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 creme 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 creme 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.

Incognito

6 parts Lillet

3 parts Cognac

1 part apricot brandy

1 dash Peychauld’s Bitters

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

This is excellent! It is a nice smooth drink that should show off a good apricot brandy very well. It is also a nice drink for showing off Lillet. As a fruity and summery aperitif wine Lillet makes a great partner to a flavor like apricot. Lillet being slightly bitter means you have to pick the apricot flavor out in this drink, but not every apricot brandy drink should taste assertively of apricots. The Cognac adds some backbone and richness, and the Peychaud’s Bitters give complexity without the heavy spicy notes of something like Angostura. Not being an especially strong drink it is also suitable for the oversized cocktail glasses that are favored these days. My only reservation is that since the formula of Lillet changed in the 1980s to become less bitter, this drink must taste a little different to how it was intended.

Culross Cocktail

1 ½ oz gold rum (I used Cruzan Estate)

½ oz Lillet

¼ oz lime juice

¼ oz apricot brandy

Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

This drink has tons of potential. It was a tad light bodied and watery, but I colder ice and a different rum might improve that. Maybe the proportions should also be reworked a little. There are several versions of this drink. This drink deserves to be looked at further.

Peck

1 ½ oz gin

½ oz dry vermouth

½ oz apricot brandy

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

This is a simple but very tasty drink. There is a similar drink that uses Crème de Cassis in place of the apricot brandy. I think it is called a Parisien or something similar. Anyway, this one uses the same principle but with a different liqueur.

Maidens Prayer Variation

¾ oz gin

¾ oz Lillet

½ oz calvados

½ oz apricot brandy

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

The addition of calvados makes this one very interesting. However, as it stands I think it comes across as a little confused. Some tweaking around with the proportions might really improve it. It could deserve a second look some time.

Mayfair Cocktail

1 1/2 oz gin

1/2 oz orange juice

1/2 oz apricot brandy

1 dash of pimento dram

optional pinch of cloves (I didn’t bother – but in retrospect I should probably have added a dash of Angostura Bitters since that has a clove taste)

Shake with ice and strain into a glass.

I was excited about this one. It isn’t often I get a chance to break out my homemade pimento dram. Sadly it didn’t do much for me. The apricot brandy and orange juice combination is just not exciting. This might work better with a tarter citrus juice.

Charlie Lindbergh

1 ¼ oz gin

1 oz Lillet

¼ oz apricot brandy

1 dash orange bitters

Stir over ice and strain into a glass.

Tasty but average.

Prohibition

1 oz gin

1 oz Lillet

¼ oz orange juice

¼ oz apricot brandy

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

Given the excellent name and the list of ingredients I had been expecting to enjoy this one. Unfortunately it was a bit of a let down. It looks good on paper but somehow the orange juice-apricot-Lillet combination does not work very well. Orange juice with Lillet tastes slightly insipid.

Barbara East Cocktail

1 oz bourbon

¾ oz grapefruit juice

½ oz apricot brandy

¼ tsp sugar (I left this out)

Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

This was pleasant enough but not especially exciting.

Shrapnel

1 ¼ oz bourbon

½ oz sweet vermouth

½ oz dry vermouth

¼ oz apricot brandy

Stir over ice, strain into a cocktail glass, and garnish with an orange slice.

This is really just an apricot accented Manhattan. Neither unpleasant nor very exciting.

This one is something I found while looking for something else. It is called a ‘Pisco Bell-Ringer’ and comes from David Wondrich at Esquire.

2 oz pisco (I used Bauza)

2 dashes orange bitters (I used Regans)

2 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters

1 ½ tsp lemon juice

½ tsp simple syrup

Rinse the inside a chilled cocktail glass with apricot brandy and tip out the excess. You want a sweet apricot liqueur here. I used Marie Brizard Apry. Shake above ingredients over ice and strain into the glass.

This is a tasty drink where the pisco really shines. You want to use a nice flavorsome pisco in this one, so get the best you can. Bauza probably wasn’t the greatest choice.

The foundation of this drink is austere – pure spirit with a dash of sourness from the lemon, and an even lighter dash of syrup to balance the thing. But then you have the two types of bitters bringing their own aromatics to the mix and adding plenty of extra interest, with the Pecyhaud’s also giving the drink an attractive hint of pink. The rinsing of the glass with apricot brandy is a nice touch and gives a whisper of apricot as you sip the thing. Make sure the liqueur reaches right up to near the inside rim of the glass though or it may not work too well. While drinking it you probably also want to make sure you keep sipping from different parts of glass to keep getting the apricot (something like you might with a margarita).

I do wonder if this drink wouldn’t be equally good if the syrup in the shaker was simply substituted with a splash of apricot brandy and the whole rinsing the glass thing was dispensed with. That approach may be worth a try, but perhaps it’s less interesting. Apparently this whole concept of a Bell-Ringer (which refers to the rising of a cocktail glass with apricot brandy) was thought up by a 19^th Century Chicago bartender named James Maloney who gave the apricot rinse treatment to all kinds of drinks.  He must have really liked apricot brandy.

Anyway, however you make it this is a good drink for appreciating the flavor of pisco. It it also the type of recipe you could play around with to suit your own tastes and the brand of pisco you are using – e.g. by varying the types of bitters, level of sweetness, etc.

You might be wondering what calvados has to do with this Mixology Monday’s orange theme, but a closer look at this ‘calvados’ drink reveals the name to be something of a misnomer. Just a third of the drink is calvados, with the remainder comprised entirely of things orangey.

Predictably, there is orange juice. There is also a generous measure of Cointreau adding its own sweetly concentrated orange perfume. No surprises so far. The presence of a whopping three quarters of an ounce of orange bitters is somewhat unexpected though. That’s right. The orange stuff that these days is lucky to be added to cocktails as a drip here or a drop here, the dusty bottle that long ago vanished from everyone’s Martinis, comprises 1/4 of the liquor in this drink. On an orange themed day a drink like this demands a bit of attention.

I had long ago noticed recipe for a drink called a Bluejacket on Ted Haigh’s cocktailDB site. That drink called for two parts gin, one part Curacao, and one part orange bitters. Reading that recipe I assumed it meant the potable orange bitters from Holland, which is said to be more a liqueur than a cocktail bitters. A drink containing one fourth orange bitters just didn’t seem credible otherwise. I ignored it and browsed on until I found something else.

However, on coming across the Calvados Cocktail in Ted’s Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails I realized there was a bit more to this ‘using orange bitters as a significant cocktail ingredient, not just as a flavor’ thing. Besides the fact that Ted’s judgment on these things is pretty good, I recently happened to have made a couple of Angostura Bitters heavy drinks, namely the Alamagoozlum Cocktail and an Angostura Fizz. By ‘bitters heavy’ I means that the bitters is measured in fractions of an ounce rather than the usual drops or dashes. I had heard of Angostura Bitters being drunk during Prohibition owing to the fact that it had a high alcohol content and remained legally available. I guess I’d imagined people choking back vile Angostura Bitters flavored concoctions out of desperation. The thing was, when I made these Angostura heavy cocktails they were good. If Angostura Bitters, why not orange biters?

The Calvados Cocktail is as follows:

1 part calvados

1 part orange juice

½ part Cointreau

½ part orange bitters (I used Fees because I figured its relatively mild flavor would work well in a recipe calling for such a large dose)

Shake over ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Ted Haigh notes you might like to consider reducing the quantity of bitters used depending on brand. I took the plunge and added the full measure. Using Fees I think it tastes fine like this, but Fees is fairly mild and I like bitter tastes. Depending on your brand and tolerance for bitterness you might want to cut back to start with. You can always add more later if you think the drink needs it.

This is a spectacular drink. Surprisingly it retains its calvados character despite all the orange bitters. Of course it goes without saying that the drink is also massively and bitterly orangey. I guess you could compare it with the Negroni, but it is less sweet, less herbal, and perhaps more refreshing. Making it with Fees orange bitters there is a strong background taste of some Indian spice that I can’t seem to name right now. With a different brand of bitters I’m sure the flavor would be radically different – and quite possibly not very pleasant. Using Fees though this is a very unusual and tasty drink.

If you have Fees orange bitters handy you definitely owe it to yourself to give this one a try. If you use some other brand then a little experimentation could yield pleasant results.

The Blackthorn cocktail is one of my favorites, a gin base with a generous splash of both Dubonnet and kirsch. Dubonnet and gin appear together in all sorts of early 20^th Century drinks. In the Blackthorn the Kirsch adds an extra dimension to a well worn combination. The drink is intensely fruity, but the use of eau de vie rather than a liqueur keeps things at the dry and bracing end of the spectrum.

I am surprised this drink is not better known. Part of the reason may be confusion about recipes. CocktailDB (www.cocktaildb.com) lists six recipes for the Blackthorn and its variations. Only one recipe is for the gin, Dubonnet and kirsch drink that I am fan of. A further four of the recipes are mixtures of sloe gin, vermouth (usually sweet but sometimes dry) and bitters – in one case with a little straight gin added for some extra kick. While different, the above five recipes at least share in common the use of gin, berry flavored spirits/liqueurs, and herbal aperitif wines. The sixth and final recipe is a whiskey, vermouth, pastis and bitters drink that seems to have no connection with the others besides name.

I have no idea where the above recipes were sourced from or the dates of their first appearance in recipe books. However, given that there are four recipes for variations on the sloe gin Blackthorn and only one recipe for the Dubonnet and Kirsch Blackthorn, it seems likely that the sloe gin Blackthorn may be the original, or at least the version that enjoyed greatest popularity.

I first came across the Dubonnet and kirsch version, during a search for Dubonnet and gin drinks. However, having picked up a bottle of sloe gin the other day I thought I would give the sloe gin version a try to compare it. I had actually made it before, but since I cheated by substituting a mixture of sloe vodka and standard gin for the sloe gin I guess my earlier attempt doesn’t count.

I chose the most basic looking Sloe Gin Blackthorn recipe from CocktailDB, as follows:

2 parts Sloe Gin (I used Gordons)

1 part Italian Vermouth (I used Martini)

1 dash orange bitters (Regans)

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with squeeze of lemon peel.

Hmm. . . It’s not bad compared to some other liqueur and vermouth heavy concoctions from older cocktail recipes. The sloe gin and vermouth both have a little bitterness, saving the drink from tasting overly sweet. The orange bitters don’t make an obvious appearance, though perhaps their absence would be noticeable.

I plan to try one of the more gin heavy or dry vermouth oriented sloe gin Blackthorn variations to see if I prefer it, but I wouldn’t go too far out of my way to this particular drink again.

Then I tried the Dubonnet and kirsch Blackthorn again for comparison. You do owe it to yourself to try one, as follows:

1.5 oz gin (I used Tanqueray)

0.5 oz Dubonnet

0.5 oz kirsch (I used Arthur Metz)

Stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

This was much better than the first drink, but not quite as brilliant as I remembered. While nice the parts somehow seemed not to be working together as well as they could. I put this down to the brand of kirsh, and perhaps the gin. Previously I’d always made it with Dolfi kirsh and a higher proof gin.

All criticism aside though this drink is a great example of what eau de vie can do in a cocktail. I don’t know why you don’t see eau de vie used more often in mixed drinks. Cherry, apricot and pear are all very handy eau de vie for cocktail making. In fact, if you happen to have apricot or mirabele on hand, but no kirsch, you will find they make a nice substitute for the kirsch in a Blackthorn. No harm experimenting to see if other fruits also work.

Returning to the drink though, I decided a dash of bitters might help bring things together.  To test this I thus tried some variations of the Blackthorn over the next few days, adding Fees Brothers Aromatic, Peychauds, and Regans Orange bitters – two dashes in each case. Each time I found the bitters surprisingly assertive. I should really have gone lighter and added just a dash. The Fees Brothers worked nicely in a spicy kind of way, but took attention away from the eau de vie and focused it more on the aromatics in the Dubonnet. Nice, but perhaps too much of a departure from the spirit of the original. The Peychaud’s version was very interesting but the anise flavors distracted from the fruitiness in the drink. Still, this may work with a smaller dose of bitters. The orange bitters probably turned out to be the best option in that they helped integrate the drink a little while leaving the flavors intact. I tried again with the less intense Fees Brothers orange bitters (three drops) and found that turned out perhaps the best among all my attempts. Regans might be equally good in a smaller quantity – two dashes may have been too much. Whatever bitters you use it is important to go light.

The theme for this week’s Mixology Monday (hosted at Spirit World) is Drinks for a Festive Occasion. I was a little stumped about what to contribute. I had been thinking about something using my homemade Pimento Dram, the Jamaican allspice liqueur. Allspice evokes the holiday season more than most tastes do. I am not entirely happy with how my Pimento Dram has turned out though. The only over-proof rum I could find was Bacardi 151 which may be the reason my Pimento Dram is a little harsh, and the allspice taste is more ‘hot’ than fragrant. However, rough Pimento Dram is better than none.

I was still thinking along the lines of Pimento Dram when I wandered down to the supermarket looking for some cider. The plan was to do mulled cider with a shot of Pimento dram in it. It turned out the supermarket no longer stocked cider, but they did have something unexpected and even more seasonal – Samichlaus Bier from Austria.

Samichlaus Bier (Santa Claus Beer) bills itself as the strongest lager beer in the world. For a while it was the strongest beer in the world but with all the microbreweries opening up in the U.S. over the last decade some U.S. brewery now claims that title. Samichlaus Bier is brewed each year at Christmas and released in time for the following Christmas, meaning it counts as an aged beer. The beer itself is a deep copper color, with a sweet and winey taste, relatively little bitterness, and a staggering 14% alcohol by volume. It used to be made in Switzerland, but now seems to be from Austria.

I don’t know how easy this beer is to buy internationally, but must be widely distributed if it has turned up in Shanghai. It used to appear in New Zealand each year before Christmas. I remember one year walking into a wine shop and being surprised to find the stuff. The woman who owned the shop waxed lyrical about how fantastic it was and I bought a couple of bottles. A year later I happened to walk past the same shop and saw the same beer, now at a give away price, complete with a sign reading “The most revolting beer in the world! Please help us get rid of it!” I think I bought a case.

The Austrian version seems to have less character than the original Swiss version but is still a pleasant beer. It is a bit sweet and you wouldn’t want to drink it too often, but it is definitely not revolting. I thought it would be fun to use Samichlaus Bier to make an ale flip.

A flip is a very old fashioned winter drink that simply involves mixing hot alcohol, an egg, sugar, and maybe something spicy. A Samichlaus Bier flip seemed perfect for the holiday season, and since a flip is vaguely punch-like you could mix this stuff up in a large batch to serve a crowd. Note that I’m not suggesting in any way that this would be a good idea and obviously you should check the details of your home and contents insurance policy first. Alternatively just serve it at a friend’s house and observe the fun.

The recipe. . .

Sleigh Flip (or Santa May Not Make It)

250ml Samichlaus Bier

1 egg

30ml St. James amber rum

2 teaspoons Pimento Dram

4 dashes Angostura Bitters

2 dashes orange bitters

1 teaspoon dark muscovado sugar

If the egg is from the fridge, first warm it in a bowl of hot water to bring it to room temperature or thereabouts. Warm the beer on the stove or in the microwave to just below boiling point. Be careful not to actually let it boil, since it will likely foam up and spill everywhere. In a warm bowl (the bowl you just warmed the egg in would be easiest) beat the egg with the rum, Pimento Dram, bitters and sugar until slightly frothy. Add the warm beer and beat together. Pour into a mug and serve.

This doesn’t have to be made with Samichlaus beer. Any reasonably full bodied beer would work nicely. Samichlaus is a lager but generally ales would work better. Samichlaus works well because it is an extra strong lager with plenty of flavor. You might want to adjust the ratio of sugar depending on the beer you use. Samichlaus is very sweet so you need no more than a teaspoon – in fact you could probably even dispense with the sugar entirely. A drier beer might demand more sugar.

St. James or some other Martinique rum seems an appropriate spirit addition because it has complex but not too assertive flavors and relatively little sweetness. Whiskey would also be interesting too but may be a little dominant. Brandy would be nice but would be less traditional than rum. Rum was often used in flips when they were still popular (in the 19th century and earlier), perhaps because it was cheaper than brandy or whiskey, and a better fit than gin. I am ready to try most things, but a mug of hot gin, beer and an egg? Hmm. . . maybe after a mug of hot rum, beer and an egg.

Benedictine makes a nice substitute for the Pimento Dram, though in this case consider leaving out the bitters and upping the ratio of Benedictine since Benedictine is relatively subtle. If using Benedictine consider substituting honey for the sugar. You could even consider trying Chartreuse. It sounds a little crazy, but why be shy when dealing with half a pint of hot beer and an egg? A drink like this calls for heavy flavors.

Enjoy!

The topic of this month’s Mixology Monday is bitters. On a recent trip to Cambodia I happened to pick up a bottle of Suze. I had heard of Suze before but never tried it. From what I could make out of the label it seemed to be flavored with Gentian, an ingredient I’d only vaguely heard of before. The shop where I bought it was Phnom Penh’s largest French supermarket so I was fortunate enough to be able to ask a passing French woman what Gentian tasted like. ‘Aniseed’ she said. That didn’t sound entirely right to me since I had a feeling Gentian was something different. However, given that aniseed is such a divisive flavor I figured her description meant Suze had some kind of interesting taste and so I grabbed a bottle.

The French woman clearly was not much of a Suze drinker, or perhaps was as confused about aniseed as I was about gentian. When I finally got the bottle back to Shanghai (along with my other Cambodian finds – St. James rum and Marie Brizard Apry) I tasted no aniseed. I found the Suze rather like Campari, but less intense and without the orange taste. Apparently gentian is some kind of bitter flower. Suze is lighter bodied than Campari, less bitter, a little floral, and apparently has a wine base. I like it.

Suze tastes great with a splash of soda or tonic, but I wanted to find some Suze cocktails. I did a little research but came up with nothing. There were a few cocktail suggestions on the Suze website, but none of them grabbed me. The standard cocktail websites don’t mention it much.

So in honor of the approaching Mixology Monday I did a little experimentation myself. Because of Suze’s similarity to Campari I took the Negroni (a favorite of mine) as my starting point.

I tried mixing 1 part Suze, 1 part gin and 1 part French Vermouth. This was drinkable but I felt it didn’t mesh together well. Perhaps it would work with the proportions changed around – the gin dominates a bit. I thought Suze would go nicely with some fruit, and that some sweetness and acidity might help put the gin in the background, so I tried adding some orange juice. A version with equal parts of Suze, gin, vermouth and orange juice wasn’t too bad, but lacked character.

Another day and another attempt and I came up with something I was happy with. This time I used calvados instead of gin, to produce a fruitier gentler drink that plays off Suze’s relatively mild bitterness. Calvados always reminds me of Autumn and so bringing out the calvados bottle seemed fitting for the season as well. I think this would make a nice aperitif before an autumn meal involving cooked apples – maybe pork with apple, or chicken Normandy?

So the recipe. . .

Autumn Frogman

1 oz Suze

1 oz calvados

1 oz French vermouth

Stir ingredients over ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Squeeze a twist of lemon peel over the drink to extract the oils, rub the peel around the rim of the glass, and drop into the drink. A dash of orange bitters might also be nice instead of the lemon twist, though I haven’t tried this yet.

This drink isn’t as bold as the Negroni, but I think Negroni drinkers will appreciate it. Personally I’m very pleased with it. For an aperitif this drink is slightly mellow (something that could probably be changed by upping the ratio of Suze), but the mellowness seems part of the charm. While I would never want to abandon the wonderful Negroni I can see myself substituting the Autumn Frogman occasionally when I feel like something slightly more low key and heart-warming. If you simply happen to want to bring out the Suze this drink is just the thing.

Why is it called an Autumn Frogman? This drink has three French ingredients so the name was always going to refer to France, and who could refer to the French without having a joke at their expense?

I am from New Zealand and in our minds (or is it just in mine?) the French will forever be associated with the bombing of a Greenpeace protest boat, the Rainbow Warrior, in Auckland Harbor. Yes, I know it happened in 1985, but we’re talking about the French here! The Rainbow Warrior was sunk in winter, but I expect the French agents spent the Autumn wet-suited up and training for the mission. The Calvados also matches the Autumn theme. So I present to the world, the Autumn Frogman!

Being an unforgiving person, on a previous occasion I came up with a Rainbow Warrior cocktail, but that will have to wait for another day.