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.

Savoy’s Depth Charge – a cocktail recipe to quiet those rumblings below

Thumbing through the Savoy Cocktail Book is always a treat.  You find recipes for classic cocktails and ones you’ve never heard of; some sound fascinating, and others you probably wouldn’t want to try.  The Depth Charge definitely had an interesting sounding name, and the recipe was fairly simple for the amateur mixologist to stir up for an evening’s enjoyment.  The Savoy can be rather vague on quantities.  In the case of the Depth Charge it calls for “½ glass” each of Dry Gin and Kina Lillet, which could be anything up to 3 ounces.  That seemed a little much, so quantities have been rounded down to a healthy 1 ½ ounces each. 

The original Savoy recipe includes Kina Lillet, which had quinine in it, but is no longer made.  You can, however, simulate Kina Lillet by adding a dash of Angostura Bitters to the mix as specified in the recipe below.  There was a bottle of Hendrick’s Gin in the bar, and the idea of combining that with the Lillet was intriguing, to say the least.  The product was a bone dry cocktail, but the bouquet of the Hendrick’s combined with the orange peel garnish was delicious, and still tasted great as the cocktail warmed a little toward the bottom of the glass.  Be sure to inhale deeply through your nose as you sip this pale yellow beauty to savor the complete package.

Depth Charge

• 2 dashes Absinthe
• 1 ½ oz Hendrick’s Gin
• 1 ½ oz Lillet
• 1 dash Angostura Bitters

Add ingredients to a mixing glass 2/3 full of ice.  Stir briskly for 20-30 seconds.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a long languorous twist of orange peel.  Enjoy!

Golden Dawn cocktail will make your day

Salt Lake City cocktailians who read these posts should be familiar with Ted Haigh’s book Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, where you can find great recipes for vintage cocktails and (possibly a greater source of enjoyment) an engaging collection of cocktail lore.  When the Utah Mixologist attended Portland Cocktail Week, he had the privilege of meeting “Dr. Cocktail,” a quiet, unassuming man who really knows his cocktails.  If you’re serious about cocktails, you should pick up a copy.

Regular readers have probably noticed that the titles of these posts usually involve an amusing play on words or turn of a phrase.  The current title was not the first one that came to mind; the first idea was “Golden Dawn will start your day with a bang.”  This title, while a little more clever, kind of sent the wrong message about the starting time for cocktail hour, so it was left on the proverbial cutting room floor.  The name “Golden Dawn” is what first interested me to this cocktail, but when I scanned the recipe, I knew I had to try it.

This is a simple recipe, with equal parts of the four main ingredients (there is an alternate recipe in the book).  I used Bombay Sapphire® for the Gin and Laird’s® Apple Jack in lieu of Calvados.  Haigh recommends Marie Brizzard® Apry apricot flavored brandy, but it is not available in Utah.  If you are aware of an available substitute better than the ubiquitous Arrow®, please post a response to this post.  The subtle way the mixture of fruit flavors (orange, apricot, apple, and grenadine) play off against each other is striking.  You can just catch a hint of the Gin and its botanicals, and the Apple Jack makes its presence known and contributes a memory of apples.

Golden Dawn

• ¾ oz Dry Gin (try Bombay Sapphire®)
• ¾ oz Laird’s® Apple Jack (or Calvados)
• ¾ oz Apricot Brandy
• ¾ oz Orange Juice
• Pomegranate Grenadine

Add the first four ingredients to a shaker 2/3 full of ice.  Shake vigorously until well chilled.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail class.  Add a cherry (Haigh recommends no stem or pick on the cherry) and finish by drizzling some of the Grenadine into the glass.

Rob Roy: this Scottish outlaw may steal your heart

While reviewing the list of cocktail ingredients on sale in Salt Lake City this month (October, 2011) and wondering what cocktail to recommend for the Dewar’s™ White Label (CS# 004866, on sale), the Utah Mixologist realized that he had never written about the venerable (Wikipedia traces it back to 1894) Rob Roy cocktail.  There is a recipe for the Rob Roy in the Savoy Cocktail Book (1930), although the proportions of Scotch to Vermouth (1:1) are not the ones in general use today (2:1). The Rob Roy is a classic Scotch Whisky cocktail, named after a famous Scottish outlaw (or after an operetta based on his life).  If you enjoy making Manhattans, you already know the recipe: just substitute Scotch Whisky for the Bourbon or Rye.

Connoisseurs of good Scotch will want to save their single malt for sipping, so any decent blended Scotch (e.g. Dewar’s™ White Label) is recommended for this cocktail.  Instead of Italian Vermouth, I ended up using my favorite sweet Vermouth (Quady Vya™, available in Utah (CS# 910764), keep it in the fridge once it’s open).  If you’re not a Scotch drinker, this cocktail will surprise you; if you’ve never had one, you’re in for a treat.  Feel free to experiment with different ingredient ratios, depending on the Scotch you’re using, and let us know the results.

Rob Roy

• 1 oz Italian Vermouth (Sweet Vermouth, like Quady Vya)
• 2 oz Scotch Whisky (use blended, like Dewar’s)
• 1 dash (1/8 teaspoon) Angostura Bitters

Pour ingredients into a mixing glass half full of cracked ice.  Stir briskly until well chilled, and strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass.  Garnish with a cocktail cherry and enjoy while it’s icy cold.

Blood and Sand cocktail will cure those Utah desert blues

Recently the Utah Mixologist wrote about the reincarnation of Salt Lake City’s venerable Bar X as a cocktail bar.  The cocktail menu included a classic cocktail found in the Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) that this mixologist had never tried: the Blood and Sand.  The Blood and Sand was created in 1922 to capitalize on the popularity of the Rudolf Valentino movie of the same name.  Researching this recipe led to Ted Haigh’s Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, where you can find a short discussion of the history of the Blood and Sand, along with an interesting variation on the recipe.  The original Savoy recipe calls for equal parts of all ingredients, and tastes pretty good, but Haigh’s recipe adds an additional quarter ounce of both OJ and Scotch and makes a perceptible improvement.

A word of warning: the color of the Blood and Sand has more sand than blood in it, which makes presentation problematic.  Cherry Heering Liqueur® is reddish in color, but once the Vermouth, Scotch, and OJ are added, you end up with a distinct, brownish hue.  So if you’re serving these to friends or at a party, try to use glasses with a complementary color or use some colorful cocktail picks to jazz things up.  Be sure to experiment with the ingredient variations given below to see which proportions work best for you.  An easy way to do this is to mix a batch using the classic from the Savoy recipe, taste it, and then add the extra quarter ounces, stir a little, and taste it again.  Post your findings here to let us all know which variation tastes best to you.

Blood and Sand (Savoy)

• 3/4 oz Orange juice
• 3/4 oz Blended Scotch (Dewars® works)
• 3/4 oz Cherry Heering Liqueur®
• 3/4 oz sweet vermouth

Fill a cocktail shaker 2/3 full of ice. Add ingredients and shake until your hand gets cold.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass.  Garnish with a cocktail (or Maraschino) cherry and ride off into the desert.

Blood and Sand (Ted Haigh variation)

• 1 oz Orange juice
• 1 oz Blended Scotch
• 3/4 oz Cherry Heering Liqueur®
• 3/4 oz sweet vermouth

Bobby Burns: a cocktail fling from the Italian Highlands

Not quite enjoying a prematurely cold November evening in Salt Lake City, the Utah Mixologist was thumbing through the Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) looking for something interesting to mix up when he stumbled across the Bobby Burns cocktail.  As always, when you’re looking for a classic cocktail to experiment with, the Savoy is a good source of cocktail inspiration.  At first glance, the Bobby Burns sounded a bit like the Rob Roy, another Scotch Whisky classic cocktail, but where warlike Rob Roy has a dash of bitters, the more poetic Bobby Burns has three dashes of Benedictine.  Connoisseurs of good Scotch will want to save their single malt for sipping, so any decent blended Scotch (e.g. Dewar’s®) is recommended for this cocktail.  Instead of Italian Vermouth, I ended up using my favorite sweet Vermouth (Quady Vya™, available in Utah (CS# 910764), keep it in the fridge once it’s open).  This interesting blend of herbals from the Vermouth and Benedictine combined with the Scotch is to be savored.  As it says in the Savoy, “One of the very best Whisky Cocktails. A very fast mover on Saint Andrews Day.” So put on your Scotland football jersey, stir up a Bobby Burns, and enjoy.  And don’t forget to have one on St. Andrew’s Day (November 30).

Bobby Burns Cocktail

1 ½  oz Italian Vermouth (Sweet Vermouth, like Quady Vya)

1 ½  oz Scotch Whisky (use blended, like Dewar’s)

3 dashes (1/3 teaspoon) Benedictine

Pour ingredients into a mixing glass half full of cracked ice.  Stir briskly until well chilled, and strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass.  Twist a piece of lemon peel over the glass, rub it lightly around the rim, and drop it in.  Enjoy while it’s icy cold.

Hanky Panky Cocktail could get you into trouble

A couple of weeks ago, the Utah Mixolgist picked up a bottle of Fernet Branca ™ (CS# 905790) at the Utah State Liquor Store, and decided to see if anyone on Twitter had some good ideas on how to use it.  He soon had a Tweet from The Intoxicologist: try the Hanky Panky.  The Hanky Panky is another classic cocktail from the Savoy Cocktail Book (1930).  The Savoy has always been a good source of cocktail inspiration.  Recently, the Mixologist wrote about Erik Ellestad’s blog and his project to recreate every cocktail recipe in the Savoy.  Well, Erik is going through the Savoy in alphabetical order, and is now up to the T’s, so finding the post on the Hanky Panky that he wrote almost two years ago was easy.  I was pleased to see that he recommended using my favorite sweet Vermouth (Quady Vya™, available in Utah (CS# 910764), keep it in the fridge once it’s open) and (this is key) using a “gin with some spine” to stand up to the fifty-fifty blend with Vermouth.  Enjoy the interaction of the Fernet with the Gin.

Hanky Panky Cocktail

2 dashes Fernet Branca.

1 ½  oz Quady Vya Sweet Vermouth

1 ½  oz (London) Dry Gin. (Tanqueray works well)

Pour ingredients into a mixing glass half full of cracked ice.  Stir briskly until your wife yells at you to stop, and strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass.  Twist a piece of orange peel over the glass, rub it lightly around the rim, and drop it in (or throw it away if you are a purist).  Enjoy while it’s icy cold.

ATTY Cocktail: Named after Attorneys or Teletypewriters?

Sometime in late June, the Utah Mixologist saw a mention of the ATTY cocktail (either on Twitter or in a news article) as a cocktail that contained Crème de Violette, a fresh bottle of which had recently been added to the bar.  Utahns should be aware that Crème de Violette is available in the Utah State Liquor system, unlike the still unavailable (well, you can special order a case) Maraschino Liqueur.  The name Atty was and is intriguing: is the cocktail named after the legal profession or an old-style teletypewriter?  And why is it usually, but not always, given in all caps like “ATTY?”  Some time spent with Google only revealed that no one seems to know the origin of the drink or its name, only that it can be found in the classic Savoy Cocktail Book (1930).  The Savoy has been a good source for cocktail inspiration, and readers may remember prior mention of Erik Ellestad’s blog and his project to recreate every cocktail recipe in the Savoy.  Well, Google also turned up Erik’s post on the ATTY, and it was very educational.  (Note: Erik has access to some high quality ingredients that are, sadly, unavailable in Utah, so I have not reproduced his ingredient list here.)

Not only had Erik experimented with the ATTY, but his experiments had resulted in a variation on the recipe that is a marked improvement by simply changing the Gin/Vermouth ratio from 3:1 to 2:1 (the proportions below are from Ellestad’s recipe).  An added bonus is that it’s quite easy for you to duplicate the experiment and taste the difference between the recipes.  Make the recipe below, but only use ½ ounce of Vermouth.  Strain into your cocktail glass and then pour an additional ¼ ounce of Vermouth into the mixing glass and let it set with the ice while you taste and savor the contents of your cocktail glass (the Savoy recipe).  Pretty good?  Now strain the extra ¼ ounce from the mixing glass into your cocktail glass and stir lightly with a stirrer straw to combine well.  (Note: if you’re alone, you can always pour from the cocktail glass into the mixing glass and re-strain the whole drink, but doing this while anyone else is present will not impress your guests.)  Now taste the difference: are the Absinthe and Crème de Violette making love or war? First one dominating and then the other?  Finally, bow toward San Francisco, toward where master mixologist Erik Ellestad lives.

ATTY Cocktail

1 ½ oz Dry Gin (Ellestad prefers mild and dry)

¾ oz Noilly Prat Dry Vermouth (see notes)

3 Dashes (½ tsp) Absinthe

3 Dashes (½ tsp) Crème de Violette

Combine ingredients in a mixing glass half full of cracked ice.  Stir until well chilled, and strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass.  Twist a piece of lemon peel over the glass, rub it lightly around the rim, and either drop it in the glass or drape it artfully over the rim.  Sip slowly and taste how the different flavor elements interact.  Heavenly.

Savoy’s Russian Cocktail harkens back to imperial Russia

Browsing William Grimes’ entertaining book Straight Up or On the Rocks: A Cultural History of American Drink has lead to the discovery of interesting cocktail recipes.  Just a month ago you had the chance to try an intriguing sounding cocktail of Rum, Dry Vermouth, and Grenadine, El Presidente, that had something a little different to offer.  Grimes’ chapter on Vodka’s takeover of the American drinking scene mentioned yet another interesting sounding recipe: the Russian Cocktail.  This Russian is neither Black nor White, but clear.  The semi-obligatory web search turned up a couple of recipes that were almost identical to the original cocktail recipe from the Savoy Cocktail Book, referenced by Grimes, which just calls for equal parts of all three ingredients.

No experimentation was required to develop the recipe below, but that doesn’t preclude some experimentation on your part.  Start with equal parts (as little as ¾ ounce) and work from there.  The Vodka in this recipe is present (as it often is) to tone down the flavor a little.  The combination of Gin and Crème de Cacao was a pleasant surprise, but if you find it overpowering either add a little Vodka, or cut back on the Gin and Crème de Cacao, or perhaps both.  The choice is yours, so get back to your cocktail lab and make this drink your own.  A note on garnish: The Savoy often fails to specify garnish and did so in this case, but since orange goes well with both Gin and chocolate, a twist of orange peel was added by the Utah Mixologist.  Feel free to change that, too.

Russian Cocktail

1 oz Dry Gin

1 oz Crème de Cacao

1 oz Vodka

Combine ingredients in a mixing glass half full of cracked ice.  Stir while contemplating riding across the frozen Russian steppes until you feel cold.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass.  Garnish with twist of orange peel.  The Savoy Cocktail Book says: “tossitoff quickski,” but if you used quality ingredients and enjoy the taste, take your time.

The Opal – a gem of a Cocktail

Thumbing through the Savoy Cocktail Book turned up the Opal cocktail recipe.  There is one unusual ingredient in this cocktail that, surprisingly, is available in the Salt Lake City area: Orange Flower Water.  A recent shopping trip to Dan’s groceries on Fort Union Boulevard turned up bottles of two rather exotic cocktail ingredients: Orange Flower Water and Rose Flower Water, both made in France.  These small, three ounce bottles were out of the way, up on the top shelf, but my mixologist’s eye spotted them.  In case you’re having trouble finding cocktail ingredients in the Salt Lake City area, there is a trick to it: look in the beverage section of the grocery store.  You never know what you will find there, but these two French Flower Waters are my most unusual find.  The large grocery chains, and even Target, usually have a cocktail section tucked away down the beverage aisle where you can find some cocktail mixers, which are usually to be avoided, along with specialty items like Ginger Beer, Angostura® Bitters (Target even had bitters during the recent bitters drought), and the two Flower Waters.  Stores sometimes stock cocktail straws and other supplies in this section.

The Savoy recipe is provisioned to serve six, but the 3:2:1 ratio was easy to convert down to a single serving.  The Savoy is vague (as usual) on the amounts of sugar and Orange Water, so you might want to experiment.  I would start with a three drop dash of Orange Water and increase it slightly if desired – be careful it doesn’t overpower the other ingredients.   My old stand-by Bombay Sapphire® did good service for Gin in this cocktail.  Use fresh Orange Juice if you can, and finish with Cointreau® or Grand Marnier® if you have any, otherwise substitute Triple Sec.

Opal

1 ½ oz Bombay Sapphire Gin

1 oz freshly squeezed Orange Juice

½ oz Grand Marnier

1 dash Orange Flower Water

¼ tsp Simple Syrup or ½ tsp sugar

Add the ingredients to a shaker 2/3 full of ice.  Shake until nice and icy cold.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass and garnish with an Orange twist or a wedge of Orange.  Congratulate yourself on finding Orange Flower Water as you enjoy your first sip.

The Perfect Cocktail – is it perfect for you?

The Perfect Cocktail is another classic from the Savoy Cocktail Book, found right below the Pegu Club Cocktail.  It’s simplicity is attractive, the Savoy specifies one-third each of French Vermouth, Italian Vermouth, and Gin.  Don’t use a Gin that will be overpowered by the Vermouths; Bombay Sapphire® was used here, and Noilly Pratt® works well for the French Vermouth.  The Italian Vermouth may be problematic.  If you enjoy, for example, a glass of Italian Vermouth on the rocks for an apéritif, you will enjoy this recipe as written.  If you’re aware of an Italian Vermouth that works better and is available in Utah, post its name as a response to this article.  The ones in my bar are on the sweet side, so if you prefer your cocktails a little dryer, you might want to add a dash of Angostura® Bitters to tone down the sweetness.  The choice is yours.

Perfect

1 oz French Vermouth

1 oz Italian Vermouth

1 oz Gin

1 Dash Angostura Bitters, (if necessary, not in the Savoy)

Pour ingredients into a mixing glass 2/3 full of ice.  Stir briskly for 20-30 seconds.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a lemon twist.

Pegu Club Cocktail – a tart treat from the 1920’s

The classic Pegu Club Cocktail is another classic from the Savoy Cocktail Book,  even though it wasn’t invented at the Savoy Hotel.  It was actually invented at the Pegu Club in Burma (Myanmar), from whence it “traveled, and is asked for, around the world.”  It’s a great warm (hot?) weather cocktail that is best served ice cold.  The Savoy specifies a 2:1 Gin:Cointreau® ratio, but is rather vague on how these relate to the lime juice.  A little experimentation resulted in the proportions used in the recipe below, but if you like your sour cocktails a little tarter you can go with the juice of half a lime (1/2 oz).  The only sweet in this drink comes from the Cointreau, so that’s what you have to balance against the lime juice.  If you add sugar or cut the lime juice to under a teaspoon-full, though, it won’t be an “authentic” Pegu Club cocktail.

Pegu Club

¼ oz Lime juice, freshly squeezed

1 oz Cointreau (or Triple Sec)

2 oz Gin

1 Dash Angostura Bitters

1 dash Orange Bitters

Pour ingredients into a shaker 2/3 full of ice.  Shake well while thinking of a ceiling fan slowly turning in the old Pegu Club.  Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a lime wheel or a lime twist.

Corpse Reviver No. 2 cocktail is good enough to rattle your bones

Thumbing through the Savoy Cocktail Book in search of recipes for classic cocktails always pays off.  This time no thumbing was required.  During a quiet evening scanning the Twitter-feed while sipping a Corpse Reviver cocktail, a tweeter mentioned that their favorite cocktail was the Corpse Reviver No. 2.  Such an occurrence cannot just be coincidental, it must be kismet: my next Savoy experiment was set.  Fortunately, the Savoy is in alphabetical order and the recipe did not take long to find.  The Savoy can be rather ambiguous on quantities.  In the case of the Corpse Reviver No. 2 it calls for “1/4 glass” each of four ingredients, which could be as much as 1 to 2 ounces each.  That seemed a little much, so quantities were instead determined by the quantity of juice in half a lemon.  Either use the measures given below (based on my lemon), or use as much of each ingredient as you got out of your lemon half… your choice.

The recipe just calls for “Dry Gin”.  There were bottles of Bombay Sapphire® and Hendrick’s® Gin in the bar, and it was a tough decision, but combining Hendrick’s with the Lillet had worked in the Depth Charge, so the Hendrick’s won out.  Feel free, however, to use your Gin of choice.  As mentioned in that post, the original Savoy recipe includes Kina Lillet, which had quinine in it, but is no longer made (add a dash of Angostura® Bitters if you’re picky).  And finally, Grand Marnier was substituted for Cointreau®, so use that or your favorite orange liqueur.  While the Corpse Reviver No. 2 is not my new favorite cocktail, it has definitely won a spot in my heart and will be a frequent caller at my house.

Corpse Reviver No. 2

3/4 oz Fresh Lemon Juice

3/4 oz Kina Lillet

3/4 oz Grand Marnier

3/4 oz Hendrick’s Gin

1 Dash Absinthe.

Add the ingredients to a shaker half full of ice.  Give it your best shake until you feel it’s ready.  Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.   If you object to naked cocktails, feel free to select a suitable garnish.

Savoy’s Bolo – a cocktail recipe to throw you for a loop

Flipping through the Savoy Cocktail Book can be rewarding. Sometimes you find recipes for cocktails that you’ve heard of, sometimes you find unheard of (but interesting) recipes, and sometimes you find recipes that you had marked during an earlier browsing and never gotten back to. This was the case with the Bolo. It’s an interesting sounding recipe, calling for Rum and citrus, and fairly simple for the amateur mixologist to shake up for personal consumption or for friends at an Oscar party. The original Savoy recipe includes orange juice and gives you a choice between lemon and lime juice. Add some sugar (or substitute simple syrup) to offset the sour, and finish it with some light rum.

The Savoy can be rather vague on quantities. In the case of the Bolo it calls for “1/2 Wineglass Bacardi Rum,” which could be anything up to 3 ounces. That seemed a little much, so it’s been rounded down to a healthy 2 ounces. The original recipe uses freshly squeezed juices, and they will make a difference in the quality of the cocktail. So pick up some fresh citrus this afternoon and be prepared to watch the Oscars this evening.

Bolo

Juice of ½ Lime or ¼ Lemon (1/2 oz)

Juice of ¼ Orange

1 teaspoon Sugar (fine) or Simple Syrup

2 oz Light Rum

Add ingredients to a shaker 2/3 full of ice. Shake briskly until frost begins to form on the shaker (well, that’s the ideal). Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a citrus wheel or a slice of strawberry. Enjoy!

The Olympic Cocktail: is it a medal winner?

The Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) continues to be a treasure trove of interesting cocktails, but who knew that The Savoy contained an Olympic Cocktail? Surfing the internet cocktail stream recently turned up a 2010 version of the Olympic by Drew Levinson that includes ingredients updated for the twenty-first century. Many of these ingredients are not available in Utah, so this post will present Harry Craddock’s original recipe using ingredients that you may have in your bar at home. You might want to give this cocktail a try while you're watching the USA/ Canada Gold Medal Hockey game this afternoon!

The original recipe has only three ingredients: orange juice, Brandy, and Curaçao. When Blue Curaçao is not specified, Orange Curaçao (clear in color, and not available in Utah) is usually intended. The Brandy is up to you, anything up to and including fine Cognac will work, but if you improve the Brandy you should replace the Blue Curaçao with a quality orange liqueur, perhaps Cointreau or better. Using Blue Curaçao will impart a peculiar aqua-marine color to the drink (it was hard to find a glass to make this one look good), but the taste will be closer to the original Savoy cocktail. If you can’t get past the color, though, switch to Cointreau, which is clear and will result in a cocktail that is about the color of pineapple juice. The orange juice is problematic: if you’re too lazy to squeeze your own (like some people), then the cocktail may be a little sweet. This is easily fixed with some bitters, in this case a dash of Regans’ Orange Bitters was added to balance the drink by toning down the sweetness and adding a little complexity.

Olympic Cocktail

1 oz Brandy

1 oz Curaçao (Blue if you live in Utah) or Cointreau

1 oz Orange Juice

Combine ingredients in a shaker 2/3 full of ice. Shake well while contemplating a fast luge run. Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange twist or Olympic gold.

Get stirring with the Corpse Reviver Cocktail

The Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) continues to be a treasure trove of interesting cocktails. Thumbing through it on a day off resulted in the discovery of an amusing sketch of “the beautiful Lady Cynthia, after imbibing a Corpse Reviver Cocktail.” The sketch of red-faced Lady Cynthia piqued my interest. For some unknown reason, the recipe for the Corpse Reviver turned out to be thirty pages away, and it came with the advice that a Corpse Reviver could be “taken before 11 a.m., or whenever steam and energy are needed.” A quick glance at the clock told me that a little fast action would get me in just under the wire, and all the ingredients were available. Hopefully, you invested in some apple jack when you tried out the Jack Rose, and you should have some Italian Vermouth around the house.

There are a variety of Corpse Reviver cocktail recipes to be found on the web (there are two in the Savoy book alone), and they are sometimes classified under the “hair of the dog” type of hangover cure. You can be the judge of that. The blend of flavors in this cocktail is enjoyable, so give it a try. With Halloween just around the corner, this is one cocktail recipe we will have to revisit. The following recipe is faithful in proportion to the Savoy, but you should, as usual, play around with proportions to get the right taste for you.

Corpse Reviver (No. 1)

1 ½ oz Cognac or Brandy

¾ oz Calvados or Apple jack

¾ oz Italian Vermouth

Combine ingredients with cracked ice in a mixing glass. Stir briskly until it’s far colder than a (shudder) corpse. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a twist of lemon. Prepare yourself for a high energy day!

Pink Gin: a cocktail the Pilgrim Fathers would have enjoyed

Discovered the other day while trying to get caught up on my cocktail blog reading was Erik Ellestad’s recent post on the Pink Gin, a simple cocktail recipe with only two ingredients that delivers a surprising treat. The striking photos on Erik’s site told me that this was one cocktail I had to try. The recipe is one that Ellestad was mixing for his project to recreate every cocktail recipe in the Savoy Cocktail Book (1930), and he faithfully recreated that recipe (well, except for serving it on crushed ice). He also mentioned that the recipe was explored in Dr. Cocktail’s (Ted Haigh’s) book “Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails”, a copy of which sits near my easy chair. Ted has experimented with the recipe enough that he recommends a couple of specific gins and has upped the bitters from a single dash to a grand total of six! That’s two “goodly dashes” of bitters per ounce of gin.

Just these two sources gave me plenty of variations to play with to develop a recipe that I could write home (or, at least, you) about. First step was a little less gin. Harry Craddock calls for a glass, and Haigh wants three ounces. That’s a little much for most people, especially if you like to have more than one cocktail. The amount of bitters, however, was intriguing. Erik went for the Savoy’s single dash (although there’s no way there was only one dash in his photos), while Dr. Cocktail went for six. Could the gin hold up to that bitter assault? The bottle of Plymouth gin that I had in my bar definitely did. The drink was surprisingly good in spite of its simplicity, and sipping the gin that was probably the last gin the Pilgrim Fathers threw back before departing England is a patriotic bonus. This cocktail is great on the rocks or straight up; I prefer rocks because the cold offsets the bitters, but you should experiment both ways to determine your preference.

Pink Gin

2 oz Plymouth Gin

4 dashes Angostura Bitters

Pour the gin into a mixing glass 2/3 full of ice. (If serving up, add the bitters now.) Stir briskly until it looks cold enough. Strain into a chilled white wine glass 2/3 full of ice and dash the bitters on top. (If serving up, strain into a chilled cocktail glass.) Garnish with good will and enjoy!

Paris Magique: recipes for two great Cassis cocktails

Today you get two great cocktail recipes, similar but different, for the price of one. On Father’s Day I received a bottle of Cartron Crème de Cassis and mentioned it on Twitter. I soon received a tweet from @kingvonelk (Kelvin Kong) with an interesting recipe to try: 1/3 each of Gin, Dry Vermouth, and Crème de Cassis. It sounded like something definitely worth trying, so I gave it a go. It was delicious (a trifle on the sweet side) with the Cassis dominating the flavors. After requesting the name of this delectable cocktail from Kelvin via Twitter, I started doing some research on the web and discovered a cocktail with similar ingredients: the Magique. Kelvin soon messaged me with the name of his cocktail: the Paris. The Paris cocktail has been around a while: it shows up in the Savoy Cocktail Book (1930) under the name “Parisian Cocktail”.

In the Magique, the flavor of the Vermouth comes out more as that ingredient predominates, resulting in a dryer cocktailthat still delivers that great Cassis flavor. So if you’re looking for a good Cassis-based cocktail, these two should be high on your list. Try the Magique if you want something on the dry side; the Paris if you want something a little sweeter. The two dominant ingredients in these cocktails are the Crème de Cassis and the Dry Vermouth. When buying Crème de Cassis, you should avoid the really cheap stuff that my wife says tastes like cough syrup, and stay in the $20 or higher price range. Having a bottle of Crème de Cassis around the house is also your gateway to great apertifs like Kir and Kir Royale. As for the Vermouth, Noilly Prat is a good, dry French Vermouth that will improve your Martinis as well provide a nice boost to these cocktails, so pick some up if you don’t already stock it.

Paris Cocktail

1 oz Bombay Sapphire® Gin

1 oz Cartron Crème de Cassis

1 oz Noilly Prat® Vermouth

Combine ingredients in a shaker half full of ice. Shake enthusiastically while remembering your last romantic night in Paris (use your imagination if necessary). Strain into a chilled cocktail glass, and garnish with a twist of lemon. Salut!

Magique

1 oz Bombay Sapphire® Gin

½ oz Cartron Crème de Cassis

1 ½ oz Noilly Prat® Vermouth

Combine ingredients in a shaker half full of ice. Shake enthusiastically while imaging a magique night in Paris. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass, and garnish with a twist of lemon. Santé!

Sidecar: the perfect cocktail to end a bumpy day

I was flipping through the Savoy Cocktail Book the other day when I noticed another well known cocktail that I had never tried: the Sidecar. The Sidecar is another venerable World War I era cocktail that sounds like something your dad would order. Everyone has heard of it, but few have tried it. Its popularity has declined enough that it’s no longer on the IBA short-list of cocktails. Its name seems to imply a good, stiff drink… exactly what you would need after bouncing down an unpaved road in France in a rickety motorcycle sidecar. No one knows precisely where or when it was invented; it is first mentioned in print in 1922.

The Sidecar owes its longevity to simplicity and great taste. Its winning combination of cognac (or brandy), orange liqueur, and lemon could be just what you are looking for in a cocktail. Of course, if your taste runs to American whiskeys, you can substitute your favorite Bourbon for the brandy. Play around with the proportions until you get the right balance of sweet and sour for your palate. If your first one’s too sour, add a little simple syrup.

Sidecar

1 ½ oz Cognac or quality brandy (some prefer Bourbon)

¾ oz Grand Marnier®

¾ oz freshly squeezed lemon juice

Combine ingredients in a shaker ¾ full of ice. Shake as you imagine dodging the shells falling all around you. Strain into a pre-chilled cocktail glass, garnish with a wedge of orange or a twist of lemon, and savor your first sip.

Just an old fashioned Old Fashioned

In my last post of humorous Tweets from the Twitterverse, I mentioned the Old Fashioned cocktail.  As I did so, I realized that it had been quite a while since I had had an Old Fashioned.  In fact, it had been so long that I couldn’t remember the last time (that happens when you get old…).  And so I set off on a quest for the perfect Old Fashioned.  I always thought that an Old Fashioned is made with Bourbon, but it turns out it can also be made with Rye.  As a matter of fact, according to the Savoy Cocktail Book, you can make an Old Fashioned with Canadian Club, Brandy, Gin, or Rum.  Old Harry Craddock doesn’t even mention Bourbon, but it can probably be squeezed in under his “etc.”  In other words, you can make an Old Fashioned with just about any good sipping liquor you like.  You could even throw an Old Fashioned based cocktail party, where you serve a variety of Old Fashioneds as a signature cocktail made with each guest’s favorite liquor.  We’re having friends over next week-end, and I plan on doing just that.

In the recipe below, I went with the classic Bourbon Old Fashioned, paired with Angostura® Bitters; many of my favorite Bourbon cocktails use Angostura.  If you go with Rye, you might want to use Peychaud’s® Bitters, which are paired with Rye in another of my favorite cocktails, the Sazarac.  If you decide to go with a nice Rum, you should try orange bitters, perhaps Stirring’s® Blood Orange Bitters.   I would use either Angostura® or Peychaud’s® with Brandy, and either Stirring’s® Blood Orange or Angostura with Gin.  Have fun and experiment, especially if you have a good collection of bitters.  Be sure to use good quality liquor, since the liquor is the primary ingredient.  I highly recommend adding the optional orange wheel and cherry and eating them after you have finished the cocktail when they are infused with Bourbon.

 

Classic Old Fashioned

½  oz Simple syrup or 1 sugar cubes or ½ tsp. sugar (use brown sugar with rum)

2 ½ oz Jim Beam® Black Label Bourbon whiskey

2 dashes Angostura® Bitters

Put the simple syrup and bitters into a mixing glass.  Add the bourbon (if you’re using sugar, add ½ a teaspoon of water and stir until the sugar is dissolved).  Fill the mixing glass half full of ice, and stir until Carrie Prejean gets smart (or when you think it’s cold enough, whichever comes first).  Fill a chilled Old Fashioned glass ½ full of ice cubes.  Add a maraschino cherry and an orange wheel to the glass (optional).  Strain in the cocktail mixture.  Add more ice as necessary to fill the glass.  Garnish with a twist of lemon and serve.