Scoring a Gibson's Touchdown

It's Grey Cup weekend and the Winnipeg Blue Bombers are facing off against the Saskatchewan Rough Riders.

My friend's son Simon Ho, who tends bar at Toronto's trendy Drake Hotel, entered a drinks competition sponsored by Gibson's whisky. He invented a drink called the Gibson's Touchdown. It won and is now billed as the official drink of the Grey Cup by Gibson's. Here's the recipe:

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice and combine:

- 1 1/2 oz. rye whisky

- 1/2 oz. orange juice

- 1/4 oz. maple syrup

- 1 oz. cranberry juice

- Dash of bitters

- Shake and serve in a rocks glass filled with ice

- Serve with pretzels or other salty snacks



I served the drink last night to friends. We discovered that the dash of bitters is an essential ingredient--otherwise the drinks turn out a bit too sweet. I used Averno bitters and served the drinks stirred rather than shaken with a slice of orange as a garnish.

We drank the tasty cocktails before dinner with cheese, crackers, spicy Thai-flavoured chips and corn chips.

One consumer of the drink was so taken with it that he wrote with the following remarks:

"Thaza darngolly good kinda drink, graycop er not. Tried er out shevral times B4 dinnar an gollyjeez that crunbry an maplesyrup an oranj shur nokkkt me fera looperoony, eh? Wifey wuz sayin givsome, givsom, tuchdone, tuchdon. Bud I sez Too late, eh? I drunk itall. We ar rye outta ran, eh, er rAnoutta rye."

Change of season

Autumnal warmth and colours have lasted an extra month so far this year. Usually by Remembrance Day we've had our first snowfall--as far as I remember . . .







Crocuses are already blooming in this Manning Avenue garden.

The Dalai Lama chats with Torontonians

The Dalai Lama spoke at the Rogers Centre in Toronto to an audience of about 16,000 people on Halloween.


He wants to promote human value, peace and harmony, he said. He spoke on a variety of topics.

"There is too much exploitation of animals," he said. "We almost treat animals like vegetables."


He spoke for just over an hour, and then took questions for another 20 minutes. The questions had been selected from ones asked on his Web site.


A translator helped the Dalai Lama when he was at a loss for English words. He also read the questions.