There is surely no other writer with the same number of drinks associated with them. From absinthe to vodka, if it contained alcohol Hemingway drank it, and chances were he wrote about it too. Of all the drinks Hemingway enjoyed, the Daiquiri is probably the one in which his spirit endures most strongly. I wrote a post on the Daiquiri and Hemingway here. The post includes some cool photos so check it out if you haven’t already. Of course there were many cocktails Hemingway enjoyed besides the Daiquiri. Martinis featured prominently. He was also partial to absinthe topped with champagne, a mixture he dubbed Death in the Afternoon.

Recently I obtained a copy of Charles H. Baker’s “Jigger, Beaker and Glass: Drinking around the World”. Flipping the pages I was surprised to find a drink called Ernest Hemingway’s Reviver, or Death in the Gulf Stream. Interestingly, Baker and Hemingway appear to have been friends. Baker introduces the recipe as follows:

“One January 2 years back we took MARMION in a howling no’theaster along with the, then, 4 year bride, a companion, and an insane steward, and pointed her down to Key West to get some receipts from Hemingway for the cookery book. We fished the Gulf Stream by day, and ate and drank and talked half the night. Even by the second day we were withering slightly on vine, and along with raw conch salad, or “souse,” listed in Volume I, we got Hemingway’s other picker-upper, and liked it.”

Both men spent time living in Florida so I guess it makes sense that they should have known one another. No doubt their mutual interest in drinking helped.

Baker mentions that before trying this drink he had an aversion to Genever, which he considered to taste like “fermented radishes mixed with spirits of turpentine”. As someone who traveled the world to gather cocktail recipes, Baker was obviously no slouch when it came to drinking. His feeling the worse for wear and needing a “picker-upper” after an evening with Hemingway therefore speaks volumes. Meanwhile, the fact that Hemingway’s “picker-upper” converted Baker on the matter of Genever confirms that Hemingway was more than your average boozer. Papa’s drinks were generally pretty damn good.

Death in the Gulf Stream

Recipe follows:

“Take a tall thin water tumbler and fill it with finely cracked ice. Lace this broken debris with 4 good purple dashes of Angostura, add the juice and crushed peel of 1 green lime, and fill glass almost full with Holland gin. . . . No sugar, no fancying. It’s strong, it’s bitter – but so is English ale strong and bitter, in many cases. We don’t add sugar to ale, and we don’t need sugar in a Death in the Gulf Stream – or at least not more than 1 tsp. It’s tartness and its bitterness are its chief charm. It is reviving and refreshing; cools the blood and inspires renewed interest in food, companions and life.“

Given my recent experiments with Genever I was pleased to come across this recipe. I made the drink up and found it to resemble a citrusy and summery pink gin. The drink is refreshing, aromatic, and a little bitter, with the Genever providing malty body and a slight funk. This is a good drink for appreciating the character of Genever. London Dry will make an serviceable drink, but will lack the essence of the original. Use an Oude Style Genever if at all possible.

To build the drink to best effect I suggest proceeding as follows: fill the glass nearly full of crushed ice; add two or three dashes of Angostura; quarter the lime, squeeze the juice from the wedges directly into the glass and drop each spent wedge into the glass; add a dash of simple syrup (if desired); top off with Genever and stir everything up; finish with a little more ice and a final dash or two of Angostura. Made this way the final addition of bitters will create a lacework effect in the ice on the top of the finished drink. To me this seems a nice touch.

To assist my anticipatory salivation ahead of Anistatia Miller and Jared Brown’s Tales of the Cocktail presentation on “The Cafes of Paris”, I have been taking a look at a few lesser known French aperitifs. Several weeks ago I took a look at Pineau des Charentes. Today I focus on a pair of fruit quinquinas.

Quinquina is vermouth’s neglected cousin. Vermouth is well recognized, if widely feared and misunderstood. Martini drinkers fall into two camps: those who really want vermouth in their drink, and those who merely wish to ritualistically conjure up its spirit. However, while vermouth provokes fierce debate and elaborate juju, the mention of quinquina elicits little more than a blank stare. This is a shame because quinquina is an interesting category. To fix those blank stares, perhaps a little explanation is in order.

Both quinquina and vermouth are aromatized wines (i.e. wines flavored with herbs and spices). Quinquinas distinguish themselves from vermouths in using quinine as a key flavoring. As in tonic water, the quinine originally served a medicinal purpose – warding off malaria and all that. Vermouth and quinquina are not mutually exclusive categories. Some vermouth producers sell ‘quinquina’ versions alongside their regular vermouths: for example Martini & Rossi release their sweet vermouth in both ‘quniquina’ and standard versions. However, despite some overlap there are marked differences, with quinquinas tending to emphasize spice while vermouths are more herbal.

Similar to vermouths, which can be broadly classified into sweet and dry styles, quinquinas largely fall into rouge and blanc styles. The rouge style is rich, spicy and based on red wine – Dubonnet Rouge is the classic example. The blanc style is light, citrus accented, and based on white wine – Lillet Blanc is the iconic product.

For some reason neither of these mainstream styles of quinquina ever challenged vermouth to become a ubiquitous cocktail ingredient. Cocktail recipes never casually call for a generic rouge or blanc quinquina. Quinquina is called for only occasionally, and always by brand. Even luminaries like Charles H. Baker considered Dubonnet to be “only needed in the more elaborate establishments”, and I do not recall him mentioning Lillet at all. Considering that Baker saw orgeat, kummel and six types of bitters as more or less essential bar supplies, this adds up to a bit of a slap in the face for the quinquina category.

If mainstream quinquinas like Dubonnet and Lillet are fairly obscure, fruit flavored quinquina are even more so. These fruity quinquina do not fall within either the rouge or blanc styles, with heavy fruit macerations completely masking the base wine. They deserve a look from cocktailians though, offering a great source of fruit flavors and complexity, yet one with minimal sweetness. Two products are introduced below: RinQuinQuin and Orange Colombo.

RinQuinQuin (15% alcohol by volume) is a peach flavored quinquina. It is produced in Provence by the same firm that makes Henri Bardouin pastis. The name means something like an invigorating drink or a pick-me-up in French. The production process involves maceration, distillation, blending and several months of aging. Both distilled alcohol and wine are infused with quinine, other herbs and spices, and peaches. The peaches are what distinguish the product, and are added not as fruit, but rather as leaves, skins and kernels. This makes for a very complex flavor. The product is lightly sweetened. The result is a fruity but refreshingly dry aperitif wine with a distinctly bitter edge.

Orange Colombo (15% alcohol by volume) is an orange flavored quinquina along the same lines as RinQuinQuin. Based on its complex taste I am guessing it is flavored with more than just orange skins. As in RinQuinQuin, leaves, blossoms or other material may also be used.

These fruit quinquina are traditionally consumed either chilled or over ice, perhaps garnished with a twist of lemon. However, there is no reason they cannot be used in cocktails. Bear in mind that their mild fruitiness makes them poor vermouth substitutes, while their lack of sugar and their herbal complexity prevent them from standing in for fruit liqueurs. A bit of a fresh approach is in order.

Here are a few ideas. . .

Peach Martinez

1 oz Genever (Bols Oude)

1 oz Italian vermouth (Martini Rossi)

1 oz RinQuinQuin

2 dashes Fees Whiskey Barrel Aged Bitters

1 tsp maraschino

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist.

A nice take on the Martinez. Cutting the vermouth with RinQuinQuin makes for a lighter and more interesting drink. The Genever provides a mellow but solid base, neither fading into obscurity nor dominating. The complex peach notes mingle nicely with the cherry. Increase the Genever a little if you find it lacks kick.

When playing around with RinQuinQuin to create variations on existing recipes you will probably find that cutting vermouth half-and-half with RinQuinQuin works better than a straight substitution. RinQuinQuin is more of a one note product than vermouth, albeit a complex note.

RinQuinQuin Vesper

3 oz gin (Tanqueray)

1 oz vodka (Stolichnaya)

¼ oz Lillet Blanc

¼ oz RinQuinQuin

Shake over ice, strain into a chilled cocktail glass, and garnish with a large lemon twist.

This is just brilliant. By upping the bitterness the RinQuinQuin addresses the problem of Lillet having been reformulated and lightened since the Vesper was originally invented. The RinQuinQuin also adds a peach layer to the citrus in the Lillet.

Orange Colombo can be used to create another nice Vesper variation. Both products can also be used in regular Martinis, where they work especially well with delicate gins like Tanqueray 10 that stand up poorly to vermouth. I would be inclined to split the quinquina 50/50 with vermouth.

Orange Colombo Pisco Sour

2 oz pisco

½ oz Orange Columbo (or cut back to 1/4 oz)

¾ oz lime juice

1/3 oz simple syrup

1 egg white (half an egg white per drink is sufficient if making multiple drinks)

Dash or two of Fees Whiskey Barrel Aged Bitters

Put everything except the bitters in a mixing glass. Shake long and hard over ice until the drink becomes foamy. Double strain into a sour glass. Finish the drink by garnishing the foam with a few drops of bitters – you can use a toothpick to draw a pattern on the foam. A sour glass, champagne flute or wine glass is preferable for this drink. The garnish of bitters on egg-white foam is intended to provide aroma. A sour glass concentrates the aromas, while the smaller surface area means that the foam, and the aromas, last longer.

The Orange Columbo adds both a subtle orange note and a light bite, making a pleasant variation that jazzes up the original. Perhaps I am not using the right pisco, but I find pisco sours tend to be a little too plain and smooth. Orange Columbo livens things up without creating an unseemly ruckus. You can also try a splash of Orange Colombo in a Margarita – obviously you will still need the orange liqueur, but possibly it could be scaled back a notch.

There is tons of potential for using these obscure fruit quinquina in cocktails. If you see a bottle you should grab it and have a play around. Currently these products are underutilized, leaving the field wide open to experimentation.

Improved Gin Cocktail

The Improved Gin Cocktail is probably the best place to start appreciating the flavor of Genever in cocktails. The basic Gin Cocktail is gin, sugar and bitters. Garnish that with a citrus twist and you have a Fancy Gin Cocktail. Splash some liqueur into that and you have yourself an Improved Gin Cocktail. The Improved Gin Cocktail is the best of the bunch taste-wise, though very intense and heavy genevers (I am thinking Korenwijn style products) might be better appreciated in the more minimalist Fancy Gin Cocktail. Forget about the basic Gin Cocktail unless you find yourself with Genever on hand but no citrus.

Recipe:

2 oz Genever (Bols Oude – use an Oude if at all possible)

1 tsp gomme syrup (try and use real gomme syrup – instructions on making it here)

1-2 tsp liqueur (triple sec, curacao, maraschino or absinthe are all traditional choices)

a couple of dashes of bitters (Fees Whiskey Barrel Aged, Peychaud’s and Angostura are all worthy choices)

Build over ice in a rocks glass, or serve it up if you like. Garnish by squeezing the oils from a citrus twist over the drink, then drop the twist in.

There is huge potential for experimentation with the liqueurs and bitters. While not traditional, Drambuie is an interesting choice that brings out the malt character of the gin. Drambuie probably works best in partnership with another liqueur though, perhaps triple sec. Absinthe also works nicely, as do the anise notes of Peychaud’s. The version pictured above contains Drambuie, Peychaud’s Bitters and a little Absinthe Bitters (a sort of concentrated Absinthe made by the people who make Henri Bardouin pastis).

Martinez

The next drink is not strictly speaking a Genever drink. The Martinez was first mixed with Old Tom (a sort of hybrid gin sitting somewhere between Genever and London Dry). However, in the absence of Old Tom, Genever probably makes a more authentic substitute than London dry. The drink is said to be the ancestor of the modern Martini, and the design is something like a sweetened and reversed Martini – with sweet vermouth rather than dry, and more vermouth than spirit.

Recipe:

2 oz Italian vermouth

1 oz Genever (either Oude or Jonge should do)

1 tsp maraschino

1-2 dashes aromatic bitters (the cinnamon accented Fees Brothers Whiskey Barrel Aged is a good choice)

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon twist.

The recipe looks a bit odd, but the result is a meditative drink, suitable for winter evenings. Nineteenth Century drinkers obviously were not afraid of vermouth.

Gin Daisy

These days a Tom Collins is made with London Dry Gin. However, in the 19^th Century the drink was made with Old Tom or Genever. Making a Genever-based Tom Collins is a simple matter that hardly requires any advice – just change the base spirit and you’re done. However, the Nineteenth Century also saw Genever used in other highball type drinks. The Gin Daisy is an interesting example. There is something almost Tiki-esque about the old fashioned flavorings.

Recipe:

2 oz Genever

2 tsp orgeat (Monin)

2 tsp Maraschino (Maraska)

½ oz lemon juice (juice of ½ a lemon)

Shake over ice, strain into a glass (I used a small old fashioned glass), and top up with soda water. For some reason I went very easy on the soda in this one, not wanting to dilute drink too much.

This is vaguely reminiscent of a Singapore Sling. The maraschino obviously supplies the cherry, while the soft and malty Genever boosts the fruity feel, and the orgeat adds a hint of Tiki. Tasty and very different. I like orgeat in cocktails.

Gin Fix

Drinkers in the UK will no doubt know the Bramble. In fact the Bramble is simply an updated Gin Fix. The original Gin Fix was concocted with Genever as described below.

2 oz Genever (Bols Oude)

¼ oz lemon juice (juice of ¼ lemon)

1 tsp simple syrup (or gomme syrup if available)

1 tsp raspberry syrup

Fill a glass with shaved ice – I substituted crushed ice. Build the drink over ice and stir thoroughly. Top up with more ice and garnish with seasonal berries – raspberries being the obvious choice. Raspberries being out of season meant I had to slum it with strawberries.

The raspberry syrup and Genever combination is most pleasant. The malty notes of the Genever add complexity and depth to a simple drink. It is worth a look if you want a summery take on Genever. The use of crushed ice means you should end up with a pleasantly frosted glass, adding to the summery feel. Obviously there is lots of potential for playing with different syrups, or substituting a berry liqueur as is done in the modern Bramble. You could even muddle some fruit into the drink, which would pretty much give you a Genever Bramble.

Gin and Milk

I posted on this one earlier – link here.  However, back in those days I did not have Genever.  Gin and Milk is MUCH better with an Oude Genever than with London Dry.  The character changes completely.  Rather than an oddball combination it becomes an intuitive one, with the maltiness of the Genever giving something of a ‘malted milk’ effect. There is no doubt that Gin and Milk was first made with Genever, so make the effort and try it the way it was intended to be.

In my original post on this drink I suggested a dash of orgeat.   When using Genever (especially an Oude) I am not so sure this is a good idea.  There is plenty of flavor happening already and little need to round things out with extras.  Of course if you like the orgeat then go ahead.  The bitters are still a nice touch.

Cynar has has one of the coolest label designs out there

La Cosa Nostra

2 oz Cynar

1 oz Kola Tonic* (Roses)

½ oz grappa (Carpene Malvolti)

¼ oz lemon juice

¼ oz coffee liqueur (Tia Maria)

A dash of Angostura Bitters (optional)

Build in an old fashioned glass over a couple of large ice cubes.

There are rich aromas from the grappa, an interesting interplay between the grappa and coffee (these two are always a nice match), and of course the mysterious bitterness of the Cynar. The Kola Tonic works as a pleasant sort of glue, taking the edges of the various elements and holding them all together.

The name is a bit weak. But hey, what’s in a name? I’d drink this again. It is an interesting sweetish aperitif that makes a change from the regular stuff.

Robert Simpson at Off the Presses just posted another Cynar drink. My post had been sitting around waiting to go up on the site for a few weeks, so I figured I would throw it up and declare today International Cynar Day. It may be a few years before this one becomes a statutory holiday, but get the ball rolling now by checking Robert’s drink out. It looks pretty cool. I am just going have to salivate since we don’t have Carpano Antica here in New Zealand.

UPDATE:  Sloshed just contributed this Cynar based Negroni variation.  Cynar seems to suddenly be flavor of the month.

* Kola tonic is basically cola syrup. Besides Roses (popular in South Africa), you might also find Claytons (popular in Barbados). I can’t comment on Claytons, but Roses seems a little more bitter than regular coke, and the syrup is not that concentrated (i.e. it does not require too much dilution, and pours and mixes very easily). You could probably try reducing regular Coke in a saucepan to get an approximation of kola tonic. I never tried this myself, so don’t blame me if you end up with a gruesome and unappetizing mess.

The Rough Riders take a break on top of San Juan Hill

Mixology Monday has rolled around and get and brought with it the theme of rum. The host of Mixology Monday XXVII is Trader Tiki. To be honest, this was never intended to be a Mixology Monday post. However, since the drink includes rum I guess I get a handy Mixology Monday entry for minimal effort.

I was rearranging my booze cupboard when I remembered I had a bottle of Kola Tonic that had never been used other than to make the Filmograph – from Ted Haigh’s Vintage Cocktails and Forgotten Spirits.

A few posts ago, while talking about the Early Fogcutter, I mentioned how small quantities of gin can do great things to rum cocktails. I mentioned the splash of gin found in early versions of the Cuba Libre. I repeated the story of how Teddy Roseveldt’s Rough Riders supposedly invented the Cuba Libre, noting that they could not have done so since Coca Cola was not sold in Cuba until some years after their departure. My eye fell upon the bottle of Kola Tonic and I wondered whether the Rough Riders might not have taken some type of Cola concentrate to Cuba with them.

This novel hypothesis offers a neat solution to the debate about the Rough Riders and the invention of the Cuba Libre. If they mixed the drink using a concentrate bought from the U.S. there would have been no need for coke to be available in Cuba at the time – simply mix the concentrate with soda water and voila! The locals were probably so impressed they decided to import Coca Cola themselves. Naturally, being Caribbean types who lacked the drive provided by a sense of Manifest Destiny, the Cubans let several years elapse before placing their order with the Coca Cola Corporation.

It makes perfect sense for the Rough Riders to have carried cola as a concentrate. They were on a military campaign, not a Caribbean holiday. Naturally they had to pack lightly – rifles, ammunition, rum, gin, bitters, Kola Tonic, silver cobbler shaker (no Boston shakers since glass was fragile and could become a hazard in the field). They would probably have been trained to live off the land for their lime supply.

So here is the concentrated version of the Cuba Libre, suitable for military campaigns, camping trips, and other occasions where circumstances demand you pack light. Note that this is indisputably the original version of the drink, as enjoyed by the Rough Riders themselves. You could equally well build this on ice and top with soda, but I think I like it served up. You can’t be fussing around with soda siphons as you prepare to assault San Juan Hill.

Rough Rider

1 ½ oz Cuban rum (Havana Club Blanco)

½ oz gin (Tanqueray)

½ oz lime juice

1 oz Kola Tonic (Roses)

1 dash Angostura Bitters

Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Charge up nearest hill.

Kola Tonic is more or less a concentrated Coca Cola taste, but seems less sweet and more bitter. This product was once widespread, but today only remains a staple in South Africa. Fortunately Auckland has a large South African community so it is easy to find here.

Pineau Experiment No. 6 was perhaps the best of the bunch. . .

The next step was to try mixing some drinks of my own using Pineau des Charentes.

Pineau turned out to slightly awkward stuff to mix with, probably on account of it having such a mild taste. My natural inclination was try substituting pineau in recipes that traditionally call for other aperitif wines (i.e. following well worn patterns like Manhattans and Martinis). This approach did not work well.

While I did not come up with anything truly exceptional, several experiments yielded one or two promising results.

Not following any particular plan, I tried the following.

Experiment #1

2 oz bourbon (Bulleit)

1 oz pineau

½ oz suze

1 tsp lemon added afterwards.

This was not a success. First, there was way too much bourbon. Second, I do not think bourbon and pineau are a good match. A spicier bourbon might be an improvement, but rye would be better still, and definitely in a smaller quantity. Calvados might also be interesting. Again a teaspoon of lemon juice proved an easy way of brightening it up a little. The Suze added a little interest but also did not really fit.

Experiment #2

1 ½ oz pineau

1 ½ oz pisco

½ oz lemon juice

¼ oz Cynar

I figured I would try something using pisco, loosely based on the rhum agricole Pompadour, with the addition of ¼ oz of Cynar to give a bitter and complex finish. While I enjoyed this it did not compare with the Pompadour. The Cynar could be toned down and still do its thing. A teaspoon may be adequate.

Experiment #3

2 oz Pineau des Charentes

1 oz pisco (or calvados)

1 oz fresh pineapple juice

2 dashes peach bitters

Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

On first taste this seemed almost too smooth and refreshing – like one of those vodka cocktails. I was not sure it worked. Despite an interesting list of ingredients it tasted boring. I made it again using Calvados instead of pisco, hoping for a better result. The Calvados version did not really work either.

Experiment #4

1 oz pineau

1 oz Cruzan Estate Light Rum

1 drop (not dash) Angostura

½ tsp Kummel

This was good, making a very smooth rum drink that reminded me a little of the El Presidente on account of its soft profile fringed with herbal flavors. It needs to be reworked, but is a decent start. This one deserves repeating.

Experiment #5

1 oz pineau

1 oz rye (Pikesville)

1 drop angostura

2 drops peychauds

This drink pretty much built on my experiences from Experiment #1. It is tasty enough but perhaps a bit mild and uninteresting. A bigger, spicier rye might have helped it.

Experiment #6

2 oz pineau

1 oz dry apricot brandy (i.e. a eau de vie, not a liqueur)

½ oz lemon juice

1 tsp crème de framboise

Tasty. . . The honey taste in the pineau plays nicely with the apricots. The lemon juice and eau de vie keep things dry. The crème de framboise adds some sugar to round things out, plus an extra layer of fruit flavor that contributes to an overall impression of fruity complexity.

Experiment #7

2 oz pisco

1 oz Pineau des Charentes

Dash of Orange Bitters

This was pleasant but unexciting.

I was probably expecting better results from messing around with Pineau. The first drink I tried with the stuff, the Pompadour, set the bar quite high. None of my own efforts came close.

Still, I think experiments 4 and 6 have potential. Experiment #6 was quite good, and Experiment #4 hints at a whole world of possibilities using pineau with rum and small doses of liqueurs or bitters. In general, Pineau seems to work well in drinks that are light on the spirits. Small touches of liqueurs also work nicely.

I would like to do more experimenting using Pineau and rums. There seems to be lots of potential there. It might also be interesting to mix Pineau with aromatized aperitif wines, something I did not try.

So that is it. While my experiments were not completely successful I think I showed there are promising possibilities for using Pineau in cocktails. Pineau des Charentes might not be as versatile as vermouth but it is still underrated as a cocktail ingredient. Used in the right way Pineau can make good drinks.

The Avenue

1 oz passion fruit juice*

1 oz calvados

1 oz bourbon

1 dash orange flower water (about ¼ tsp of a fairly mild Middle Eastern one – but could have added a lot less)

1 dash grenadine (about 1/4 tsp but could have added more)

Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass

‘Perfumey’ seems the best word to describe this delightful drink. There are amazing smells from the passion fruit and the orange flower water. I find the bourbon and calvados blend into an interesting base, with the bourbon giving some simple sweetness in the background and the calvados a spirituous fruitiness that provides a nice foundation for the passion fruit. The taste is still fairly challenging though. It smells like heaven, but the taste gives you a jolt – a pleasant one of course.

Freshly squeezed passion fruit juice, while full of amazing flavors and scents, is slightly astringent. Therefore you can afford to be generous with the grenadine. The grenadine will also give a little body to counteract the slightly thin and grainy quality of the passion fruit juice. Be careful not to add so much that you lose the passion fruit color though!

The Jinx

1 oz passion fruit juice (recipe specifically said sweetened so I added a dash of Monin passion fruit syrup to the juice)

1 oz gin

1 oz calvados

1 dash Angostura bitters

Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass

This drink resembles The Avenue above, with the substitution of gin for the bourbon and bitters for the orange flower water. The gin is a tasty swap. It is not necessarily better, but it is definitely good. I am not sure on the bitters though. I wonder if orange bitters would work better, or even peach. Angostura seems to distract a little from the delicate passion fruit. But maybe I just added too much.

Comparing different drinks made with common products is a very interesting exercise. My first impression of this drink was that some of the taste that I had mistaken for orange flower water in the previous drink was actually the passion fruit. Passion fruit really is that aromatic. No wonder the Chinese word for passion fruit literally means ‘hundred fragrance fruit’ (百香果).

I think I may prefer this drink to the above. It may be less aromatic, but it seems a touch more robust.

The Melody

1 ½ oz gin

¾ oz passion fruit juice

¾ oz Lillet

1 tsp Cointreau

1 tsp calvados

Here the calvados becomes a mere accent and the Lillet softens the drink up and helps everything blend together. The passion fruit juice might need a touch of sweetening, but this is a smooth drink, smooth to a fault if anything. The passion fruit takes center stage, with the other flavors just providing little touches of color.

The above three drinks were all decent. The Melody was nice but perhaps a touch one dimensional. I rather liked the Jinx.

The last drink I tried was a bit of an oddball and I am including it more for the sake of completeness than as a recommendation.

Sardi’s Delight

1 ½ oz gin

¼ oz lemon juice

¼ oz passion fruit juice (in fact I just added about a ½ oz of pulp)

¼ oz grenadine

¼ oz pastis

1 dash Angostura Bitters

Shake over ice and double strain into a cocktail glass.

Like a lot of drinks with a decent dose of pastis this tasted of. . . pastis. There was something interesting in the passion fruit and pastis combination, but for the sake of balance the pastis needed to be toned way down. I think passion fruit and pastis would be better companions in a Tiki drink style concoction that contains a decent slug of passion fruit juice and a dash or two of pastis. Maybe something like a Monkey Gland, made with passion fruit instead of or as well as orange could also be interesting?

* I extracted juice from the fruit by cutting them open, then putting the pulp in a tea strainer resting over a container and pressing with a muddler. You will need to give the juice a few minutes to drip through the strainer, and it is difficult to get a good extraction (the pulp tends to slide away from the muddler than give up its juice), but each fruit should comfortably yield up to 1/2 oz of juice. With a better method of extracting the juice you could probably get a little more.

Disney designed the Flying Tigers decal.

I found this one on CocktailDB while looking around for drinks using grenadine. In my post on The Fogcutter I mentioned how small quantities of gin can make an interesting contribution to rum cocktails. Since this drink is another example of that idea I thought it would be worth a try.

This drink appears to have been named after the legendary Flying Tigers. The Flying Tigers were a squadron of U.S. volunteer pilots who assisted China in resisting Japanese aggression before and during WWII. They were based in Kunming (the capital of Yunnan province in southwest China), and commanded by Claire Chennault. Their successes became the stuff of legend, and included protecting the inhabitants of Kunming against Japanese bombing raids for the entire duration of their deployment there, adopting novel tactics that saw them massively outperform the RAF in the defense of Burma, and allegedly destroying nearly 300 Japanese planes for the loss of just 14 of their own pilots. The Flying Tigers formed a crucial part of China’s air defenses, and were a rare U.S. success story during the bleak period of Japanese advances that followed Pearl Harbor.

Flying Tigers “Blood Chit” worn on the back of pilots’ flying jackets: the Chinese reads “This foreigner has come to China to help in the war effort. Soldiers and civilians, one and all, should rescue, protect, and care for him”

The unit had a reputation for hard drinking, though not to the extent that discipline broke down, and some members of the unit were dismissed by Chennault for drinking. One member to be dismissed was Gregory Boyington, whose alcoholism eventually saw him sent to New Zealand for four months to ‘recuperate’. Incidentally, Boyington would go on to lead the Black Sheep, the colorful Solomons based air squadron partly made up of pilots stood down from their original units over disciplinary issues.

I have been to the Flying Tigers museum in Chongqing and even bought a Flying Tigers t-shirt. Maybe it is time to try the cocktail?

1 ¾ oz light rum (Havana Club)

½ oz gin (Plymouth)

¼ oz grenadine (homemade)

1 dash aromatic bitters

This is a sweetish but not uninteresting drink. It tastes heavily of rum, but with the grenadine giving lots of body and fruitiness. The gin and bitters add some light spicy and herbal notes to make things interesting. It may not be hugely exciting, but it shows what gin can do when used as a flavoring rather than the base spirit. It is also one of those handy drinks that does not require any hard to find ingredients – provided you either have good grenadine or can put up with average stuff.

Incidentally, how is this for coincidence? The Rough Riders were a unit of U.S. volunteers who allegedly invented the Cuba Libre, which allegedly combines rum and gin. The Flying Tigers were a unit of U.S. volunteers with an associated cocktail, invented by themselves for all we know, that again combines rum and gin. Spooky? Absolutely! It was probably after a discovery like this one that early man first got all philosophical and asked himself whether the universe had an intelligent designer.

It is certainly relatively common in Barbados, being drunk in classic local drink the Corn’n’Oil (rum, falernum, Angostura Bitters, and a squeeze of lime). The Corn’n’Oil shows how versatile and easy to use Falernum is. You can simply splash it into rum to enhance the rum, or it can contribute to some more elaborate concoction like the Don the Beachcomber Mai Tai. It is sort of like a mildly alcoholic tropical version of sweet-and-sour mix.

So far I have relied on making falernum myself. Although I have tasted the Fees Brothers’ product, I do not rate it highly. The formula seems far too close to standard sweet-and-sour mix to be interesting.

I have tried two different falernum recipes. As with Pimento Dram, I found different recipes yielded very different results. Happily, my second attempt once again proved better than my first.

My first attempt was made as follows:

In 1/2 cup of white rum (Bacardi) soak the following for 48 hours: 6 cloves, 3 cm vanilla bean, zest of 2 limes, and 3 thin slices fresh ginger, and 2 drops almond extract (I was using a highly concentrated almond extract, possibly of dubious quality, hence the very small quantity).

Create a simple syrup from 2 cups white sugar and 2 cups water. Strain the rum mixture and add to syrup. Bottle and use.

This recipe made a tasty lightly spiced syrup. The flavor was not particularly concentrated so there was a temptation to use a lot and thus end up with a very sweet drink. Stored at room temperature the flavor of the syrup began to deteriorate quite rapidly. The low concentration of sugar in the 1:1 simple syrup would not have helped the shelf life of this falernum.

My second attempt used a different recipe, as follows:

Take 4 oz overproof white rum (Sangster’s Conquering Lion, 64%) and infuse it for three days with the following: 20 cloves, 2 tablespoons chopped almonds (approx 25 gms) lightly toasted in a frying pan. Add the zest of 4-5 limes (depending on size) and ¾ oz fresh ginger and infuse for a further day. Adding the limes and ginger only on the last day of the infusion stops the mixture from turning slimy and avoids over-extraction of these flavors.

Strain the above mixture through a moistened cheesecloth, extracting all liquid. Mix the rum infusion with 7 oz simple syrup (2:1 sugar to water ratio), 2 ¼ oz fresh lime juice (strained), 1/8 tsp high quality almond extract, 1/8 tsp high quality vanilla extract. Bottle and use.

This version turns out beautifully. The lime juice gives it an amazing freshness, and also eliminates the need for a squeeze of lime when making a Corn’n’Oil. Of course the lime juice also means you will need to store this syrup in the fridge or freezer. However, since the juice free recipe did not last well at room temperature, refrigerated storage is probably a good idea anyway. This version is like an all purpose rum enhancer, with sourness, sugar, and spices all rolled into one.

If I was to criticize I would say that the almond could be toned down a little. I may try it without one of either the toasted almonds or the almond extract in future. Be very careful not to over-toast the almonds given that they are an assertive taste.

A key point that emerges from comparing the two recipes is probably the importance of overproof spirits when doing infusions. The higher alcohol content extracts flavors better, so make an effort to find and use overproof spirits for infusions, particularly when the infusion is itself to be used to make a liqueur or syrup (dilution of the infusion makes it even more important that it is as intensely flavored as possible to start with). Another point is that when making falernum it makes sense to go heavy on the spices. The first recipe, with only 6 cloves to 500 mls of syrup (infused in standard proof rum), did not really cut it. The second recipe, with 20 cloves to approximately 250 mls of syrup+juice (infused in overpoof rum), was a big improvement flavor-wise. If your falernum somehow ends up too spicy you can always cut it with simple syrup, but if it lacks flavor there is not much you can do besides using huge quantities and producing overly sweetened drinks. Therefore you may as well be generous with the spices.

The first time I tried making Pimento Dram I had limited access to raw materials on account of being in Shanghai. I couldn’t find whole allspice or Demerara rum! It’s amazing I made pimento dram at all. A holiday to Cambodia and Hong Kong sorted out the spice problem, while for the rum I improvised by using Bacardi 151 – a bad idea. My first attempt was as follows:

Infusion

½ cup allspice in the form of lightly crushed whole berries (actually slightly more because my Cambodian purchased allspice – the last tiny pack in the shop – seemed slightly less flavorsome than the Hong Kong stuff)

1 ½ cups Bacardi 151

Syrup

3 cups water

750 grams molasses sugar

Infuse the rum and allspice for 2 weeks. Strain spice out. Rinse spice with a further ¾ cup of rum (Meyers). Heat the water and sugar on the stove until all of the sugar is dissolved. Allow to cool. Mix the syrup with the rum infusion and bottle. Leave for a month before drinking.

Sadly this turned out rather badly. I think I committed two key mistakes. The first mistake was using Bacardi 151. The second mistake was using molasses sugar. I figured I would go for the darkest sugar I could find to ensure a nice rich taste. Molasses sugar just does not work, giving an odd pungent and sour taste that is just not good

My second attempt was far more successful. This time I was making it in New Zealand, where obtaining allspice and Demerara rum was not a problem. Scared by my last attempt I was more cautious with the quantities.

Infusion

Generous ¼ cup lightly crushed allspice

1 1/8 cups Demerara rum (Woods)

Syrup

1 ½ cups water

350 grams light Muscovado sugar

Infuse the rum and allspice for ten days. Strain spices out of the rum. Rinse remaining spices with a further 1/8 cup of Demerara rum. Boil water and sugar until sugar is dissolved. Cool and add rum mixture. Leave for a month before drinking.

The second version was far superior to the first one. I think the difference was using Demerara rum and a lighter sugar. Unfortunately you really do need the Demerara rum to make this liqueur. Demerara rum has a spicy and sweet taste that helps the flavors integrate. The high alcohol content also helps in the infusion, and plus Demerara rum is simply a better quality product than Bacardi.

Well there you have it. . . I have seen recipes online for more complicated pimento dram recipes that include ingredients like lime zest and Angostura Bitters. I am not sure there is any need to get too complex. The above recipe works well for me.

Now the only problem is finding good cocktails that use this stuff. . .