‘Twas the night before a blog deadline, and all through the bar, Odd Bacchus was stirring some cocktails bizarre.

The booze was poured in the shaker with care, but the result would only be drunk on a dare.

Being a seasonal kind of guy, I planned on extolling the virtues of the Chimayó in this blog post. This cocktail, first brought to my attention by former Wall Street Journal cocktail columnist Eric Felten, combines tequila, unfiltered apple cider, crème de cassis (black currant liqueur) and fresh-squeezed lemon juice. I had all the ingredients on hand, and what could go wrong?

Well, something unpleasant happened between the shaker and the glass, because lovely though this cocktail to the right may look, it tasted like sour menthol smoke berries. My theory is that the gold tequila I used was inappropriate for this drink, and that silver might suit it better. But who knows? I am bereft of silver tequila at the moment, and Mr. Felten doesn’t specify the type of tequila in his article. Come on, Eric! I expected more from you.

Having completely failed at making a palatable Chimayó, it was time for Plan B. I took out a jar of vodka I’d infused with lemon-thyme, a wonderful herb a coworker gave me from her garden. Doesn’t that sound tasty? I poured a little in a glass and took a whiff. “Lemon Pledge” was the first thing that came to mind. A sip confirmed it: I’d made a jar of Lemon Pledge vodka.

Determined to salvage this unfortunate infusion, I tried mixing it with the unfiltered apple cider, a bit of lemon juice and some crème de cassis. Lemon and black currant can go really well together, and since this was a modified version of Felten’s Chimayó recipe, I had high hopes. My optimism proved to be unfounded, however. This cocktail, despite its entirely natural set of ingredients, tasted like chemical lemon candy and purple. Yes, its flavor was revolting enough to induce momentary synesthesia.

With single-minded but sadly misguided zeal, I soldiered on and made one more attempt to create something someone — anyone — might want to drink. I simplified the recipe, using just the lemon-thyme vodka, lemon juice and crème de cassis. The result stunned me with the sheer power of its noxiousness. How could so simple and natural a drink be so overwhelmingly disgusting? I gingerly tried another sip. Indeed, there was no denying the abhorrent flavor, an abomination which I took to be some sign of the End of Days. I spat it into the sink, followed by a spew of unholy expletives unprintable in a blog viewable by the general public.

Although I discovered no new cocktails to recommend on this blog, I did develop a new-found respect for professional mixologists. Tip your bartenders well, dear readers — their job isn’t as easy as it looks.

Much ado has been made about matching wine with food, but can be just as exciting to experiment with pairing cocktails. Unfortunately, while many wine bars and restaurants have sommeliers who create course-by-course wine pairings, it’s rare to find a suggested menu of spirits or cocktails to go with that prix fixe.

I’m really excited to see someone attempting to rectify that situation. Clint Rogers, the spirits director at Henri, is organizing a “Spirited Dinner Series” here in Chicago. He’s enlisted some top local mixologists to create a flight of cocktails based on a single spirit, such as whiskey or gin, to go with a particular dinner menu.

Chicago cocktail connoisseurs, mark these dates on your calendars:

December 5: Cognac cocktails by Michael Simon and his team, served with dinner at Carriage House.

January 23: Gin cocktails by Danny Shapiro and his time, served with dinner at Scofflaw.

For reservations, call (312) 578-0763. Each Spirited Dinner costs $100 per person (excluding tax and gratuity) and begins at 6:00 p.m.

Alas, we missed October’s whiskey dinner, but at least we can look at the menu and imagine what fun it must have been:

Cocktail 1: Troubadour (Eagle Rare, Punt e Mes, Aperol, Cynar, celery bitters); paired with house-made pancetta with pickle, orange

Cocktail 2: Whitman (Buffalo Trace, Cardamaro, BLiS Maple, Allspice Dram, egg); paired with skin salad with horseradish, black pepper

Cocktail 3: Torrid Affair (Weller Antique 107, Amaro Nonino, lime, cinnamon, Champagne), paired with monkfish with olive, apple, cress

Cocktail 4: Ramos Creole Cocktail (Very Old Barton 100 proof, Dry Curaçao, demerara, Peychaud’s bitters, Angostura bitters, absinthe), paired with venison with Roquefort, smoked fig

Cocktail 5: Sleeping Jolly Pecker (ingredients unknown); paired with buckwheat cannelle with glazed seckel pears, Peychaud’s caramel, Greek yogurt sorbet

Woo! Yum.

This time of year, big orange squash are inescapable, whether you’re beset by pumpkin scones at Starbucks or pestered by pumpkin-flavored beers at the bar. I admit, I get into the spirit of things a bit, ordering an annual pumpkin spice latte (one a year is enough) and occasionally even making pumpkin crème brûlée, which gives me an excuse to use my kitchen blow torch.

Now, here is where I would ordinarily start writing about how I experimented with various recipes for pumpkin cocktails to serve at your Halloween party, and how I discovered a fantastic recipe. Alas, I had neither the time nor the palate to do anything of the kind. Perhaps I’ll come up with something original for Halloween next year, but in the meantime, I’ve assembled a collection of other people’s pumpkinlicious cocktails sure to tickle your gourd. Why carve a pumpkin when you can just drink one?

TheSpir.it always has commendable cocktail recommendations. For your Halloween pleasure, you might start with some homemade pumpkin vodka.

But then, why make your own pumpkin vodka when you can just buy some at the store? After all, it’s a little late to start this stuff from scratch.

Now that you’ve obtained your pumpkin vodka one way or the other, it’s time to start mixing. I recommend consulting TheSpir.it’s list of five pumpkin cocktails, most of which sound actually rather good.

Or better yet, invest in a bottle of Corsair Pumpkin Spice Moonshine. This white whiskey is apparently “great in a Manhattan,” and heck, goodness knows I’d drink it. You can also find Corsair’s recipes for Pumpkin Spiced Punch and a Pumpkin Pie Martini here.

But this being Halloween, you’ll want to drink something really, really scary. I’ve sipped a lot of scary things over the years, but surely pumpkin wine ranks among the very scariest.

Boo!

As is often the case, the name of this liqueur sounds better in Italian. “Liquore di mirto” has more power to stir the heart than “myrtle berry liqueur.” Myrtle berry liqueur sounds like something I might try for the blog, since I haven’t the faintest idea what a myrtle berry even tastes like, but it’s not something I would see in a liquor store and snatch off the shelf. I tend to be suspicious of berry-flavored liqueurs — they’re usually just too syrupy and sweet, occasionally veering towards the medicinal.

But on a cruise this past April, I had a port of call in Sardinia, the Mediterranean’s second-largest island. I knew of three Sardinian specialties. First, wine made from the Cannonau grape, which one can find in the U.S. fairly easily. Second, Casu Marzu, a cheese made more… ripe? is that the word? …by allowing fly larvae to grow in the cheese and partially digest it. The cheese is typically consumed when the larvae are still alive. I consider myself strong of stomach, but after seeing a video of this cheese in action, I knew this option was out.

That left mirto, and I was determined to find some. Our guide, after showing us some mysterious megalithic ruins and picturesque resort towns, took me to a supermarket in a strip mall, and I procured a bottle. It was worth the effort.

I opened it recently with Scott, who assisted me with the Cherry Pie Martini, and we took a sip, not really knowing what to expect. It tasted of ripe cherries, something herbal, like eucalyptus perhaps, and cinnamon on the finish. It was positively delightful, both at room temperature and chilled (how it’s usually served).

It seemed a shame to mix it with anything, but when alcohol is involved, shame is a feeling I can easily overcome. Gin seemed the most obvious place to start, since its botanicals would likely work well with the herbal qualities of the mirto. We came up with a very simple and absolutely delicious cocktail, which we dubbed, for better or worse, the Mirtini.

MIRTINI

2 parts gin (I used Death’s Door)

1 part mirto

1/2 part fresh-squeezed lemon juice

Combine the above in a shaker filled with ice, agitate, and strain into a chilled martini glass. Garnish with a twist of lemon, if you’re feeling extra fancy. The drink starts with bright notes from the botanicals in the gin and moves into the more grounded, darker notes of the mirto before finishing with a flash of brandied cherries and cinnamon. The lemon holds it together, providing necessary texture and enhancing the flavors.

We thought the cherry notes of the mirto could also work with something brown, in the manner of a Manhattan. Cognac seemed like a good place to start, since brandy and cherries seem made for each other. Here we used mirto in the place of sweet vermouth in a Manhattan, and came up with, if you’ll forgive us, the Mirhattan.

MIRHATTAN

2 parts Cognac

1 part mirto

3-4 dashes orange bitters

Combine the above in a shaker filled with ice, agitate, and strain into a chilled martini glass. Garnish with a slice of orange peel, if you like. Scott remarked that the cocktail smelled “like expensive soap,” and I was hard pressed to disagree. Nevertheless, it tasted round, rich, spicy and sweet. It was great fun, and perfect for the cooler weather.

If you can get your hands on some mirto, by all means buy it. It’s delightful by itself, and I have a feeling the two cocktails described above are only the beginning of its mixological potential. Type in the words “mirto liqueur” into a search engine, and you’ll find some U.S. retailers which sell it, typically for $25 to $30.