Give your hot chocolate an adult twist with these boozy recipes

Four Roses has announced the release of its 2026 Limited Edition Small Batch Bourbon next month — and this year’s batch reaches back further than any prior release, blending bourbons aged 14 to 23 years.

The new blend from the Lawrenceburg-based distillery combines four hand-selected batches across three of the distillery’s ten recipes: 14-year-old OBSK, 14-year-old OESK, 15-year-old OESV, and a 23-year-old OESK. It’s non-chill filtered and bottled at barrel strength, 109.2 proof.

As a New England WASP, I probably have a hereditary fondness for grand old rooms. My Boston Brahmin forebears, after trading religious zeal for mercantile ambition, liked nothing better than sipping claret, playing whist, and smoking cigars in their clubhouses on Beacon Hill. In private quarters adorned with mahogany paneling, maritime paintings, and marble fireplaces, my flinty ancestors chortled deep into the night—safely removed from wives, papists, and, God forbid, Yale men.

Since moving to New York City, I’ve delighted in finding bars that feel like clubhouses frozen in the Gilded Age. The Campbell in Grand Central comes to mind. The Rose Club at the Plaza. Although much newer, the Polo Bar gussies up the blue-blood clubhouse aesthetic with fabulous fare, a trophy-laden wine cellar, and an ultra-exclusive mystique. But the apotheosis of robber-baron extravagance is The Gold Room at Lotte New York Palace.

When you think about the flavor of beer, what do you imagine? To me, it’s a crisp, refreshing, no-frills lager. The type of beer you’d just as likely crack open on an unseasonably warm spring day while grilling as you would after an afternoon of mowing the lawn on a hot, hazy, humid summer day. It’s light, refreshing, and tastes like beer.

That’s not to say that there isn’t a place for chocolate- and coffee-centric porters or boozy, barrel-aged stouts, or even tart, lip-smacking sour beers. There is a time and place for those and many other styles. It’s just that sometimes I want to crack open a beer and not taste an explosion of tropical fruit juices or get bashed in the head with malts or oaky wood. I want a beer that tastes the way I imagine it should. Specifically, I’m thinking about a balanced, thirst-quenching lager.