All the recent talk about Costco wanting to kill the state's monopoly on booze sales has some folks fantasizing about coffee cocktails. They're not a new concept, but there is a new coffee drink debuting at STIFF -- Seattle's True Independent Film Festival -- on Friday evening, created by Alex Negranza, a barista at Trabant Coffee & Chai.

Negranza will use a hand-held espresso maker called a MyPressi Twist to make espresso with Dry Fly vodka instead of water. The cocktail also includes Trabant's hibiscus-jalapeno simple syrup*, cilantro, lime and pomegranate juices. I believe that could relax you and wake you up at the same time. And there's a picture by Negranza with a bag of beans from 49th Parallel Coffee Roasters, which supplies Trabant and this particular cocktail.

He, coffee consultant Sarah Dooley and Trabant owner Mike Gregory also will serve herbal tea gin infusions at:

STIFF 2010 Opening Night Party
Friday, June 4, 2010
8:00 p.m. - 11:30 p.m.
Location: pun(c)tuation, 705A E. Pike St., Seattle, WA

The party is free, but the cocktails are only for badge holders -- and you can buy a badge there for $50, which will get you into all STIFF events through June 13, said festival director Clint Berquist.

* If you can't make it to the party but like the sound of hibiscus-jalapeno syrup, Trabant makes an Italian soda using that syrup at its University District location, where it's experimenting with making syrups in-store and at the moment also has ginger, vanilla made with blue agave and Hawaiian sea salt caramel flavors.

Here's the party:

View pun(c)tuation, site of STIFF party in a larger map

Here's the Trabant location with house-made simple syrups:

View Trabant, University District in a larger map

And here's Trabant's other location, in Pioneer Square:

View Trabant, Pioneer Square in a larger map