From the Blog
Chapeau Cocktail – Tribute to Bradley Wiggins
So today at the 99th attempt, Great Britain has all but produced her first winner of cycling's toughest race, the Tour de France. Not only that but a British 1-2 with Chris Froome behind the man with the awesome grips, Bradley Wiggins. Chapeau. All that remains is to complete the job tom...
Shuijingfang cocktails1
Shuijingfang Baijiu Cocktails Part 1 - Classics I have been living and bartending in China for 3 1/2 years now. Over the course of that time I have tried to taste a few Chinese baijius from a professional perspective (as well as from a social one over dinner!) and write some tasting not...
Gerry’s Soho Manhattan
I spent the day in central London today doing some early casing of possible locations for a second bar (more dreaming than anything else at this stage), but while walking through Soho made a first visit to the wonderful drinks emporium which is Gerry's on Old Compton Street. If you haven...
The Yellow Emperor
A baijiu 'enthusiast' by the name of Derek Sandhaus recently paid me a visit with a bottle of Erguotou (二锅头) and a challenge - make him a tasty drink. Given he'd been drinking neat baijiu with a senior representative of the brand all day, I'm not sure his palate was at its fines...
Fernet and Cola Flip
Tried Luxardo Fernet for the first time yesterday. Bought a bottle today and have been playing around with it... Given the recent bartender-driven popularity of Fernet & Coke, I thought I'd play around with a twist. Fernet and Cola Flip was the result. 30ml Luxardo Fernet 25ml Ta...
Martinez variation
So a quick variation on the Martinez, the richer, sweeter grandparent of the martini. Should you use gin, a more authentic old tom gin, or even a properly old school genever? Well I went for the last two answers in even measure. The twists came in the form of the vermouth or vermouths us...
Beetroot bitters pt 1, 2 & 3
26th February 2012 So now to blend. First thing is that there has clearly been rather a lot of oxidation in the raw beetroot infusion which is now a distinctly rusty coloured deep red. By contrast the roasted beetroot infusion is still a clear purple red. In future I think I would just...
Ocho Mole Alexander
This week I was lucky enough to get a ticket (in fact two) for a tequila tasting organised by Emma, Kate and Mark of the London Cocktail Society. The tasting (really an impassioned speech followed by a tasting) was given by Tomas Estes. Tomas part-owns Ocho tequila which is made by Car...
Aperol (Picon) bière
I felt like a Picon bière this evening - the French bitter orange aperitif dropped into a cold, refreshing draught lager. Unfortunately Amer Picon has yet to make it to Beijing, and I hadn't made prior importing arrangements - so had to improvise. Keeping the bitter theme, I chose Aper...
Stout in cocktails
Stout has a long but not particularly illustrious history in cocktails. As with other beers, cocktails tend to involve a pint or half of the beer either blended with another beer or with a shot of something to moderate the flavour. Think Black Velvet (stout and champagne - or stout and c...
Experimentation in savoury flavours
The Christmas food surge is subsiding leaving in its wake the jetsam of overstuffed people and leftover food. The idea of breaking out of the traditional herbal/fruit flavours that dominate cocktails is an intriguing one, but there may well be a reason that these flavours dominate; they...
Centurion’s Martini
I am sipping on a rather lovely Fin de Siècle made to Harry Craddock's 1930 recipe but with a dash of orange blossom water. 50ml beefeater gin 20ml carpano antica formula 10 ml amer picon Dash homemade orange bitters Dash orange blossom water However it was pronounced a little too cha...
YangMei Blood & Sand
This is an Asian variation on the blood & sand recipe using yangmei (杨梅 / Chinese Bayberry) and Nikka 'from the barrel' Japanese whisky for a bit of a kick. A lovely rich version of the drink with a good vivid red colour. 30ml Nikka 'Whisky From The Barrel' 25ml Carpano Antica For...
ShuiJingFang Grapefruit Sour
Yesterday I was tasked to create a cocktail with Diageo's Baijiu (白酒) brand, ShuiJingFang (水井坊). It's got all those classic baijiu flavours - some sweetness, some funk, some citrus and massive amounts of congeners - quite a challenge for mixed drinks, but one that bartenders in...
Pepper and Smoke
A moment of cocktail invention inspired by a fabulous Marzen beer that we have in the fridge at The Hide, Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier from Brauerei Heller Bamberg. It has a smokiness reminiscent of a good Islay for example the terrific Lagavulin 16 year. There is, they say, no smoke...
Ruby Gold
Egg, Port and Suze. Three ingredients meant to go together. How to make an egg and port based drink less like a pudding? Simply add some rye whiskey for body and strength and an undercurrent of herbal flavours with Suze, a gentian based French aperitif dating back to 1889, which als...
Malacca Sling (Part 1)
I am currently in Malacca, Malaysia, tracing a little family history. My mother was born here (Malacca/Melaka General Hospital - we visited earlier today), and my grandfather spent most of his working life here, representing the Dunlop Rubber Company in their local plantation operations...
Boilermaker Refashioned
The Boilermaker is one of the most basic of "cocktails". Basic because generally the two key ingredients are kept separate until combined within the drinker. The first is a shot of liquor (traditionally whiskey) followed by a pint of beer of some sort and was historically the favouri...
F.F.J.
To celebrate the arrival of the newest member of our team, baby Felix, we have created the "F.F.J." 20 ml of 5 star syrup 15 ml of homemade grenadine 15 ml of lemon juice 35 ml of Old Fitzgerald 1849 Bourbon 5 ml of egg white Dry shake, then shake hard with ice. Single strain into a ma...
The Cocktail
We refer to most mixed drinks these days as cocktails, originally however, it was just another style of drink, alongside juleps, smashes, flips, fizzes, sours, cobblers, punches and toddies. In Jerry Thomas’s 1862 How to Mix Drinks, cocktails appear in a scant 11 of 220 alcoholic mixe...
Three Vine Cocktail
I started the evening with a Black Dagger, sourced from the Ardent Spirits iphone app "Flip 'n drink" - "'n"? who would have thought Mr Regan was English? This is an adaptation of a recipe from Robert Hess and is a 4:2:1 blend of cognac, vermouth and cointreau, with a dash of angostura...
Sazerac Manhattan
A fairly simple twist on a Perfect Manhattan. The wash of absinthe and substituting a mix of orange and peychaud bitters for Angostura. Sometimes simple is so the right answer though... This combination works very well. I was planning to use a blend of rye and brandy - a nod to the fact...
No Pork Chop
Experimenting here with an apple balsamic thyme flavouring. The crystals give a slightly salty finish to the drink which is either very odd or nicely compliments the balsamic flavours depending on your point of view. 50ml Knob Creek bourbon 25ml fresh pressed apple juice 10ml lemon...
The Chartreuse Daiquiri
50ml Toz St. Lucian white rum 25ml chartreuse syrup 20ml lime juice 2 good dashes homemade orange bitters Garnish with lime peel and a sprinkling of caramelised chartreuse salt crystals. To make chartreuse syrup, simply add sugar to a jar of green chartreuse and shake. A lot. To make...
Spanish Harlem
A new recipe from Rufus, with the following background: Having to improvise as we have scandalously run out of French Vermouth. But out of adversity comes triumph... Spanish Harlem 50ml Booker's Kentucky Straight Bourbon (Batch No. C00-A-20) 10ml Carpano Antica Formula 15ml Lustau Dry...
Golden Solera
Sticking with a Sherry theme from The Beginning of the End, here's another old sherry number from Rufus: Golden Solera 50 ml Oloroso Dulce Matusalem 30 Year Solera sherry 10ml Benedictine 10 ml sugar syrup 15 ml lemon juice 1 egg yolk Shake hard first without ice then with. Double...
Beginning of the End
A quick one to assuage the guilt of not posting for a while... This is a cocktail I won a competition with a couple of years ago at about this time. Still a drink I love, although for those of us in China, two of the four ingredients are a little hard to come by. Fortunately Diplomati...
Emperor’s Whiskers
Based on the classic Satan’s Whiskers cocktail from the 1920s & 30's, this uses a pu’er tea infused vermouth to give a Chinese flavour: 20ml Gin 20ml pu’er infused dry vermouth 10ml sweet vermouth 10ml fresh orange juice 15ml Grand Marnier Shake and strain into a coupe glass...
Year of the Tiger Cocktail
14th February 2010 marks the start of the year of the Tiger. If you're based anywhere near China (or most of Asia for that matter), you'll know that. Sitting in Beijing surrounded by fireworks, I'd imagine most of the world knows it - or can at least hear that something's going on! To m...
Blood & Sand
I thought it fitting that our first cocktail post should be the name of the site (and our company). It's an unusual combination of ingredients, but not that uncommon on the menu of reasonable cocktail bars, and it is for this reason we came to name the company after the drink. The cock...