Calvados Cocktail will jack you up

Salt Lake City cocktailians who read these posts should be familiar with the Savoy Cocktail Book (1930), one of the classic cocktail books written at the height of Prohibition by the great Harry Craddock, barman at The American Bar in the Savoy Hotel.  Regular readers will recall the recent post on the Golden Dawn cocktail, where Laird’s® Apple Jack (CS# 053536) was substituted for Calvados French apple Brandy.  While the Utah DABC stores’ product list contains many different authentic Calvados, most retail for around $50 a bottle.  While these are great for sipping, the Laird’s makes a good substitute in most cocktails.  Thumbing through the Savoy book in the hope of finding another Calvados-based cocktail led to the discovery of a cocktail named after the Calvados itself.

The original Savoy recipe serves six, so unless you are hosting a party you will want to scale the recipe down a bit.  Fortunately, the proportions given are easily amenable to reduction, so a recipe for a single serving follows.  Readers will be surprised by the amount of Bitters that the recipe calls for.  While some of my recipes in these pages call for more Bitters than you are probably used to (the Rapture comes to mind), nowhere do they approach ¾ ounce in a single serving! If you’re worried about the Bitters, I recommend mixing the drink with about half the amount in the recipe, sampling it, and then adding more Bitters if you think it works.  The mixture of apples and oranges in this cocktail is quite good, and the Bitters offset the sweetness to give the cocktail more depth.  Finding good Bitters is always a problem in Utah, I used Regan’s® Orange Bitters #6 that I purchased over the internet, but if you have a local source, please post a response and let us all know.

Calvados Cocktail

• 1 ½ oz Calvados or Apple Jack
• 1 ½ oz Orange Juice (fresh squeezed if possible)
• ¾ oz Cointreau®
• ¾ oz Orange Bitters

Add the ingredients to a shaker 2/3 full of ice.  Shake vigorously until well chilled.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail class.  Garnish with a twist of Orange, or use a wedge or a slice.