As pumpkin season lands upon us with a slightly squishy thud, allow me to share this recipe for pumpkin cocktails. These are always a huge hit at Thanksgiving, but also enjoyably appropriate for Halloween. Be aware that you need to prepare in advance to give the vodka time to infuse....

There was a brief period, somewhere around my sophomore year in college, when I drank a lot of Captain Morgan spiced rum. Looking back, it's not hard to see why I fell in love with the stuff: I've always been a big fan of root beer and cream soda, and Captain Morgan was like an alcoholic cross between mulled cider and cake frosting. It was sweet and spicy, and when I mixed it with cola, it tasted like a cream soda with overtones of lighter fluid.

After about a year, the love affair was over. Part of this was the fact that my tastes had wandered away from rum, and part was the fact that Captain Morgan's had gone from refreshingly tasty to cloyingly sweet. Mostly, I think, I had learned to enjoy the flavor of liquor and was no longer interested in drowning it under a mass of sugar and spice. With tears in my eyes, I bid farewell to the Captain and shifted my focus to other shores.

My thoughts returned to the Captain recently when I tried Rogue Spirits' Hazelnut Spice Rum. The "spiced rum" moniker, combined with the fact that Edward Teach is prominently featured on the bottle, led me to anticipate an aggressively seasoned, supersweet flavor; instead, I found a delicate, mild rum with a hint of vanilla, the slightest touch of spice, and the smooth, rounded flavor of hazelnuts. To put it mildly, this was a whole other ball game.

Having now tried and retried the Rogue rum, I don't really know how to characterize it. My tastes tend toward golden rums, notably Appletons Estate, and Rogue seems mild, almost delicate by comparison. Moreover, most of the hazelnut-flavored tipples that I've consumed have been hyper-sweetened, artificial, and aggressively nutty. Rogue, on the other hand, is subtle and sly, with a flavor that tastes very natural. It's odd to describe a flavored rum as "pure," but that's a pretty good description of this spirit. Basically, it's a spiced rum for grownups, as oxymoronic as that may sound.

The downside of Rogue's delicacy is that I could very easily see the flavor getting drowned out by mixers. The distillers suggest combining it with buttershot liqueur for a "butternut," or mixing a "fuzzy nuts" with Irish cream and Amaretto. While these sound interesting, I find it hard to imagine the flavor of this rum remaining intact when combined with stronger-tasting additives. Personally, I think I'm going to stick to the occasional shot on the rocks, slowly sipped to enjoy the complex blend of flavors!

Mmmm...hot chocolate. Is there any other drink that is so tied-in and associated with a season than hot chocolate's association with winter? It truly is the comfort drink of the season.

For this happy hour, I figured I'd find something that was hot chocolate, but kicked up a notch* for the adults who read Slashfood. This Grown-Up Hot Chocolate has Ghirardelli chocolate chips and cocoa as the main ingredient, along with amaretto. You can substitute a hazelnut, orange, or coffee liqueur or peppermint schnapps or extract. The link above has a bunch of other winter cocktail recipes too, including Baroque, Glogg, and Silk Stocking.

* Seriously, I don't mean this in an "Emeril Lagasse" sort of way.

So you have to work tomorrow, how about one more drink tonight before you go to bed?

This is the Chocolate Kiev. I'm not a big vodka drinker (ever since drinking too much in one night many years ago), so I'm not familiar with vanilla vodka, but this one sounds like it has a good kick but enough chocolate sweetness too.

Chocolate Kiev

1 oz hot cocoa mix
4 oz hot milk
1 oz vanilla vodka
3/4 oz Amaretto

Combine in a mug, and stir well.

Disaronna Originale is an amaretto (almond) liqueur with 28%abv / 56 proof, it comes in a bumpy, old fashioned, rectangular bottle. Originally known as Amaretto Di Saronno, the company changed the name to Disaronno Originale a few years ago after there were some copyright issues. The liqueur is made of 17 selected herbs and fruits soaked in apricot kernel oil, and has a beautiful amber color. It is the world's best selling Italian liqueur.

The aroma is first a toasted almond scent, followed by a waft of sweeter marzipan, then a assortment of fruits, with hints of spices and herbs intermingled throughout.The taste is a bitter sweet almond and marzipan base, piled high with a mélange of fruit and spices floating hither and yon. The legend of Disaronno is quite old and involves a pretty inn keeper who models for an artist painting a cathedral, and gives him the gift of what will become amaretto liqueur. It is argued whether Disaronno is the original liqueur that can be traced back to this legend and I will let you decide.