Falernum with a plastic after taste? - Tiki Drinks and Food

A AceExplorer Grand Member (8 years) Deep in the Jacksonville Flori-duh jungle. Joined: Apr 03, 2008 Posts: 2564	A AceExplorer Posted posted on Tue, Apr 10, 2018 7:19 AM That's very strange. I don't think we should be too broad and say "falernum" and thereby include all falernums out there - including home made. There are huge differences in how these are all made, how they taste, how they are preserved, and how they are stored. Low-grade preservatives in the store-bought stuff can cause freshness and shelf-life issues. Same is true for how home-made is preserved and stored. It might be helpful for me to repeat some things I have said in the past: As a preservative, I add pure grain alcohol to mine. I use either EverClear brand, or the other generic brand from Total Wine, and it works great. (1.5 oz to every 12 oz of falernum) As additional preservation, I keep my falernum in my freezer. It remains fluid at zero degrees. I prefer home-made over any store-bought. Period. It has been documented that The Bum together with someone else (Martin Cate, I believe?) tested a real vintage falernum and concluded that falernum recipes #8 and #9 were super-super-close facsimiles of the original vintage stuff as you can reasonably get. This is one reason I make it at home. The other is that Taylor's is a super-weak tasting falernum and I am never confident that works in vintage tiki cocktails. From my tests, home-made always makes a nice subtle background appearance in the classics. Taylor's does not. While Fee's is MUCH better, it is still not like home-made in drinks. You can test this assertion with a Zombie, QB Cooler, Saturn, Rum Barrel and more. My shelf life is superb as a result of the above. We've discussed preservation of stuff in other threads, including in the other falernum thread(s). Sorry about the anti-Taylor's pro-home-made rant. Good falernum is one of my secrets to success, so I like to encourage others to spend time in the kitchen and make their own.

That's very strange. I don't think we should be too broad and say "falernum" and thereby include all falernums out there - including home made. There are huge differences in how these are all made, how they taste, how they are preserved, and how they are stored. Low-grade preservatives in the store-bought stuff can cause freshness and shelf-life issues. Same is true for how home-made is preserved and stored. It might be helpful for me to repeat some things I have said in the past:

As a preservative, I add pure grain alcohol to mine. I use either EverClear brand, or the other generic brand from Total Wine, and it works great. (1.5 oz to every 12 oz of falernum)
As additional preservation, I keep my falernum in my freezer. It remains fluid at zero degrees.
I prefer home-made over any store-bought. Period. It has been documented that The Bum together with someone else (Martin Cate, I believe?) tested a real vintage falernum and concluded that falernum recipes #8 and #9 were super-super-close facsimiles of the original vintage stuff as you can reasonably get. This is one reason I make it at home. The other is that Taylor's is a super-weak tasting falernum and I am never confident that works in vintage tiki cocktails. From my tests, home-made always makes a nice subtle background appearance in the classics. Taylor's does not. While Fee's is MUCH better, it is still not like home-made in drinks. You can test this assertion with a Zombie, QB Cooler, Saturn, Rum Barrel and more.

My shelf life is superb as a result of the above.

We've discussed preservation of stuff in other threads, including in the other falernum thread(s). Sorry about the anti-Taylor's pro-home-made rant. Good falernum is one of my secrets to success, so I like to encourage others to spend time in the kitchen and make their own.

Post #785852 by AceExplorer on Tue, Apr 10, 2018 7:19 AM