Pisco Punch

Everybody needs a good Pisco Punch recipe.  Here's mine...

2 ounces Pisco
1 ounce distilled water (or otherwise purified)
3/4 ounces lemon juice
2/3 ounces pineapple syrup (1:1 sugar to fresh squeezed pineapple juice.  For an added bonus, mix in about 1 tsp of gum arabic to make it a gomme syrup)
2 dashes vanilla extract (just a few drops or sprays from your atomizer)

Now some will have you shake and strain this drink, though since we're already pre-diluting this cocktail with water, I don't find that necessary.  Instead, I like to build it over ice in a punch glass and then give it a healthy stir (around 40 rotations) to bring it down to temperature.  Really a fantastic drink.  Nice and dry and tart like any great punch.  This one goes hand in hand with the Philadelphia Fishhouse Punch.

Cobblers

So many cobblers!  It's a wonderful summer drink FO SHO.  Drawing from Mr. Jerry Thomas I have worked out my basic cobbler recipe, which can be applied to ANY SPIRIT YOU'D LIKE!  √ it dawgs....

2 ounces Spirit (rum, tequila, whiskey, gin, vodka, brandy, eau de vies, etc...)
1 tsp sugar (or 1/4 ounce 1:1 simple syrup) (any flavor of your choosing!  Have some fun with this)
A couple slices of orange (this is a to taste sort of thing.  I usually take two fairly thin wheels)
1/8 tsp of Maraschino Liqueur

Now take all of this, and shake real good with ice.  You can muddle the orange first, but I feel the hard shake with ice does this just fine.  As we will be garnishing with A TON of fruit and berries in season, it IS optional to also shake with these fruits first if you want a more berriful flavor!

Now some people will tell you to not strain and just pour straight into your glass, ice, fruit and all.  I find this a bit ugly for my taste, especially if you're shaking with your berries.  I double strain into a glass with ice.  However you like it, usually a small punch glass, or brandy snifter, or wine glass or something of that nature.  Even a double old-fashioned will do.  You can do crushed ice, or one big cube, or whatever you like.  Then it's time to garnish with seriously, all of the fruit and fresh berries you can find.  Get good in-season stuff from your local farmers market.  Tuck in an orange wheel on the side.  Cover with strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, everything!  Maybe you'll make a fall cobbler with cranberry and apples!  YUM!  Rum or brandy as your spirit, 1/4 ounce cinnamon syrup.  Maybe swap out the maraschino for a good apricot brandy (liqueur not the eau-de-vie).

Your options with the cobbler are really limitless, which is why this recipe really should be a general outline, not the gospel.  Now go on, and preach the word!

Crustas

Since we're on the subject of crustas...  A wonderful and simple drink.  Make it with any spirit.  Brandy crustas and Rum crustas are my other goto's.  I prefer Jamaican rum the best when making the latter.  Like appleton 12 year.  Always make sure to use a high quality spirit, whatever you choose, as this is a drink where your spirit is playing the feature role.

2 ounces Any Spirit (Gin, Rum, Whiskey, Mezcal, Tequila, Eau-De-Vie, etc)
1 tsp simple syrup
1 tsp lemon juice
1 tsp orange curaçao (lately I like pierre ferrand dry curaçao, though there are lots of good orange liqueurs on the market that could sub)
2 dashes bitters (I like to play around with this, but angostura is always a good bet)

shake and strain into a sugar rimmed wine glass.  Take the peel of the entire circumference of a lemon for garnish.   Cheers!

This is a great one btw for experimentation and improvisation.  As you see below, It's easy to take many cocktails and render them in a crusta format!  Let's take the last word.  Equal parts gin, lime juice, maraschino liqueur, green chartreuse.  Watch this...

2 ounces Gin
1 tsp green chartreuse
1 tsp lime juice
1 tsp maraschino liqueur
2 dashes bitters

Blammo, done!  A good way to think about the Crusta is that it's an evolution of an Old-Fashioned.  Instead of just bitters and a sweetener, we're augmenting that with also a bit of liqueur, and just a bit of citrus.  Not enough to make it a sour, just enough to brighten the drink up.  If you're an Old-Fashioned fan, then I suggest you try a Crusta, stat!  Though watch out for those bars that pour in the maraschino, make sure they're making it correctly first!

Pegu Club Cocktail

A classic that was once great, then horrible and now great again.  sometime during the 20th century, I imagine as a result of prohibition, curacao lost it's way.  Once more bitter and made with actual bitter orange peels from the Curacao island, it became a sugary artificial orange flavored mess.  The fine folks at Pierre Ferrand made that all better, and now we can enjoy great cocktails like the Pegu Club again!

1 1/2 ounces Gin (I like navy strength)
3/4 ounces Pierre Ferrand Dry Curacao Anciene Method
1 tsp lime juice
1 dash orange bitters
1 dash angosura bitters

Manhattan

You can't go wrong with a Manhattan.  It's so simple, but there's endless posibilities for it.  First created at the Manhattan Club in NYC in the 1800's at some point.  Traditionally made with Rye or Bourbon, though there's nobody stopping you from using japanese whiskey, or a great scotish single malt!  Playing around with different bitters/sweetvermouth/whiskey combos is really where it's at with this drink.  Tonight I made myself this...

1 1/2 ounce Corsair Wry Moon (unaged or 'white' rye whiskey.  spicy and incredible)
3/4 ounce Martini & Rossi sweet Vermouth (Italian Vermouth)
2-3 dashes Bitter Truth Creole Bitters

spicy and sweet!  What a great manhattan.  Anyway, have some fun with it, there's no rules, only delicious whiskey :-)  Cheers!

ps - I'm currently making a barrel-aged manhattan at home with an assortment of ryes, vermouth and The Bitter Truth's Jerry Thomas' Own Decanter Bitters!  I'll let you know in a few months how that turns out.

Philadelphia Fish-House Punch - FOR ONE!

I took a little liberty with this one.  This is a great famous punch from the famous (?) fish-house club in Philadelphia.  I think it was a fishing club!  Anyway, they had their own punch and it is awesome.  The great David Wonderich (cocktail writer) had a recipe for this in his book PUNCH.  I turned it into a single serving.  It's pretty darn great!  Check it out....

1 ounce jamaican rum

1/2 ounce cognac

1/2 ounce peach brandy (Kuchan makes a barrel aged, peach eau de vie which is the closest you can find to what original peach brandy would have been like.  At least that is my understanding.)

1/2 ounce lemon juice

1/2 ounce simple syrup

shake vigorously to give it a nice and good dilution.  I poured ice and all into a glass, because a little more dilution was fine with me, as it is a strong drink.  

BTW....this recipe is based off a printed punch recipe from 1795.  Which means this drink was probably floating around a while before that.  Chances are, this drink is older than the usa itself!

Clover Club Cocktail

This is my favorite version of this classic....

1 1/2 ounces gin
3/4 ounce french vermouth (I like Dolin)
3/4 ounce raspberry syrup
1/4 ounce lemon juice
1/2 ounce egg white

shake and strain. You'll want to dry shake (with no ice) first to emulsify the egg. Then add your ice and and shake as normal.

check out my recipe on fruit syrups on how to make the raspberry syrup. I'd juice the raspberry's and add equal parts sugar. Cheers!

Singapore Sling

The one and only (that's actually not true. there are a lot of different recipes but I like this one.)

1 ounce lime juice
1 ounce cherry heering
1/2 ounce benedictine
1/2 ounce brandy
2 ounces gin
1 1/2 ounce club soda

Shake all except soda. Strain into tall glass filled with ice cubes. Stir in soda.

Sidecar

The almighty classic. Honestly, you can swap out the spirit for whatever you want....

1 1/2 ounces Brandy (I like a nice cognac)
1 ounce cointreau
1/2 ounce lemon juice

Shake and strain.

This is a classic 3-2-1 ratio. It will really work with whatever you put as the spirit. Vodka, gin, whiskey. Tequila, and replace the lemon with lime and you have a margarita!

Corpse Reviver #2

Here's a great one from the savoy.

3/4 ounce gin
3/4 ounce cointreau
3/4 ounce lillet*
3/4 ounce lemon juice.

*Note about lillet...
Sometime in the 70's or 80's the company that produces lillet went and CHANGED THE RECIPE ON US! WHAT a bunch of jerks am i right!? Anyway, this presents us a problem because this recipe is from the 30's. So obviously, if the lillet is difference, the cocktail TASTES different. The good news is, according to some people, that Cocchi Americano tastes quite similar to how the original recipe lillet tasted like. So whenever I make myself a Corpse Reviver #2, I always use Cocchi instead of the lillet. It has some quinine in it, so adds this great bitter edge to the drink that totally changes it, for the better in my opinion.

Also, remember, lillet AND cocchi are fortified wines. so THEY ARE WINE! When you open the bottle, they begin to oxidize quickly, just like normal wine. So when you open them store them in the fridge. After 1 month has gone by, throw them out! I usually will buy small bottles, and only one type at a time. During that month, or few weeks, i'll try to have lots of drinks that involve that particular aperitif.

Last Word

Perhaps my all time favorite cocktail. Firstly because it's great. But also because it was invented at the Detroit Athletic Club in the early 1920's during prohibition. Me being from Detroit, I take great pride in all things from the D. I have in fact, had a Last Word at the D.A.C which is phenomenal. Instead of using gin, they replace that with their own vodka infusion. I assume they do this, to more approximate the homemade or bathtub gin that was more common during prohibition. There was definitely some Anise flavors that were coming out in that one. I will occasionally spritz some absinthe on top with my atomizer to approximate this sometimes.

3/4 ounce gin
3/4 ounce maraschino liqueur
3/4 ounce green chartreuse (if you only have yellow, just use more like 1 ounce or 1 1/4 ounce.)
3/4 ounce lime juice

shake and strain.

Aviation

One of my favorites, and one of the first I made at home that got me into classic cocktails.

2 ounces Gin
3/4 ounce lemon juice
1/2 ounce maraschino liqueur
1/4 ounce creme de violette

shake and strain.

Monkey Gland Cocktail

This one is from the Savoy. Usually I'll use homemade syrups, but this one I used a great pomegranate syrup I picked up at the Hollywood farmers market from a local farm. Delicious. Also, fresh squeezed orange juice is always great if you have some oranges around :-)

1 1/2 ounces Gin
3/4 ounce fresh orange juice
3 dashes Grenadine (i just did a quick free pour)
3 dashes absinthe (a few squirts from my atomizer)

Shake and strain.