Holy Spirits! Cocktails for Catholics by Michael P. Foley

Add some religious “spirits” to your holiday festivities with these Catholic-themed concoctions

Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine,
There’s always laughter and good red wine.
At least I’ve always found it so.
Benedicamus Domino!
—Hilaire Belloc

That’s the first thing we read in Michael P. Foley’s inventive book, Drinking With the Saints: The Sinner’s Guide to a Holy Happy Hour. After making a good case for “Catholicism’s numerous contributions to the spirit world” (he means libations, of course: a number of beers, champagnes, wines, whiskeys and especially liqueurs carry long Catholic pedigrees) and an equally strong argument in favor of responsible drinking as a convivial part of the Benedictine concept of “Holy Leisure,” Foley provides the reader with useful toasts and blessings and gets down to the business of sharing drink recipes amid saintly hagiographies.

He does this brilliantly and with astonishing thoroughness, even cross-referencing cocktails and drinks that serve multiple duties for saints throughout the Catholic calendar. Have a devotion to St. Philip Neri? In Foley’s world his May 26 feast day is a time to recall Philip’s “burning love of God” (and how it manifested physically in his heart), and how better to toast that fascinating saint than with a drink called a “Heart Warmer No. 2” (number 1 is cross-referenced to St. Francis de Sales), or another cocktail called “Heartburn”?

In Drinking With the Saints, one will celebrate Our Lady of the Rosary by reading about the victory at Lepanto and then mixing a solid “Lady Victorious” or a lugubrious-sounding (but eye-pleasing) “Turk’s Blood.” One will read about St. Dominic on his feast day and then consider a potion called not — as one might guess — the “Hair of the Dog” but rather “Master of the Hounds.”

And what of these holidays and holy days? Foley has a whole second half devoted to the seasons of Lent, Advent, Easter and Christmas (right through to Pentecost and Epiphany, respectively). Those who enjoyed our recent feature on the role rosemary would have played in the lives of the Holy Family might find Foley’s Epiphany libation to be refreshing:

ROSEMARY MARTINI

Ingredients:

• 2 ounces gin
• 1 dash vermouth
• small sprig of rosemary

Instructs Foley: “Pour all ingredients except rosemary into shaker filled with ice and shake 40 times (Foley recommends that number both for the sake of thoroughness and scriptural integrity!). Strain into cocktail glass and garnish with rosemary. “If you don’t have rosemary,” he writes, “use an olive, which will remind you of the olive orchards of Bethlehem.”

Many of us have enjoyed a hot mug of cocoa flavored with a bit of peppermint schnapps, but somehow when Foley calls that a St. Nicholas’ Helper, in honor of St. Nicholas of Myra, it all makes the sweetest sense. When he prescribes a “Three Wise Men” as equal parts Johnnie Walker, Jack Daniels and Jim Beam, one gains an entirely new perspective on Gaspar, Melchior and Balthasar.

Here, in these last days of Advent, we find ourselves torn over whether we should tonight try the Third Week of Advent specific “Pink Rose” or a Jubilee Year relevant, “Jubilee” (it’s a Bacardi Cocktail that sounds delightful), or perhaps we should try the “Mezcalicious” Foley offers for December 18, Our Lady of Solitude. Tough choice. The Pink Rose seems most tempting:

PINK ROSE
Ingredients:

1 1/2 ounce gin
1//4 ounce grenadine
1/4 ounce cream
1 egg white
1/4 oz lemon juice
Pour all ingredients into a shaker filled with ice and shake the requisite 40 times. Strain into a cocktail glass.

So many choices! Perhaps we’ll simply have a diet soft drink tonight and wait for December 22, when we can either imbibe some Holy wine after our O Antiphons, or salute the great saint, Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini with Foley’s perfectly configured recommendation: a Manhattan.

Or perhaps we will catch up on our series of pieces on the Angels of Advent while sipping this:

BLUSHING ANGEL
Ingredients:

1 1/2 ounce red Dubonnet
1 splash cranberry juice
5 ounces sparkling wine, chilled
1 lemon twist

Build Dubonnet and cranberry juice in a champagne flute (preferably chilled). Top with sparkling wine and garish with lemon.

Call it an easy route to Holy leisure. Drinking With the Saints is a fun and surprisingly reverent reference book that helps us to imbue even our most casual get-togethers with a faith perspective. It is also a fine Christmas (or host or hostess) gift.

And now, a toast from Aleteia to you, our readers. May God bless you with abundant prosperity when it comes to all the things that matter most: faith, family, friendship, love and truth. We hope you enjoy your holidays and these delicious recipes. Just remember: while God gave us the fruit of the vine as a gift for our enjoyment, we’re also called to moderation. So enjoy these gifts responsibly, and have a safe and Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!