Cocktail Hacker

In flipping through The Bubbly Bar I noticed a classic Champagne cocktail that I’ve been wanting to mix up for a while now, the Kir Royale. This drink has an interesting past as well. The drink that started it all was blanc-cassis, a blend of dry French white wine and creme de cassis. After World War II the drink was renamed to honor the then mayor of Dijon and prominent member of the French Resistance during the war, Felix Kir. And thus, the original Kir was born. There are a number of variants on the classic Kir. The best known being our pick for today, the Kir Royale.

Kir Royale

1/2 oz Creme de Cassis

5 oz Champagne

Lemon Twist

1) Add the creme de cassis to a Champagne flute

2) Top with Champagne

3) Garnish with a lemon twist

The Kir Royale is truly elegant in its simplicity. The color that the creme de cassis brings is a lovely maroon. The berry flavor is bright but not overpowering or overly sweet. In this drink’s case that lemon twist isn’t solely for decoration, either. It adds a nice citrus note to the aroma and flavor. This really is a delicious drink and I think it would work great for a party. It’s a tasty twist on standard Champagne, simple enough that people can mix their own and packs a bit lighter punch than a French 75.

My fourth and final cocktail this week is the Waikikian. In flipping through Grog Log, this recipe stood out as sounding quite delicious. After looking a little more carefully and mixing up my first one, I recognized why this cocktail sounded so tasty. The recipe is very similar to the Mai Tai, which I absolutely love. There are differences though, and this cocktail is distinct enough that it’s definitely worth giving a try.

The Waikikian is a sweet, but nicely balanced, cocktail. Interestingly, the lemon in this drink isn’t as overwhelming as it was in some of the other recipes. Rather, it acted as a perfect foil for the sweetness of the orgeat and curacao. In blending this drink, I’ve decided that I definitely need a newer and better blender. Mine doesn’t do well with ice at all. That said, I don’t think my lack of an awesome blender really hindered this drink much. In fact, if you don’t have a blender at all, simply use some cracked ice and you’ll end up with an equally good cocktail.

Enough about blender woes, back to the flavor. Like the Mai Tai, you get an interesting twist from the orgeat. It’s nutty and sweet but the flavor is quite subtle so you most notice it lingering in the background. One ingredient that I definitely think is essential to this cocktail is the curacao. You can really taste the brandy base and I think using triple sec wouldn’t be as delicious. Overall I really enjoyed this drink and if you’re a Mai Tai fan then you should definitely give it a go.

Waikikian (Grog Log)

1 1/2 oz Lemon Juice

1 oz Curacao

3/4 oz Orgeat

1 1/2 oz Light Rum

1 1/2 oz Dark Rum

1) Combine everything but the dark rum in a blender

2) Add ice and blend

3) Pour into a double old fashioned glass

4) Float the dark rum

You’ve heard me refer to Rick’s blog Kaiser Penguin in the past. Most recently I “borrowed” his recipe for falernum with great success. Well, last week Rick announced a contest offering a signed copy of Beachbum Berry’s newest book for the top three new tiki recipes posted in the comments. This couldn’t have come at a more opportune time for me! But, before I get too much further, let me say that Rick’s contest is open to anyone. So if you have a great tiki drink idea rattling around in your head then put up a comment and enter!

Having never tried making my own cocktail from scratch, let alone a tiki drink, I decided to give it a go. I spent some time thinking about what I’d like to include. At first I wanted this drink to be an ass kicker, like the zombie, so I started with high test rums. After contemplating for a bit longer I decided to keep one high proof rum in the mix but not go for ultimate power, but rather a delicious flavor. I love peaches, so I knew I wanted to use peach nectar for this drink right from the start. So, after this bout of thinking I came up with this recipe:

The Wilson (Version 1)

3 oz Peach Nectar

1 oz Wray and Nephew Overproof

1 oz Appleton V/X

1/2 oz Lime Juice

1/2 oz Gosling's Black Seal (Float)

This version was okay but lacking. It needed more sourness to balance the sweetness of the peach nectar and it needed some complexity of flavor. The lime juice was easy but I wasn’ t exactly sure how to approach the complexity issue. I pondered adding some bitters, perhaps Fee’s Old Fashioned or even a bit of my homemade version of Robert Hess’ House Bitters. Those would certainly work, but didn’t seem tiki enough. Then it came to me, falernum. It’s deep, it’s complex, it’s down right magical. Adding a bit, I had my solution.

The Wilson (Cocktail Hacker)

3 oz Peach Nectar

1 oz Wray and Nephew Overproof

1 oz Appleton V/X

1 oz Lime Juice

1/2 oz Falernum

1/2 oz Gosling's Black Seal

1) Combine all ingredients in a shaker

2) Shake with ice until well chilled

3) Pour into a chilled highball glass

4) Float the black seal rum

Granted, I’m the proud parent, but I really like this cocktail a great deal. The peach and falernum give it a great level of sweetness balanced by the lime juice and rum. The falernum also adds a great complexity that is exactly what I was looking for. Finally the blend of rums gives this drink a solid punch with a nice flavor. Naturally I recommend you mix up tons and enjoy!

If you’re wondering about the name think Castaway. Credit goes to my friend Colton who, amongst other things, seems to be a cocktail naming genius. Thanks buddy!

Calling this drink a Fog Cutter is a grand misnomer. Much better thought of as a fog maker. In Grog Log, Beachbum Berry has a great quote from Trader Vic that sums up his creation nicely. “Fog Cutter, hell. After two of these, you won’t even see the stuff.” To give you a hint of why this is the case let’s take a peek at the recipe to get us going.

Fog Cutter (Grog Log)

2 oz Lemon Juice

1 oz Orange Juice

1/2 oz Orgeat

2 oz Light Rum

1 oz Brandy

1/2 oz Gin

1/2 oz Sweet Sherry

1) Combine the ingredients (except sherry) in a shaker

2) Shake with ice until well chilled

3) Pour into a tiki mug

4) Float sherry on top

If you take a look you’ll notice that there are 3 1/2 oz of hard alcohol in this drink, 4 oz if you include the sherry. See what I mean when I say fog maker? After a couple of these and the fog settles in deep and wonderful.

When I first mixed this drink my first comment was that this is another tart but delicious cocktail. The sourness from the lemon was a little overwhelming. After a little thought it occurred to me that maybe it wasn’t the recipe but rather my ingredients. It would seem that my lemon juice this go-round is tarter than usual. This is a nice segue into a good point I should make. It’s always a good plan to give you cocktails a small taste before you shake and serve them. This will give you an idea of whether your is mixed correctly. For example perhaps your lemon juice is too tart.

To really give this drink the review it deserves I mixed up another with only 1 1/2 oz of lemon juice. The resulting cocktail is much more balanced. So, now that you know the drink is ~1/2 hard alcohol, on tasting it you’d never guess. The sherry really only comes through in the scent, which explains why the recipe calls for it to be a float. I don’t notice the gin in this drink but I used Junipero which isn’t a particularly strongly flavored example of the spirit. The brandy and rum meld nicely to make a harmonious core flavor with the citrus and the orgeat adding a subtle background flavor.

This is a great drink. Whether you choose to mix it to cut your fog or perhaps deepen it a bit I’m certain you’ll be quite pleased with the results.

[Note] There are some other cool pictures from this cocktail. I even got to play with dry ice. Check them out on Flickr.

The first cocktail of my Tiki in December week is one I’ve heard mentioned many times, but I’ve never had the opportunity to try, Planter’s Punch. Thankfully I decided I make a change to that. This drink is a lovely pink with an interesting brown cap of dark rum. The look of this drink alone screams out to me that it should be featured front and center in an ad for some tropical locale. The tastes is best summed with that same word, tropical. There is a ton of citrus flavor, not surprisingly, and the rum and grenadine flavors accent in the background.

This is definitely a drink that goes down very easy. Although the tartness from the lemon juice does slow you down at least a little bit. When you go to make this drink make sure you get a nice sweet orange juice. If you don’t you may need to tone down the lemon juice a bit so it isn’t overly sour. Experiment and see what you like.

I think this drink could also be a great party drink mixed up in advance, but still on the same day to preserve the fresh taste of the juice. Put it all in a big pitcher and let people pour their own with some cracked ice. Were you to take this route I’d go ahead and mix in the dark rum from the start. The visual appearance won’t be as striking but your guests won’t have the trouble of trying to float the rum on top of their own drinks.

Planter's Punch (Beachbum Berry's Grog Log)

1 1/4 oz Orange Juice

1 1/4 oz Lemon Juice

1/2 oz Grenadine

1 1/4 oz Light Rum

1/2 oz Dark Rum

Orange Slice

Maraschino Cherry

Pineapple Chunk

1) Combine all but the dark rum in a shaker

2) Add crushed ice

3) Shake until well chilled

4) Pour into a tall glass

5) Float dark rum on top

6) Garnish with orange, cherry and pineapple