Cocktails

I've recently been having fun putting cocktails together, experimenting with different ingredients, discovering combinations that work together surprisingly well. I had never been much of a cocktail person - finding them too strong and expensive - but when I worked at hangingditch I became fascinated with the different spirits, liqueurs, and bitters that people would come in specifically asking for. Now I'm already becoming one of those people, searching out obscure ingredients that will provide a subtle but vital fix to the recipe.

history

Cocktails date from early on in the nineteenth century, when they were a mix of spirits, sugar, water, and bitters. They gradually became more complicated, with liqueurs added to the mix. Their height in the US was during Prohibition, often to cover up the dubious quality of spirits. Gin was a popular base spirit - as in eighteenth-century England, an easy spirit to make, easy to make badly, and easy to get drunk on. After the Second World War, gin was replaced by vodka, a neutral spirit to which many flavours could be added. After a lull in the 1960s and 70s in the US (though in the UK they became popular with the rise of middle-class dinner parties), cocktails returned to fashion in the 1980s, particularly in New York. This was also the point when Bourbon, which hadn't really recovered from Prohibition, was embraced back into American drinking culture through cocktails like the Manhattan and Old-Fashioned.

bitters

Historically created for their health-giving properties, bitters are alcoholic liquids with bittering agents added, such as quinine, angelica, orange, or rhubarb. Those bitter flavours can also be aromatised by the further addition of clove, vanilla, coriander, or ginger.

Many of the great bitter drinks originate from central Europe, in particular northern Italy where they are called amaro. A famous amaro apertif is Campari, which is used to give colour to cocktails; its bitterness tempered with a sweet edge, it's made from bitter orange, quinine, and rhubarb. A lower strength, less complex, more herbal alternative is Aperol.  

Amaro can also be drunk as a digestif. Italy's top-selling amaro is Averna, which is sweet and made from herbs, bark, and botanicals. The Czech Republic also produces another famous sweet, herbal digestif, Becherovka. Other digestifs are overtly and intensely bitter, designed to be drunk in small quantities. A famous example is Fernet Branca, made from rhubarb, saffron, aloe, myrrh, iris, bitter orange, and cinnamon. More notorious is Jägermeister, made from 56 different herbs.

For use in cocktails, there are many specifically flavoured bitters which have been reduced to their essence. The most famous are Angostura's aromatic bitters, a secret recipe made from herbs and spices. Originally a medicinal drink for the army of the great Venezuelan revolutionary Simon Bolivar, these are an essential element of any cocktail bar. A classic cocktail featuring them is a Pink Gin, which dates from the days of the British Empire in India. A favourite of Ian Fleming, it's made with 2½ ounces of gin and 4-5 dashes of Angostura, with a lemon twist.

Another historic producer is Peychaud, from New Orleans, whose bitters are more aromatic and sweeter, and the key ingredient in a Sazerac cocktail. Other great producers include Bob's Bitters and Bittermens, and many new companies are emerging as cocktails once again become popular. My good friend Matt Hemeyer makes spiced bitters at addition, a fine example of the imagination and experimentation behind every great cocktail.

vermouth

Dating from late-eighteenth-century Turin, vermouth is a vital ingredient in classic cocktails such as a Martini, a Manhattan, or a Negroni. Vermouth is wine with herbs, bark, and roots added to it and can be either sweet or dry. Famous brands are Punt e Mes, from Italy's Carpano family who also produce Antica Formula, a richer, fuller high-quality vermouth, Cinzano, and Martini & Rosso.

liqueurs

A liqueur is a spirit flavoured, infused, or distilled with herbs, fruits, or flowers and often with a sweet syrup added. The complex, intense aromas make them ideal for adding to a cocktail. Crème de Cassis is a liqueur made by soaking blackcurrants in alcohol; added to white wine it makes Kir and to Champagne a Kir Royale. Other similar liqueurs, which will make a profound difference to a cocktail with just a small amount, include Crème de Cacao and Crème de Menthe. Another famous liqueur is Grand Marnier, which is Cognac flavoured with the distilled essence of bitter oranges, while Cointreau is another orange-flavoured liqueur from sweet and bitter orange peels (non-branded alternatives are called Triple Sec). Amaretto, meanwhile, is flavoured with almonds. The list is endless.

cocktails

Here are some cocktails I've made recently which I've enjoyed, arranged by the core ingredient.

Brandy

Although Cognac would be the preferred base, a good brandy will suffice. Likewise with fruit brandies - good Calvados, an apple brandy from Normandy, is expensive and Laird's Applejack does the job.

Corpse Reviver

As the name suggests, this is a hangover 'cure' - at the very least, it will wake you up. There are a number of different recipes each called the Corpse Reviver; this one is brandy based. An equal combination of three ingredients - 1oz each of brandy, applejack, and sweet vermouth.

Champagne

It may seem sacrilege to corrupt a drink as fine as Champagne with other ingredients, but it nevertheless makes a superb base for complex cocktails.

Jumping Jellybean

Add 1oz each of tequila blanco, Grand Marnier, and fresh lemon juice to a chilled flute, and then top it up with Champagne. The result is a refreshing, citrusy, salty drink.

Gin

For some base drinks - for example, white rum - the quality of the spirit doesn't matter too much, but with a spirit like gin it's essential. The mix of botanicals will impart vital flavours to the drink. The classic gin cocktail is the Martini, a combination of gin and dry vermouth.

Alfonso Special

Mix and shake 1½oz of Grand Marnier, ¾oz each of gin and dry vermouth, and ¼oz sweet vermouth, with a couple of dashes of Angostura to create a bitter, spicy cocktail.

Rum

White rum, which has fairly neutral flavours of tropical fruits, is a great base for cocktails as it adds some but not too many flavours to the mix. It's what else goes into the mix that counts.

La Floridita

Mix and shake 1½oz white rum, ¾oz sweet vermouth, ¼oz crème de cacao, and 1oz of fresh lime juice, with a dash of grenadine. That touch of crème de cacao gives a strong chocolately finish to the spicy, herbal, cherry-like vermouth.

Tequila

Although darker versions of tequila can be used, it's tequila blanco that's most common - most famously in the Margarita. Always use good-quality tequila that's been made from 100% agave.

Tequila Mockingbird

Mix and shake 2oz of tequila blanco, ½oz of white crème de menthe, and 1oz of fresh lime juice. Float a sliced lime wheel on top. A beautifully coloured, salty, minty drink.

Vodka

A neutral-tasting spirit, vodka nevertheless comes in different guises, made from a range of base materials including grain, potatoes, or grapes. Increasingly fashionable now are flavoured vokdas such as vodka citron.

Agent Orange

Everything about this cocktail is orange, flavouring the neutral flavour of the vodka: 1½oz vodka, ¾oz Grand Marnier, ¼oz Cointreau, and ½oz fresh orange juice. 
 

Whiskey

Many whiskey-based cocktails use Bourbon (such as the Old-Fashioned) or rye whiskey (Manhattan, though some prefer Bourbon). Others use Canadian whisky, perhaps because so much whisky came from Canada during Prohibition, when cocktails were all the rage as part of the Roaring Twenties.

Commodore

1½oz of Bourbon, ¾oz of crème de cacao, and ½oz of fresh lemon juice. The flavours here are strong and powerful - great if you have a cold.

serving cocktails

There are different glasses for different types of cocktails. A Martini glass has a long thin stem with an inverted conal glass; a Margarita glass is similar but more like a goblet. An Old-Fashioned glass is a stocky tumbler, which is used for serving drinks over ice. The other classic cocktail glass is a Highball, tall and straight and to be filled with ice. Even if a cocktail isn't served with ice, it's usually mixed and shaken with ice in a cocktail shaker.

Cocktails are fun. They do require quite a stash of alcohol at home to make, which is fine if you're a collector like me. They work as aperitifs or as a pick-me-up after a hard day's work; they're also a great way of exploring spirits and discovering the world of obscure European drinks that survive because of the inventiveness of bartenders around the world.

Brandy

The word brandy comes from brandewijn, the Dutch for "burnt wine," which is pretty much what brandy is: a wine distilled into a high-alcohol spirit. Brandy can be made anywhere in the world, but as ever it's France which has the most famous examples. I've written about Cognac before, so here I'll focus on the other famous French brandy, Armagnac, as well as Spanish brandy.

Armagnac

One of the central reasons for the success of Cognac over the centuries is trade. Cognac is just north of Bordeaux, with easy access to the international trade routes that the port has historically provided, particularly to important spirits markets such as England/UK and the Netherlands. Although also in the south west of France, Armagnac is located further inland with no easy access to a major port and has therefore never had the commercial success of Cognac - though it hasn't suffered the boom and bust cycles of that region either. 

Besides location and reputation, there are other significant differences between the two styles of brandy:

grapes as with Cognac, the most important grape is Ugni Blanc (Trebbiano in Italy), which produces a wine with neutral aromas and high acidity. In Cognac, it accounts for 98% of plantings, but in Armagnac it's lower, at 55%. 32% of plantings are of Baco, the only hybrid grape allowed in the production of quality wine in the EU (a hybrid grape is a cross between a variety of the European vitis vinifera, in this case Folle Blanche, and a North American vine species, in this case vitis riparia), which gives rich, earthy, dried fruit characteristics to the spirit. Ten grape varieties are permitted, but the other two important ones are Colombard and Folle Blanche, an aromatic variety which was badly hit by phylloxera in the nineteenth century.

taste Armagnac is a much more rustic, earthy drink than Cognac. A unique still, called the alambic Armagnaçais, is used, a type of column still which produces a relatively low alcohol spirit (often less than 60%). Distilling to such a low volume of alcohol, as well as using more aromatic grape varieties, means that the aromas and flavours of Armagnac are much more powerful and aggressive than Cognac. I prefer the robust, agricultural taste of Armagnac, but it all depends on personal preference, as well as the time and occasion.

ageing the terms are very close to Cognac, but with slightly different definitions. Although this provides a point of difference between the two, I don't think it's very helpful, leading to confusion as well as abuse by lesser brandies not subject to regional regulation. The ages refer to the youngest wine in the blend. 

Blanche unaged (a category introduced in 2005)

VS/*** one year

VSOP four years

Napoléon six years

hors d'age/XO ten years 

age indicated the youngest spirit is the age stated on the label (e.g. twelve years)

vintage this is a huge difference from Cognac, which (more or less) doesn't allow vintages. For a market that likes to see a year on the label, this is a huge advantage Armagnac has over Cognac. 

Diploma tasting

At the end of the spirits tasting, we all got a number on a piece of paper, which denoted which spirit we'd get to take home. I was 19 out of 26, so I was delighted to walk away with this Armagnac.

Bas Armagnac Dartigalongue VSOP 
A lovely soft toffee fudge nose, floral and fruity too, like chocolate strawberry sweets; on the palate, the alcohol is warming at first but smooth, with a minty, caramel, chocolate mouthfeel, with coffee and toffee and a peppery spiciness to it from the well-integrated oak. A very good, complex, but accessible brandy.

if you buy Armagnac, make sure it's from Bas Armagnac

"French brandy": warning!

During the brandy tasting, we sampled ASDA's French Brandy, a dreadful, barely drinkable spirit. Not only that, its labelling was extremely disingenuous, using Cognac and Armagnac terms to its advantage. On their website, below the product listing, ASDA claim that they "do everything we can to make sure the information about the products we sell is always as accurate as possible," but that "we recommend that you always read the label carefully before using or consuming any products." Well, quite. The label has VSOP in large letters, *** at the bottom, and the word Napoléon at the top: three entirely different ageing terms to impress the unsuspecting customer. It's easy to get frustrated by the French appellation system, but it's there for a reason: to protect quality wine areas. In this instance, though, only Cognac and Armagnac are subject to appellation regulations, meaning that unscrupulous producers in the rest of France (or British supermarkets) can use the terms however they want.

Spanish brandy

Spanish brandy is a widely-produced drink without any great reputation, yet its slight sweetness and sherry flavours can make it a very flavoursome and surprisingly complex brandy. The main grape is Airén, which until recently was the most planted grape in the world, grown in La Mancha in the heart of Spain where the wine is usually distilled too. The grape is lower in acidity and higher in alcohol than the French brandy grapes. The two main areas for actual brandy production are Penedès in Catalunya and Jerez in Andalucia; the latter is the only Spanish brandy controlled by law.

Brandy de Jerez is aged in the same way as sherry, using the solera system, which means that spirits of different ages are continually being blended together to create a consistent taste year after year. This ageing system, together with the blending of high- and low-alcohol spirits from distillation, gives a Spanish producer a variety of options for the style of brandy. Further complexity comes from ageing in old sherry barrels, the previous sherry contents imparting flavour rather than the oak: grilled nuts from a fino barrel, walnut, plum, and figs from an oloroso barrel, and raisins from Pedro Ximénez.

Diploma tasting

Sobreano Solera Reserva Brandy de Jerez
The one Spanish brandy we tasted was very good and represented excellent value, especially compared to ASDA's own French Brandy. For a price little different, this had all the complexity of a brandy one should expect, with figs, raisins, sultanas, hazelnuts, and coconuts.

At the higher ender of the scale, I'd recommend Lepanto, also from Gonzalez Byass, or Lustau, another brandy from a great sherry company.

 

Pisco

I've never tasted pisco and it wasn't touched on during our Diploma tasting, but it's something we need to know about. There are two types of pisco, Chilean and Peruvian, both claiming to be the more authentic. The major differences are the grape varieties allowed, the distilled level of alcohol (much lower in Peruvian), and ageing in oak (none for Peruvian, at least 60 days for Chilean). I've never heard good things about pisco, but I'm open-minded about all these drinks...