On Mount Sinai, God established a covenant with his people. It was a covenant etched quite literally into two stone tablets. This covenant established the relationship between God and his chosen people. On the outset, it seemed so simple. After all, God had done all the heavy lifting. He had heard their cries in the land of Egypt, brought them out with a mighty outstretched arm, enabled them to walk through the Red Sea on dry ground, and protected them in a pillar of cloud by day and fire by night. They didn’t have to earn that right; they didn’t have work towards this blessing. Instead, they are given a law, one set in stone, that would guide how they live. All they were given to do was live lives that reflected the blessings of their God. They were to have no other god’s before them, not use the Lord’s name in vain, and remember the Sabbath and keep it holy. The list, of course, goes on, but we don’t need to go much further to see that they failed to keep their end of the covenant.
Category Archive: Paul Nelson
It’s winter and perhaps you’ve bought or received a bottle of cognac or brandy as the temperatures drop. Very understandable, […]
We were hosting some new friends for dinner a few weeks back. As I prepared various drinks, the […]
You’re introduced to a new cocktail by a bartender or trusted friend. It’s magical and delicious and you […]
Cocktails are always evolving and new concoctions are constantly introduced. Considering the variety of liquors, the sheer number […]
The Drink It’s hard to believe I haven’t written about margaritas yet. Margaritas are where I began my love […]
The Drink When discussing tequila cocktails, indubitably the first one which springs to mind is the margarita (Spanish […]
The Drink A variation on the traditional Manhattan using an amaro rather than sweet vermouth. Amaro is a category […]
By Paul Nelson –
I didn’t grow up on James Bond. I wasn’t allowed to watch the movies until I was a teen, and even then it was only the edited-for-television broadcasts on ABC. I may have seen one James Bond film in the theater, and I watched Skyfall on Netflix a few years ago. But in general the films have been too over the top for my tastes, whether on the scale of explosions and car chases or in the realm of drop-dead gorgeous femme fatales. I’ve never even read any of the books.
By Paul Nelson –
Legend has it that the Negroni came to be nearly a century ago when the Italian Count Camillo Negroni asked a bartender in Florence to make his favorite cocktail, the Americano, stronger. The bartender substituted gin for the traditional soda water, resulting in the Negroni. Whether or not you believe this particular story isn’t terribly important, but it’s another example of the fascinating and by and large thoroughly unsubstantiated world of cocktail lore. It’s also an example of a classic cocktail that makes gin somewhat palatable!