach desired color. Fill glove with water, fastening end with a twist tie or rubber band. Hang glove from a shelf in the freezer and freeze overnight. When frozen, pull glove from ice and place “hand” in the punch.
Antidote Shots (Syringes) – Deconstructed Cocktails
- Cape Fear – Cranberry Juice, Vodka & triple sec
- After Midnight – Black Vodka & Pomegranate Juice
- Alien Secretion – Melon liquor, Pineapple & Rum
- Creepy Old Man – Burbon, dash of vanilla, triple sec
- Ta-Kill-Ya Sunset – Tequila, triple sec & Grenadine
- Gin Ricketts – Gin & Lime Juice
MIXERS – Soda Water, Tonic Water, White Cranberry Juice, White Grape Juice, Ginger Ale, lemon lime soda
Secret Potions (Medicine Jars w/ Droppers)
- Infatuation – Pom Juice & Eldeflower Liquor
- Revenge – Brandy & 151 rum, pineapple juice
- Mind Eraser – cognac, triple sec
- Sedation – lavender infused gin, lime juice, simple syrup
- Adrenaline – pear vodka, pear puree
Hallo-Tinis
- Bloody Cosmo
- White Cosmo w/ strawberry glazed rim
- Orange vodka
- White cranberry juice
- Triple sec
- Lime juice
- White Cosmo w/ strawberry glazed rim
- Black Magic
- Black cosmo w/ dark kayro syrup & orange sugar rim
- Blavod Black Vodka
- Pomegranate juice
- Triple sec
- Lime juice
- Black cosmo w/ dark kayro syrup & orange sugar rim
- Poison Apple
- Spike cider with caramel rim
- Apple Vodka
- Hard Apple Cider
- Goldshalager
- Spike cider with caramel rim
Oct 20, 2011 | Categories: Master Mixology ® | Tags: Alien Skin, Alient Secretion, Better, Better TV, Beverages, Beverages and Food, Cape Fear, champagne, Concoctions, Creations, Creepy concotions, Creepy Old Man, Dropper, Entertaining Spaces, Eyeballs, Food, Ginger Ale, Goggles, Gummy Bugs, Halloween, Halloween Parties, Halloween Party, holidays, Hollywood, Infatuation, Lab, Lab Coat, Labels, Laboratory, Liquid Spells, Mad Scientist, Mad Scientist Bar, Mind Control, mixology, orange juice, Oscars, parties, Potions, Radio Active Punch, Scream, Secret Potions, Sedation, Setting the stage, Soda Water, Specimen Punch, Ta-Kill-Ya Sunset, The Antidote, Wine, Worms, WOW | 2 Comments »
The French Guillotini

The French Guillotini Cocktail
I wanted to create a playful and somewhat macabre cocktail for Bastille Day this year that was a take on a classic French cocktail. Champagne cocktails seemed very fitting especially as we were going over my friend Shalini’s house a Bastille Day dinner party, an admitted Francophile and lover of champagne.
I found my inspiration for the Guillotini in the French 75 cocktail made from gin, champagne, lemon juice and sugar. The drink was originally concocted in the Franco-American war by mixing champagne with cognac as it was readily available and the combination was said to have such a kick that it felt like being shelled with the powerful French 75mm howitzer artillery piece, also called a “75 Cocktail”, or “Soixante Quinze” in French. The gin version was popularized in America at the Stork Club.
Ingredients:
5 oz. Brut Champagne
1 oz. Fine Champagne Cognac
Superfine Suger
Maraschino Cherry w/ juice
Tools:
Cocktail Spoon
Two Shallow Dishes
Champagne Flute
One Ounce Shot Glass or Jigger
Use a tall dramatic champagne flute as it will heighten the spectacle of the presentation. Poor a small amount of the cherry juice and superfine sugar in separate shallow dishes just wide enough to dip the rim of the flute. First dip the rim in the juice then quickly in the sugar and immediately righten the glass. If done properly the sugar will melt in the cherry juice and start to drip down the edge of the glass (this is actually a good thing for this cocktail). You might need to practice once or twice until you achieve the perfect effect. Now carefully pour the cognac into the glass and slowly fill the remainder of the class with champagne. To complete the garnish slice a cherry in half an then almost in quarters leaving the two parts connected at the top. Slip the cherry on the rim and you have a gruesome but delicious French Guillotini. The sweetness of the sugar rim with the bold flavor on the cognac give this cocktail a sweet kick… ‘off with their heads’ and down the hatch.
Aug 17, 2009 | Categories: Master Mixology ® | Tags: bar, bartending, Bastille Day, beheaded francophile, champagne, champagne cocktails, champagne flute, champagne glass, cherries, cherry juice, classic cocktails, cognac, drinks, French, French 75, French Revolution, Guillotine, maraschino, maraschino cherries, Marie Antoinette, mixology, off with there heads, party drinks, Queen of France, Shalini, sugar rim | 1 Comment »














