COCKTAIL CHRONICLES: THE “MIDORI” SOUR aka Japanese Slipper
Time to move on. I was intrigued by the idea of a Midori sour but Midori liquor is impossible to get here in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Therefore, I did a lot of research and came up with the original creation below.
"MIDORI" SOUR aka Japanese Slipper
Spirits: 1.5 parts Gin OR Blanco Tequila (see notes below)
Liqueurs: .5 Part Grand Marnier
Fruit: 1 part Lemon; 1.5 parts Cantaloupe
Sweets: .5 parts Simple syrup
Bitters: .5 part Egg white (optional)
Sodas: None (but can be optionally added to turn this into a Highball/Fizz style cocktail; see notes below)
Shake all ingredients together WITHOUT ice aka do a ‘dry’ shake first to foam up the cocktail. Then add ice and shake again. Pour into a glass over ice. If omitting the egg white, simply shake all ingredients together with ice and pour into a glass over ice. If turning into a highball style fizz cocktail, top up in the glass with 4 ounces of soda. Enjoy.
On the nose, the gin dominates. But on the palate, the smooth sweet melon flavors take hold along with the gin’s botanicals, followed by sweet lemon drop and then finally the gin’s botanicals linger on the palate only to fade out and let the melon sweetness return. Nice.
Midori is of course the famous sweet Japanese melon liqueur produced using muskmelon and Yubari melons aka the Japanese versions of what we call cantaloupe. The liquor’s green color might fool you into thinking that honeydew is the main flavor but it is in fact cantaloupe that we’re after. To be honest, that artificial neon green color turns me off and I’d rather not use Midori even if I could get my hands on it. Rather than attempt to make a steeped Midori style liquor which would take time, I chose to use both fresh cantaloupe juice and simple syrup in the cocktail instead to replicate the flavors.
Getting cantaloupe juice is easy as long as you have a hand press citrus juicer and not a reamer. All you have to do is take a few cantaloupe chunks and put them into a hand press citrus juicer and squeeze away until you have the required amount of cantaloupe juice.
The biggest issue was deciding which spirit to use as the cocktail place. The original Midori Sour/Japanese slipper calls for just Midori liqueur so a neutral spirit base would have made sense but for the fact that I abhor vodka. So the next obvious choices would be brandy, gin or tequila. I found that gin gives a nice savory menthol like note thanks to the juniper and the botanicals whereas the Tequila actually helped punch up the melon and the lemon flavors quite a bit more and added a touch of smokiness. It really depends on your personal tastes. I was surprised that the Gin version actually tastes a touch sweeter than the Tequila version, I was expecting it to be the other way around. I liked both variations equally but they’re very different and if I was forced to choose between them I’m surprised to find myself going with the Gin version.
I know absolutely nothing about Gin. What research I’ve done shows that there seems to be two streams of thinking in crafting gin. The first is “less is more” where Juniper and as few botanicals as possible are used to make a very dry herbal style. Tanqueray, for example, uses a mere four botanicals. The other is “more is more” where as many different botanicals as possible are used to create a unique gin. On top of that, you also have to choose between the large commercial brands and the craft distillers. I hedged my bets and chose a half bottle of Bombay Sapphire to start crafting gin cocktails with as it is a known high quality commercial brand but uses a large number of botanicals. I will likely go with a craft artisinal gin after my half bottle of Bombay Sapphire is done.
Tasting it straight, I have to say that Gin is probably the only spirit I would never drink straight. I appreciate the herbal flavors but I feel they work best mixed in cocktails. I feel Chartreuse is much more enjoyable overall as a straight herbal liqueur when I’m in the mood for that. In fact, it might be interesting using Chartreuse as the base spirit in this cocktail.
My next cocktail is an updated version of the Pennicillin that doesn’t require the hassle of making ginger honey syrup beforehand but does require a little bit of extra care due to the use of fresh grated ginger:
PENNICILLIN
Spirits: 2 Parts Scotch Whisky BONUS VARIATIONS: 1 Part Rum + 1 Part Bourbon; or 2 Parts Bourbon only (see notes below)
Liqueurs: none
Fruit: 1 part Lemon
Sweets: .5 Fresh honey
Bitters: 1 tsp fresh grated ginger
Sodas: None
Place the Scotch whisky, lemon juice and honey in a shaker and stir very gently with a spoon until the honey is dissolved. This won’t take more than a few seconds. Drop in the freshly grated ginger. Fill the shaker with ice. Double strain through the shaker and a hand held mini sieve to ensure no ginger root shreds end up in your drink into a glass filled with ice. Enjoy.
As one of the very few popular Scotch cocktails around, I had to give this a try. On the nose, the ginger and honey dominate. On the palate, sweet creamy barley hits first followed by honey sweetness, lemon tartness, and then spicy ginger which lingers long into the finish. Very nice but you better really like the taste of fresh ginger if you want to enjoy this cocktail.
The original recipe for a standard Pennicillin calls for you took together your own honey-ginger syrup which IMHO is a complete waste of time. No matter how much or how little you make, you now have an ingredient that is only useful for either making more Pennicillins or you hope a food dish or dessert that happens to require both honey and ginger in it. Not to mention that it will lose its freshness just sitting around in the bottle. Better to just use straight honey and fresh shredded ginger.l
This cocktail is essentially just a classic Scotch whisky sour kicked up with the addition of honey instead of sugar and fresh ginger. The fresh ginger does provide quite the bite, even just a little teaspoon full, so be prepared. If your idea of a ginger flavored drink is commercial canned ginger ale, this is going to be a shock. It’s closer to a high end ginger beer.
Speaking of which, feel free to add 4 ounces of soda to turn this into a highball style drink.
I have pretty much exited the Scotch whisky scene on principle due to what I feel is overpricing and the general ripping off of the consumer but decided to pick some up for the specific purposes of making Scotch based cocktails. I chose the Chivas Regal 18 which I thought was a good choice for a high quality base yet still relatively affordable at $100 CDN. It’s actually a very good whisky and I’d be happy to sip it on its own with a single rock as well.
If you’re going to go high-end as I did with the liquor, don’t cheap out on the honey and the lemon. Use some artisanal preferably local honey as I did and freshly squeezed lemon juice. You’ll be glad you did.
BONUS: While researching this cocktail, I came across two other interesting variations. They differed only in their spirit : the first used equal parts Rum and Bourbon and the other used Bourbon entirely to replace the Scotch whisky. My friends and I were not terribly impressed with the Rum/Bourbon variation as the combined spirits seemd to allow the ginger to take over completely making for a very hot cocktail. The fully Bourbon only variation, on the other hand, was magnificent. Where the blended Scotch lent a mellow sweetness and a touch of smoke to the cocktail, the Bourbon’s intense smokiness and caramel char went perfectly with the ginger. So much so that for me it was a genuine tossup which version I enjoyed more. I recommend giving the Bourbon variation a try as well as the Scotch variation and see which of the two you prefer. You might end up loving them both as I did.
My next cocktail is the first I’ve made to involve Sherry and it required quite the tweaking from the original:
ARTIST’S SPECIAL
Spirits: 1.5 Parts Scotch Whisky
Liqueurs: 1.5 parts Oloroso Sherry
Fruit: .5 part Lemon
Sweets: .5 Pomegranate molasses, raspberry syrup or red currant syrup
Bitters: none
Sodas: None
Place the Scotch whisky, sherry, lemon juice and fruit syrup in a shaker with ice and shake. Pour into a glass filled with ice. Enjoy.
On the nose, I get the nuttiness of the sherry and a little of the sweet whisky but no lemon or pomengranate. On the palate, the pomengranate and lemon dominate as the sherry and whisky provide the backbone. Some notes on the cocktail.
The original recipe for a standard Artist’s special calls for just 1 part each of whisky and sherry. I found this way, way too weak and completely overpowered by the lemon and pomegranate in my case, requiring me to add more of the Whisky and Sherry to balance out the cocktail with richness and nuttiness. Good decision.
The original recipe also calls for a red berry syrup with the option of pomegranate, raspberry or red currant. Now I’m not sure if the cocktail creator was using artificially flavored sugar syrup or cheap grenadine, but I used natural pomegranate molasses which is both extremely flavorful and very tart and it completely overwhelmed the sherry and Scotch with the original proportions. So I doubled the amount of Scotch and Whisky and voila, flavorful cocktail. Now you could argue that the cocktail was never intended to be made with pomegranate molasses which is just natural pomegranate syrup. I say again, if a high-end ingredient upends a cocktail, there is something wrong with the cocktail itself and not the ingredient. I would highly recommend using natural pomegranate molasses and my proportions listed above.
This cocktail is actually supposed to be a hue of bright red in color, but again, I can presume this comes from using artificially colored syrup as an ingredient. Natural pomegranate molasses is a dark reddish brown, hence the same color in my cocktail pictured below. As I was only serving myself, I cared more about flavor than appearance in this specific case so the brownish color of the cocktail really didn’t bother me and it shouldn’t bother you either.
Flashback to the 80’s for me with the Midori.
Must have drunk 1000 frozen Midori daiquiris at the Steak and Ale chain and from the home blender.
Kind of like Margaritaville. But there’s booze in the blender…
I decided to use the last of my fresh cantaloupe juice to make another “Midori” flavored cocktail with a more tropical bent for the late summer heat:
"MIDORI" ILLUSION
Spirits: 2 parts Brandy
Liqueurs: none
Fruit: 1 part Lemon; 1 part Pineapple; 1.5 parts Cantaloupe
Sweets: .25 Simple syrup
Bitters: none
Sodas: None
Place the brandy and juices in a shaker with ice and shake. Pour into a glass filled with ice. Enjoy.
On the nose, I get the fruitiness of the cantaloupe and pineapple right away. On the palate, the cocktail is surprisingly dry given the amount of fruit juice in it and the smooth cantaloupe tames the sour lemon quite a bit. The brandy comes through on the finish but the fruits are the main players here.
The biggest surprise is how dry and refreshing the cocktail is. I cut down the sweetener in half from my “Midori” sour due to the added pineapple juice and the light sweetness is perfect. The cantaloupe and pineapple and lemon play together very well in this cocktail.
I could easily see this recipe working with a substitution of either Rum or even Vodka in it.
Skipping the pic this time as there are no new ingredients to show in the photgraph. Next time.
It’s hot out here in Toronto and I was in the mood for a Tequila cocktail to beat the late summer heat:
CUCUMBER MARGARITA
Spirits: 1.5 Parts Tequila
Liqueurs: .5 Parts Grand Marnier or Cointreau
Fruit: 1 part Lime; 1 part Cucumber
Sweets: .5 Part Agave syrup
Bitters: none
Sodas: None
Place the Tequila, orange liqueur and juices in a shaker with ice and shake. Pour into a glass filled with ice. Enjoy.
The cocktail is a dark earthy green thanks to the cucumber juice. On the nose, it’s smoky tequila all the way. On the palate, Sweet agave and lime are mellowed out by the savory cucumber. Absolutely delicious.
This cocktail leans towards the sweet side as Margaritas tend to do so make sure to have plenty of ice in your glass.
To make cucumber juice, simply shred some cucumber on a grater into a sieve fitted over a bowl. Press down on the shreds with a spoon or spatulat until you extract every last drop of fresh cucumber juice.The leftover cucumber shreds can be added to homemade Tzatziki dip or a salad.
You could further change the flavor of this cocktail by switching out the Grand Marnier/Cointreau for a different flavor fruit brandy.
It’s still hot out here and I decided to go for a tropical variation of a daiquiri by adding my favorite tropical fruit of all, passion fruit:
PASSION FRUIT DAIQUIRI
Spirits: 2 Parts Rum (original calls for white rum; see notes below)
Liqueurs: none
Fruit: 1 part Lime; 1 whole Passion Fruit
Sweets: .5 Part Simple syrup
Bitters: none
Sodas: None
Cut open the passion fruit and spoon the seeds and pulp into a shaker. Add in the rum and lime juice and ice. Shake and pour over ice into a glass. Strain if you don’t want any seedlings in your drink. Enjoy either way.
The cocktail is a golden brown-yellow thanks to the dark rum and fresh passion fruit. On the nose it’s all rum. On the palate, the lime and passion fruit take center stage as the rum provides a nice intense hit of molasses and heat on the finish. The seedlings provide a nice crunch snack to finish on.
The Daiquiri traditionally calls for the abomination that is white rum to allow it to take on the color of whatever fruit you add. I used the high end Flor de Cana 18 because quality and taste were more important than appearance to me. Just be aware that using real rum will take away from the traditional crystal clear pleasing aesthetics of a traditional Daiquiri. In return, you will get actual, you know, rum flavor in your drink.
Shaking your cocktail will rip the passion fruit pulp away from its seedlings and imbue its tangy sweet tropical flavor into the drink. If you don’t care for the seeds, feel free to strain the cocktail when you pour it out into your glass. I prefer to keep the seedlings for both the contrast in appearance as the dark black seedlings settle at the bottom of the gold brown-yellow cocktail and also to munch on them afterwards. Tasty and full of antioxidant goodness for you.
COCKTAIL CHRONICLES: THE HIGH PRIEST OF CALIFORNIA
It’s the weekend so I went for a second cocktail after my Margarita to help cool me down. This time I went for an unusual tiki cocktail that uses Brandy instead of Rum as its spirit base:
HIGH PRIEST OF CALIFORNIA
Spirits: 1.5 parts Brandy; .5 parts dry Sherry
Liqueurs: none
Fruit: 1 part Lime or Lemon; .5 part Pineapple
Sweets: 1 part Orgeat
Bitters: .5 parts Campari; a few dashes bitters
Sodas: None
Shake all ingredients together and pour over ice into a glass. Feel free to use lots of ice, as this is essentially a tiki cocktail.
Creamy reddish pink in the glass. Surprisingly, the sherry dominates on the nose above all else. On the palate, fruity and complex flavors of lime, almond cream, toasted nuts and smoke with a nice bitter backbone. Really delicious.
This cocktail is the most complex I have made to date, with no less than 7 different ingredients. It’d be advisable to have everything ready to go when making this one. Trust me, it’s worth the effort.
As mentioned above, this is really unusual in that it’s essentially a tiki cocktail but uses Brandy as its base. To be honest, I’d have absolutely no problem subbing in Rum instead of the Brandy and neither should you.
I decided to take another crack at a Bourbon based cocktail and I think a classic may have helped crack the formula:
PAPER PLANE
Spirits: 1 part Bourbon
Liqueurs: 1 part 40% ABV Amaro
Fruit: 1 part Lemon
Sweets: none
Bitters:1 part Campari, Aperol, Rosso Antico, Martini Bitter or other red bitter aperitivo of your choice
Sodas: None
Shake all ingredients together with ice and pour over ice into a glass. Enjoy.
Reddish brown in the glass. Surprisingly muted on the nose. The palate is another matter, bursting with flavors of smoky bourbon, sweet fruit, coffee, and the lemon acidity to carry it all through. Smoke, bitterness and lemon on the finish lingers on.
Now this is a great Bourbon cocktail. Yes, I used my 25 YO Orphan Barrel Rhetoric and it worked perfectly. The key here to me was the 1:1:1:1 ratio. Everything was perfectly balanced and unlike my first Apricot Sour, the smoky flavorful Bourbon didn’t overpower everything else and played well together with all the other ingredients. It would be interesting to go back to the Apricot Sour and try it with just 1 part of Bourbon and 2 parts of Apricot Brandy instead.
My Amaro is a blend of equal parts Fernet Branca, Unicum, and China-China. The key here is that all three of these Amari are 40% ABV and as strong as your typical spirit. You should be wary of using Amari that clock in at 30% or less as they are using more sugar instead of alcohol to provide flavor and body. Using them just adds more sugar to this cocktail which is completely unnecessary.
Note that simple syrup is not an ingredient in this classic. It’s got more than enough sweetness from whatever red bitter aperitivo you choose, not to mention that Bourbon and Amaro taste naturally sweet on the palate as well. Any more added sweetness would overload this cocktail. That’s why you should not use an Amaro of less than 40% ABV as mentioned above.
Here’s a Brandy based cocktail named after the famous French landmark as well as the song:
CHAMPS-ELYSSES
Spirits: 2 parts Brandy
Liqueurs: 1 part Chartreuse
Fruit: 1 part Lemon
Sweets: .5 Simple syrup
Bitters:few dashes Angostura bitters (or your favorite brand)
Sodas: None
Shake all ingredients together with ice and pour over ice into a glass. Enjoy.
Light brownish in the glass. Surprisingly the Brandy carries the nose, not the herbacious and more potent Chartreuse. The Brandy and Chartreuse are the heroes here followed by the lemon acidity and the bitters just linger on the finish. Tasty cocktail but not as mind-blowing to me as the Paper Plane was. No additional notes for this one, it’s a pretty straightforward cocktail.
I used Chartreuse V.E.P. which is Chartreuse that has been cask aged for 15 years. The additional long aging gives the Chartreuse a richness and depth that makes regular Chartreuse taste like a Ricola candy. Pricy but very worth it IMHO.
Here’s a refreshing Gin cocktail to help take you out of summer and has opened me up to new possibilities:
CUCUMBER GIMLET
Spirits: 2 parts Gin
Liqueurs: .5 part St-Germain elderflower liqueur
Fruit: 1 part Lime; 1 part Cucumber
Sweets: .5 parts Simple syrup
Bitters: None
Sodas: None
Shake all ingredients together with ice and pour over ice into a glass. Enjoy.
Semi-translucent green in the glass. Subtle aromas of elderflower, cucumber and juniper. Very refreshing and balanced blend of juniper, cucumber, elderflower and lime flavors. Finish is a bit short but this is so refreshing it doesn’t matter because you’ll have another sip right away.
The Gimlet is to Gin as the Daiquiri is to Rum and the Margarita is to Tequila. It’s the basic sour cocktail formula for the base spirit of Gin. Basic but it works. Cucumber juice and St-German elderflower liqueur provide a fruity depth when combined with the lime. Great little cocktail and easy to make.
It’s been a while since I had a Rum based cocktail. Time for something a little tropical:
FLAMINGO #2
Spirits: 2 parts Rum
Liqueurs: None
Fruit: 1 part Lime; 1.5 parts Pineapple
Sweets: 1 tsp Pomegranate Molasses
Bitters: None
Sodas: None
Pour all ingredients in a shaker and stir a little first to dissolve the thick Pomegranate molasses. Then add in ice and shake vigorously. Pour into a glass over ice. Enjoy.
Semi-opaque brown like brown sugar in the glass. Beautiful head of foam that never dissipates thanks to the pineapple juice. The pineapple aromas dominate the nose, but the cocktail is actually pretty well balanced between the pomegranate, lime, rum and pineapple flavors. Not too sweet as there is no added simple syrup. Nice little cocktail.
There was a previous post on using aquafaba (chickpea liquid) to create foam for a cocktail instead of egg white but there’s something even better. Pineapple juice naturally produces a long-lasting foam that lasts as long as your cocktail does. Of course, unlike egg white or aquafaba, pineapple juice completely flavors your cocktail with, well, pineapple flavor. So you have to like that flavor if you want to use it as an option.
Good news. Another heat wave starting this weekend in Toronto and forecast is for summer type heat to last well into September. So it’s time for a pair of refreshing sour cocktails starting with this rum based variation of the modern classic Paper Plane cocktail called the Lost Plane which I then tweaked with dry Sherry and renamed into the Avion Perdido:
AVION PERDIDO
Spirits: 1 part Rum
Liqueurs: 1 part dry Sherry
Fruit: 1 part Lemon
Sweets: None
Bitters: 1 part Amaro; 1 part Campari (or other red aperitivo)
Sodas: None
Pour all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake vigorously. Pour into a glass over ice. Enjoy.
Reddish brown in the glass. Unlike the Bourbon in the Paper Plane, the Rum takes a supporting role here. Flavors of coffee bean, toasted nuts, brown sugar, sweet red fruit, lemon and bitters. Good cocktail and well balanced.
The major aspect of this cocktail is that both Rum and Sherry are being used to emulate the effects of Bourbon. Whereas Bourbon by itself provides caramel, smoke and vanilla flavors to the Paper Plane, here Rum provides brown sugar sweetness and Sherry provides nuttiness instead of smokiness. Both are great but I must admit I prefer the smoky Paper Plane. You can’t go wrong with either cocktail, though.
Next up is a Margarita enhanced by fresh raspberries and raspberry liqueur:
RASPBERRY MARGARITA
Spirits: 2 parts Tequila
Liqueurs: .5 part Chambord or Raspberry brandy
Fruit: 1 part Lime; 10 fresh raspberries
Sweets: .5 Agave syrup
Bitters: None
Sodas: None
Pour all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake vigorously. No need to muddle, the shaking will rip the raspberries apart into the cocktail. Pour into a glass over ice, straining if desired. Enjoy.
Semi-opaque ruby red in the glass. Raspberry and agave aromas dominate. Smoky tequila, lime and fresh raspberry flavors with texture provided by the raspberry pulp and a bit of crunch from the seeds as I chose not to strain. Refreshing and tasty.
A frozen Margarita gets its texture from being blended with ice but the problem is the texture will lessen as the ice melts. Further the large amount of blended ice really dilutes the cocktail. Here, the texture is provided by the fresh raspberry pulp and never dissipates. Plus, dilution is controlled by the more minimal amount of ice in the glass that you fully control.
Raspberry seeds aren’t to everyone’s liking so feel free to strain out the seeds by double straining into your glass. Just be aware that you will also lose a great deal of raspberry pulp as well if you choose this option. I prefer to keep the seeds.
My next cocktail is a rather complex Bourbon based sour to which I have made an interesting alteration based upon my experiences with the Apricot Sour:
BILLIONAIRE
Spirits: 1 part Bourbon; 1 part Canadian Whisky (original calls for 2 parts Bourbon)
Liqueurs: .25 Absinthe
Fruit: 1 part Lemon
Sweets: .5 Simple syrup
Bitters: .5 Campari, Aperol, Rosso Antico or any red aperitivo
Sodas: None
Pour all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake vigorously. Pour into a glass over ice. Enjoy.
Reddish brown in the glass. Tastes of smoke, tobacco, cream, licorice, herbs, and sweet red berries. Very nice sour cocktail with more complexity than usual.
This is my first use of Absinthe in a cocktail. Some consider it a liqueur, others consider it a bitter. I consider it more of a liqueur due to the very high ABV, even higher than that of green Chartruese and matching a cask strength spirit. I was expecting it to be herbal based on the complex ingredient list but the most predominant flavor is actually anise, to the point where I honestly felt that a Pastis liqueur could also do the job. My internet research shows that Pastis was in fact invented when Absinthe was hard to acquire. Feel free to substitute as you like.
The original Billionaire cocktail calls for 2 parts Bourbon. Based on my experience of the Orphan Barrel Rhetoric 25 YO Bourbon overwhelming the Apricot Sour, I decided to split the spirit base into equal parts of the hefty Rhetoric and the Gooderham & Wort’s Wellington 49 19 YO Canadian Whisky. Right call. I get the classic smoke, char and sweet vanilla from the Bourbon tamed by the creamy backbone of the Canadian Whisky. I will likely use this combo for future mixing when Bourbon is called for.
You will find many recipes on the Internet for the Billionaire that calls for grenadine instead of a red aperitivo. My research shows that this is either a widespread error or possibly an attempt to get by with a cheaper ingredient in the cocktail. Either way, it is incorrect. It is the Millionaire cocktail that calls for grenadine syrup and the Billionaire that calls for an Italian red aperitivo. Proportions for the Millionaire are exactly the same as above just substituting in grenadine for the aperitivo. would advise using pomegranate molasses instead to at least get genuine pomegranate flavor.
COCKTAIL CHRONICLES: COME SEE THE PARADISE – AN ORIGINAL COCKTAIL
I finally feel confident enough to do an attempt at a wholly original cocktail that hasn’t been done before. I even gave it its own pretentious name so it has to be good! Behold my creation:
COME SEE THE PARADISE
Spirits: 2 parts Gin
Liqueurs: .5 St-Germain
Fruit: .5 part Lemon; 1 whole Passion fruit (either small purple or a larger Grenadilla will do)
Sweets: .5 Agave syrup
Bitters: .5 Campari, Aperol, Rosso Antico or any red Italian aperitivo
Sodas: None
Scoop the pulp and seeds of 1 whole passion fruit into your shaker. Add the rest of the ingredients and fill with ice. Shake vigorously for several seconds. The whip action will crush the passion fruit pulp and extract its juice, but you may certainly muddle before shaking if you wish. Pour into a glass over ice, straining it if you don’t want to munch on the passion fruit seeds. The pitch black seeds do make a a nice visual contrast in the glass, however, as they fall to the bottom of the cocktail. EIther way, enjoy.
Bright yellow reddish in the glass. Passion fruit dominates the nose with a slight touch of juniper. In the mouth, lovely refreshing tastes of passion fruit, juniper, elderflower, bitters and red berries. Very refreshing.
This is my first wholly original cocktail. It is not taken from any other source, nor is it a variation of a previously existing one. A Google search aftewards for the terms gin, passionfruit, St-Germain and Campari yields some that are surprisingly close like the Old Friend, Sun Fruit, but not close enough. I have succeeded. Mine is different enough that I can claim it is a true original. Yay me.
This is a fruit forward cocktail and the gin is a supporting player, not the star of the show. It leans towards the tropical but is not quite a tiki cocktail as it lacks orgeat or coconut cream. However, I could certainly see this working with either addition and changing out Gin for some Rum.
I used Agave syrup for its flavor profile but you could certainly use plain old simple syrup if you wished.
The cocktail shaker I use is a stainless steel Trudeau cocktail shaker. It’s a cobbler style shaker with built in strainer and cap/2 oz measure. If you Google it up you will see that they have since updated the design twice. The first time to be less rounded and more angular. Presumably so that it looks like something designed in the era of smartphones and tablets and not the 1970’s. The second time was to print recipes on the outer layer of the cup and add a useless second steel jacket with little oval windows so you can read the recipes. My personal feeling is that they should have stopped at the second angular design and not gone with their latest iteration which looks kitschy and is a huge step backwards IMHO. Anyhow, here are my pics of my shaker below:
Time for another cocktail found on the Internet. This is a Rum sour variation that might appeal to people :
KING’S JUBILEE
Spirits: 2 parts Rum
Liqueurs: 1 part Maraschino liqueur
Fruit: 1 part Lemon
Sweets: None
Bitters: None
Sodas: None
Shake all the ingredients together with ice. Pour over ice into a glass. Enjoy.
Light gold brown in the glass. The Maraschino dominates the nose. Tastes of brown sugar, almonds, cherry essence and lemon. Well integrated and evenly balanced cocktail. Tasty but not necessarily exciting.
This Rum sour variation relies on Maraschino liqueur and it’s a make or break deal. The Maraschino is either the hero or the villain of the cocktail depending on how much you enjoy that flavor. If you like it, you’ll enjoy that cocktail. If you don’t, you’re going to hate this. IMHO there really isn’t any two ways about this as Maraschino is the only igredient that separates this from a traditional Rum sour.
If you don’t have Maraschino liqueur on hand there’s a couple of easy substitutions you can use instead. The first is 1 part syrup from a jar of Maraschino cherries. The other is 1 part Kirsch and .5 parts simple syrup. In case you didn’t realize, Maraschino liqueur is in fact nothing more than a mix of Kirsch and simple syrup.
So you have to like that flavor if you want to use it as an option.
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Behold my creation:
