For Facing The Great Outdoors

The summit of Vermont’s Killington Mountain isn’t high on most people’s list of hospitality hot spots. Rivalling its neighbor, Mt. Washington, in temperature, wind velocity and general meteorological homeliness, Killington does, however, possess one very distinct and enticing advantage: There’s a bar up there, a very friendly bar, where hundreds of skiers a day find fuel and fortitude for the long trip down.

   On my first trip up there, more than 30 years ago, when I asked the bartender for “something to heat up the central core,â€� he took a pot off a hotplate, poured a shot of something I couldn’t see into a coffee cup and drowned some indeterminate garnishes with  some of the contents of the pot, and set it before me. The steam that hit my nostrils made my toes curl and the taste?

   Well, let’s just say I did not get my money’s worth from my lift ticket for the remainder of the afternoon.

   Although they would like you to think so, I’m not sure Killington’s bartenders were the first people to blend hot apple cider, ginger brandy, a thin wedge of orange and a cinnamon stick; they may, however, have been the first ones to call it a broken leg, most likely because that was what you were asking for, parenthetically, when you ordered a third one before heading out the door. Broken legs are no longer made one by one over a hotplate; they’ve become so popular up there, a large, custom-built receptacle the size of an oil drum dispenses gallons over the course of a lunch hour. And I think they’ve cut down on the amount of ginger brandy that lands in each cup; the lawyers who now govern the sport most likely have mandated a reduction that will only sprain something, not break it.

    So here’s what you do to make some of the most fruitful, flavorful antifreeze known to personkind.

    Pour very hot apple cider over two fingers of ginger brandy in a coffee cup. Add a cinnamon stick and a thin wedge of orange; too fat a hunk of orange ruins it. Don sheepskin slippers, find comforter and soft seat and, if possible, a working fireplace. Caveat: If you’re like me and occasionally find yourself “ingredient-challenged,â€� keep in mind that substituting something else for the brandy will radically change the drink; there is some je ne sais quois about the symbiosis of apples and ginger that should not be monkeyed with.

Next week,  Lauren Simons of Hamilton Restaurant in Millerton, NY,

turns a cocktail into dessert.