Winter Spice

Rum Toddy - cup by Toasted Glass

In nature, winter is a time of hibernation, conservation and storing of energy, ready to burst forth and be plentiful again in the spring. Sadly, in the kingdom of men, there is no such respite. We may be top of the food chain, but with great power, comes great responsibility and apparently, it is our responsibility to buy vast amounts of Christmas gifts and eat our way through the rest of the food chain. So no rest for us; while foxes, badgers and squirrels snuggle up until spring, we must pull on our woolly hats and soldier on through the cold, battling the the elements and other high street shoppers as we try to find the perfect Christmas gifts. Alternatively, you could take inspiration from our woodland creatures and snuggle up indoors. Bearing in mind the cost of heating our homes this winter, a soft, woolly blanket, a pair of slipper socks and a cocktail that is guaranteed to warm you up from the inside, sound like the perfect accompaniment to a spot of online Christmas shopping....

After infusing Campari with chilli for last week's cocktail - 'Satan's Circus', I decided ( as I often do ) that it would taste even better made with gin, which proved to be the case in my opinion at least. Now this cocktail may be served chilled, but the heat of the chilli infused Campari will have you feeling toasty in no time. The trick is to infuse the Campari for just long enough to give you a glow without getting into ‘vindaloo’ territory. Let the chilli steep for no more than an hour and the resultant drink will warm you deliciously without burning the throat. To get the recipe for Chilli Infused Campari - click here.

This recipe also requires Cherry Heering, a cherry liqueur made from the maceration of real fruit with an intense, but natural, cherry flavour. If you do not already have some, you can buy online or in store from more specialist purveyors of spirits, such as Amathus Drinks. Finally, you will need gin, of which there are literally hundreds to choose from and all with surprisingly different flavours. I used Gin Xoriguer, a small batch gin from the Balearic island of Menorca, which has enough juniper and spice to stand up to the Chilli Infused Campari.

visit the Gin Xoriguer website

Cherry Devil

Ingredients
2 oz Gin Xoriguer
3/4 oz Cherry Heering
3/4 oz chilli infused Campari
3/4 oz freshly squeezed lemon juice

Add all of the ingredients to a shaker with ice and shake hard until the outside develops a frosty bloom.
Strain into a chilled martini glass.

Cherry Devil cocktail - glass by Toasted Glass

This next recipe uses the warming power of ginger to chase away the winter blues and will require making some honey-ginger syrup. To get the recipe for Honey-Ginger Syrup - click here

As the following recipe is a variation of a traditional margarita, it will of course require tequila. It is best to use a ‘resposado’ tequila rather than a young, ‘blanco’ or ‘silver’ tequila as the more aged spirit has an earthier flavour that works best with the honey and ginger.

Ginger Margarita

2 oz Tequila Resposado
1 oz honey-ginger syrup
1 tsp grated orange zest
1 oz freshly squeezed lime juice
Strip of orange zest and slice of ginger to garnish

Add all of the ingredients, apart from the garnish, to a cocktail shaker.
Shake hard for about 20 secs and double strain (to remove the grated zest) into a chilled cocktail glass.
Twist the strip of zest over the glass to release the essential oils and garnish the drink.

Ginger Margarita cocktail - glass by Toasted Glass

Our final winter warmer cocktail is a warm, boozy beverage that can be prepared almost as simply as a cup of tea and in fact, you may wish to scale up the quantities and make a pot for friends.

Rum Toddy

1 1/2 oz dark rum
3/4 oz apricot brandy
1/2 oz lemon juice
1 tsp light muscovado sugar
3 oz boiling water
Cinnamon stick to garnish

Add the rum, brandy and lemon juice to a cup and top up with boiling water.
Add the spoonful of dark muscovado sugar and stir with a cinnamon stick until the sugar dissolves.

Rum Toddy - cup by Toasted Glass

Dark Side of the Cocktail Cabinet

Since having children, Hallow'een takes on a very different light, possibly more terrifying than I could ever have imagined. Gone are the quandaries as to which party I should attend and whether or not I should go, 'sexy witch' or 'slutty vampire' and instead, it becomes an evening of cursing every time the door knocker sounds, interrupting my busy sofa surfing schedule with a parade of stunted grotesques, demanding sweets. I am ashamed to admit that despite my children's pleas, I refuse to decorate the doorway or furnish the front step with a pumpkin, lest it should lend further encouragement to  the little blighters to come begging for confectionary. I have noticed that some enlightened recluses actually leave a bucket of sweets outside the door, thus avoiding the awkward shuffling on the doorstep, accompanied by unintelligible mumbling through a (fake) bloodstained, skeleton mask. I am tempted to adopt this approach myself, except that my boys are quite concerned that there would be no sweets left for them....

To mark the spookiness of the occasion (and to ease the pain of social interaction with minors), Mr TG and I will be taking a trip to the dark side of the cocktail cabinet and drinking a couple of bourbon cocktails that look suitably gothic, without veering into parody. Both are drinks I had been meaning to try for some time, having come across them whilst researching material for previous posts and although I do like create my own cocktails a lot of the time, sometimes it is nice to try out what's hot right now.

'Hot' is definitely an appropriate description for our first cocktail, the spookily monikered, 'Satan's Circus', which contains a thai red birdseye chilli infusion that certainly awakens the senses. The original drink was created at the NoMad Hotel in New York and named after the area which was known as 'Satan's Circus' in the 19th Century due to the profusion of brothels and speakeasies that sprang up there. According to Bar Manager, Leo Robitschek, the cocktail was created as a homage to that history and certainly, there is an air of danger to the drink.

I have replicated the recipe as best I can, but the original does call for Aperol rather than Campari, so if you have some, do use that instead. However, I think it's an equally marvellous drink with Campari and Campari does tend to be easier to get hold of. Both Campari and Aperol are Bitters and taste fairly similar, although Campari is higher in alcohol content and not quite so sweet. The most obvious difference to most, however, is in their colour; Aperol is an intense orangey red and Campari, a bright ruby.

The only preparation needed for this cocktail, is to infuse the Campari/Aperol with the thai birdseye chilli, which is simple enough to do.

Chilli Infused Campari

Ingredients
6 oz Campari
1 red thai birdseye chilli

Slice the chilli lengthways and pop it in the Campari with the stalk still on.
Leave to infuse for 1 hour and then remove the chilli.
Strain to remove any seeds and store in a sealed container indefinitely.

Chilli infused Campari - cup by Toasted Glass

Satan's Circus

Ingredients

2 oz rye bourbon (I used Buffalo Chase)

3/4 oz chilli infused Campari

3/4 oz Cherry Heering

3/4 oz freshly squeezed lemon juice

Add all of the ingredients to a shaker with ice and shake hard until the outside of the shaker frosts over.

Strain into a chilled martini glass.

Satan's Circus - cocktail glass by Toasted Glass

This next drink also hails from New York and is an unusual, but rather wonderful take on a Whisky Sour. The idea of combining wine and spirits in cocktails is very popular in cool bars, but actually, this drink dates back to the 1870's when there was a trend for creating drinks with a 'claret snap'. Although claret refers to a particular type of wine nowadays, back then, it could be used to mean any type of red wine. The best wine to use for this drink is something rich and fruity like a Shiraz or Malbec and I have used one of my favourites, Yellow Tail Shiraz, which is so fruity and chocolately, it's hard to stop at just one glass. The idea is to float the red wine on the top of the drink so that it sits in two distinct layers, but I recommend that once you have admired your skill at cocktail creation, take a swizzle stick and give it a mix, as it tastes even better that way.

New York Sour

Ingredients

2 oz rye or bourbon whiskey (I used Buffalo Chase)

1 oz freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 oz simple syrup

1/2 oz Shiraz or Malbec red wine

Add the bourbon, lemon and syrup to a shaker with ice and shake hard for 30 secs.

Strain into a tumbler filled with ice and carefully pour the red wine over the back of a spoon so that it floats on the surface in a separate layer. 

New York Sour - glass by Toasted Glass

If you would like to try something suitably spooky looking this Hallow'een, I can highly recommend you try the 'Ruby in the Weiss' cocktail from my Beer Cocktail post, but to give a special eerie twist, use blue curaçao instead of triple sec. This will taste equally delicious, but the colour will turn from deep ruby to almost black.

Hallow'een 'Ruby in the Weiss' cocktail

Kentucky Fried....

Arial View of Manhattan cocktail glass - by Toasted Glass

Don't worry, there's nothing chicken based about this post and my lifetime achievement of never setting foot in a fried chicken outlet, still stands. No, the 'Kentucky' I am referring to, is of course, bourbon and the 'fried', well, that's how I'm feeling now after sampling the delights of this week's spirited rye, Buffalo Trace.

I had the pleasure of taking tea in London at the weekend with my new companions from the Secret Tea Society, whom you might remember from an earlier post in which I detailed the rather delicious cocktail I created for them (click here for details). Anyway, whilst in the vicinity, I took the opportunity to pop in to the Soho branch of Amathus Drinks where the immensely helpful staff were able to assist me with a number of requests, including, a bottle of bourbon.

My knowledge of bourbon is limited to a brief period in my early twenties, when I made it my sole mission to  try just about every drink behind the bar. Along with the better known Jack Daniels and Jim Beam were the amusingly named Sheep Dip, Wild Turkey and Knob Creek. However, I have latterly, tended towards the clear spirits and although I have dipped a toe (metaphorically) into scotch, bourbon has remained a bit of an enigma. Thankfully, the resident cocktail expert at Amathus was able to point me in the right direction and impart some of his considerable knowledge. I now know that bourbon falls into two main categories - those that are made with rye, like Buffalo Trace and those that are made with wheat. Wheaty bourbon has a smoother, creamier finish and rye gives a bit more spice to the flavour. As I was looking to make cocktails, in particular, a Manhattan, he suggested I go for a rye as the spicy finish married well with the sweet vermouth and bitters.

I have consequently discovered that in actual fact, to qualify as a bourbon, at least 51% of the grain content must come from corn and in the case of Buffalo Trace, it is distilled from a mixture of corn, barley and rye. The clear distillation is matured in oak barrels for 8 years, in which time, it takes on some of the colour and the flavour of the oak. The makers say that it has a rich and complex flavour with hints of vanilla, toffee and candied fruit and I agree that there is a sweetness to it, which in my opinion, is reminiscent of glace cherry and yes, a bit of vanilla and spice too.

So, armed with my spicy bourbon, a bottle of sweet vermouth and some Peychaud's bitters, I made my first Manhattan. I used the 70's classic, Martini Rosso as my vermouth and yes, I know it's not very cool, but it's a good all rounder I feel and was more than up to the job. Peychaud's were the bitters, originally used in the Manhattan and although Angostura are more commonly used these days, I wanted to keep as close to the original recipe as possible. That said, I did go for a wetter version of the drink (more vermouth) as I thought it could be a tough swallow on an uninitiated palate. In the end, I went for a full ounce of vermouth as oppose to half and for me, it was definitely the right choice. Finally, I garnished the drink with a frozen fresh cherry, rather than a cocktail cherry, which is the norm, if one is including a garnish. My reasons were two fold - one, I'm not overly keen on maraschino and two, I didn't actually have any...oops. Anyway, the addition of the frozen cherry turned out to be a bit of ripping wheeze after all as it helped to keep the drink cold and actually, the slight infusion of cherry juice at the bottom of the glass was delicious and dare I say it, my favourite part of the drink. Overall, I really enjoyed the complex flavour of this cocktail; the slight bittersweet of the vermouth, the spice of the bourbon and Peychauds - there's a lot going on in every sip so that the complexity of flavour seems in disproportion to the amount of ingredients.

Manhattan

Ingredients
2 ounces Buffalo Trace bourbon
1 ounce Martini Rosso (sweet vermouth)
2 dashes Peychauds Bitters
Cocktail cherry (or frozen cherry) to garnish

Pour the bourbon, sweet vermouth and bitters into a large highball or the bottom of a shaker, with plenty of ice.

Stir well with a barspoon, for about twenty seconds to get the right temperature and viscosity and then strain into a martin glass
Garnish with a cherry if desired.

White Lace Cocktail Glass by Toasted Glass

Following on from the Manhattan, I decided to make an admittedly, more complex cocktail, that built on the flavours I had identified and enjoyed, namely cherry and hint of orange that I discerned from the vermouth. I didn't want to totally overwhelm the bourbon, but at the same time, I wanted to make something a little easier for a novice like me to drink. The result was pretty delicious and still very much a bourbon flavour.

Kentucky Cherry

Ingredients
1 1/2 ounces Buffalo Trace bourbon
1/2 ounce Cherry Heering
1 ounce freshly squeezed orange juice
1/2 ounce freshly squeezed lemon juice
2 dashes orange bitters
Frozen cherry to garnish

Add all of the ingredients apart from the frozen cherry, to a cocktail shaker with ice and shake hard for 20 seconds.
Strain into a chilled martin glass and garnish, if desired.

Cocktail Glass by Tasted Glass

My final cocktail, before the Kentucky spirit got the better of me, was always going to work for me as I am such a big fan of King's Ginger. It's spice and warmth seem to work with just about everything, although I haven't tried it with rum yet... Anyway, pairing it with a spicy bourbon was a no brainer and adding to that, the classic sour mix of lemon and just a little syrup, as the King's Ginger is already sweet, made for a highly quaffable drink.

Ginger Bourbon Sour

Ingredients
1ounce King's Ginger
1ounce Buffalo Trace Bourbon
3/4 ounce lemon juice
Barspoon of simple syrup

Add all of the ingredients to a cocktail shaker with ice and shake hard for 20 seconds.
Strain into rocks glass filled with crushed ice

Black Stag Rocks Glass by Toasted Glass

On refection, I think my favourite drink of the day was the Kentucky Cherry as it retained the essential bourbon flavour and had a level of complexity that made it interesting, but was just more enjoyable to drink than the Manhattan - purists forgive me - I am trying ....

If you are in any way confused by any of the terms used in this post, then please take a look at the Dufford's Guide post which seeks to demystify some of the jargon.

And finally, if you are ever in London, I can't recommend enough, that you take a trip to Amathus City or Amathus Soho where the staff are so helpful, so knowledgeable and really make it a very pleasant, buying experience - and no, they're not paying me to say that... x

Cherry Vodka

Black Lace Cocktail Glasses by Toasted Glass

If you follow me on twitter or facebook then you will know that this week I have been all about the Cherry Vodka. I am no stranger to making flavoured vodkas as I used to work in a cocktail bar, many years ago, where the in-house, flavoured vodkas were our speciality. Most were sugary sweet like the Loveheart Vodka I showed you how to make in an earlier post, but I was intrigued to try making a fruit infused vodka. I settled on cherry because I figured the colour would be pretty amazing and also because I had some in the freezer, left over from making Cherry Margaritas. As I said before, I think frozen cherries are just fine for cocktail making. They are frozen at the point of picking and retain all the colour and flavour. The only thing lacking, when they defrost, is a little of the firmness, but when you are squishing them up or steeping them for days in vodka, it doesn't really matter. I used Absolut Vodka because that was what I had and I would recommend that you use something of a similar or even higher quality. This is a fruit infusion and the flavour is quite subtle and not sweetened with sugar so the quality of the vodka will make a big difference to the end result. If you fancy giving it a go yourself, follow the simple steps below.

How to make Cherry Vodka

You will need 

300ml good quality vodka

100g frozen cherries

Pour out 300ml of vodka into a clean measuring jug. Obviously you can make more if you wish - just scale up the quantities accordingly.

Place the cherries in a sieve and run cold water over them to get rid of the ice glaze - if you don't, when the cherries defrost in the vodka, you'll actually be inadvertently adding water. Similarly, allow the cherries to drain before adding them to the vodka.

Transfer the cherries into an airtight container, cover with the vodka, close the lid and wait.....

And finally , on the fifth day, it was good to go.

As you can see, the colour got more intense with each passing day and depending on your patience, you could leave it even longer, although the cherries themselves, by this point, have lost their colour and flavour, so I'm not convinced it would produce any better a result.

The cherries had retained their shape and it would probably have been fine just to use a sieve, but incase the fruit should break up when you separate it from the vodka, I suggest using a coffee filter paper. They will come in handy, should you decide to try the Loveheart Vodka too.

Tip the contents of your airtight container into a measuring jug before filtering, to avoid messy spills.

Allow the cherries to drain for quite a while as they are holding a lot of vodka.

Store the left over cherries in an airtight container in the fridge. With so much vodka in them, it would be a shame to throw them away!

Pour your vodka into a clean bottle and label it clearly to avoid any mishaps (especially if you have children).

So now you have your Cherry Vodka, what can you make with it? Well, of course, you could just drink it schnapps style, but that's not for the fainthearted. There is a sweetness to the vodka and a fruitiness that makes it quite palatable, but it's no sweet liqueur and in my opinion, it is best suited to cocktail making., so here are a few ideas.

Cherry Sour

Ingredients

1 1/2oz Cherry Vodka

1oz Cherry Heering

2oz Vita Coco

1/2oz fresh lime juice

Vita Coco, if you haven't heard of it before, is natural coconut water with no added sugar. It has an almost imperceptible coconut flavour and a slight natural sweetness. It is very different to coconut milk or coconut creme, both of which are quite calorific and thicker in texture. Apparently it's very good for you - lots of electrolytes, which is a good thing, so the blurb says, but that's probably a moot point when it's in an alcoholic beverage. Still, every little helps I suppose.

This recipe also contains Cherry Heering which adds a stronger cherry flavour and some sweetness. You can read more about Cherry Heering and where to buy it, in my Alfresco Cocktails post.

Add all of the ingredients to a shaker and add a handful of crushed ice

Shake vigorously for 20 secs and strain into chilled cocktail glass

This cocktail has the whole sweet and sour thing going on, that I like so much, but it's fairly subtle, which is nice. It is refreshing and would work well as a long drink over ice, too.

Next up, a very fruity and delicious cocktail that tastes like summer in a glass. It's sweet but in a very natural tasting way and if your fruit tastes sweet enough, don't bother adding the 1/4oz simple syrup

Cherry Berry

Ingredients

2oz Cherry Vodka

3 strawberries

6 blueberries

1/4oz simple syrup (optional)

Place the fruit in the shaker and muddle (squish). If you don't have a muddler, I find the handle of an ice cream scoop or something similar, works quite well.

Add the Cherry Vodka and a handful of ice

Shake vigorously for 20 secs and strain into a chilled cocktail glass

NB - this cocktail is quite slow to strain through the holes in the shaker as berries become a little gloopy, but be patient, turn the shaker upright again and jiggle it a little before straining out the rest.

White Lace cocktail glasses by Toasted Glass

This next cocktail is aptly named Lolita. It has an almost bubble gum sweetness due to the apricot brandy that belies its alcoholic content and it is the most sensational colour.

Lolita

Ingredients

2oz Cherry Vodka

1oz apricot brandy

1/2oz lemon juice 

Add all of the ingredients to a shaker with a handful of crushed ice and shake vigorously for 20 secs

Strain into a chilled cocktail glass

Butterfly cocktail glasses by Toasted Glass

Our last cocktail today is a tropical inspired little number featuring a lovely rum I picked up in Amathus City a couple of weeks ago, which has an almost coconut flavour of it's own.The addition of fresh pineapple and coconut water, definitely give it that tropical feel and make me long for a more temperate climate. Still, whip up one of these, turn on the heating and samba round the living room - job done.

Carmen Miranda

Ingredients

1oz Cherry Vodka

1oz Flora de Cana rum (or similar quality)

Handful of fresh pineapple

2oz Vita Coco

1/2oz agave nectar (see Ay Caramba post for info on Agave nectar)

Muddle the pineapple in the bottom of the shaker

Add all of the other ingredients, plus a handful of crushed ice

Shake vigorously and strain into chilled cocktail glass

Cherry Cocktail Glasses available on Etsy

This is another cocktail that would be a lovely drink over ice in a highball glass and perhaps with a squeeze of lime too, but then I like a squeeze of lime on most things.

So there you have it - Cherry Vodka - worth the wait for the colour alone. It's so easy to do, I recommend you give it a whirl, even if it just so you can drink a pink V&T. Have fun making cocktails, drink responsibly and have a wonderful weekend X

Alfresco Cocktails

Cocktail Glasses - available on Etsy

Strictly speaking, any cocktail is an 'afresco' cocktail, provided you drink it outdoors and indeed, go to most of my previous posts and you'll find something to fit an outdoor occasion, but the combination of good weather and a long weekend, gave Mr TG and I, more time than usual, spent in the garden, cocktail in hand. There's nothing quite like sipping on a chilled glass of something or other, barefoot, toes in the grass and listening to the sounds of the garden. Of course, back in the real world, the idyll was short lived as we were invaded by our Nerf gun toting offspring declaring war, but the cocktails helped soften the blow.

All of this week's selection would make an excellent accompaniment to an afternoon spent in the sun, although I do recommend slapping on the sunscreen beforehand and quaffing lots of water too, as cocktails have a habit of making you forget to take the basic precautions and before you know it, you'll have a blinding headache and rosy glow that could guide ships in at night.

Our long weekend began on Friday, when we bunked off to the City of London for a spot of lunch and to visit the wonderful Amathus, City in Leadenhall Market.

Amathus Drinks Leadenhall

If you click on the link you'll be able to see the lovely staff, who were both in store when we visited and couldn't have been more helpful. We were treated to a tasting of gins, one of which is definitely on my list for when the Hendricks runs out and to delicious Coffee  and Cherry Heerings. In the end, we left with a bottle of Kings Ginger, a bottle of Cherry Heering, a miniature of Chase Marmalade Vodka and a bottle of rum which I will save for another post. Suffice to say that my knowledge of rum is greatly enriched and that I am inspired to devote a post to it entirely when I've learnt a little more.

King's Ginger is a delicious  and warming liqueur, prepared from the maceration of ginger root and added lemon oil. It is both spicy and zesty, not to mention more alcoholic than many liqueurs, weighing in at a hefty 40%. The story goes that it was developed for His Majesty, King Edward the VII, to stimulate and revive him whilst out driving his new horseless carriage.

Cherry Heering, produced in Denmark, is an intensely fruity, cherry flavoured liqueur with a brandy base. It is world renowned, highly valued in cocktails and generally considered the best of the dark cherry liqueurs. As you can probably see from the picture, it is so delicious, we had opened the bottle and had a snifter before I remembered to take a picture of it.

                                                                                                                                                                                              

I was extremely excited to try this out, having fallen in love with Chase Elderflower Liqueur, in the past. A perusal of previous posts will play this out as you'll notice that it crops up a lot. Let me just say, it did not disappoint. It has all the zesty, oranginess you would expect and a slight caramel, sweetness that gives it that unmistakable, marmalade flavour.

All of these tipples are worthy of drinking straight, in a schnapps glass or in a tumbler, over ice, but equally, make some great cocktails, so if you decide to buy, you can be sure they won't be lurking malevolently at the back of the cocktail cabinet, gathering dust. Anyway, enough waffle....to the cocktails!

Cherry Sling

Ingredients

1oz gin (I used Hendricks)

1oz Cherry Heering

1oz lime juice

1/4oz simple syrup (optional)

Splash of soda water

Add all of the ingredients, apart from the soda, to a cocktail shaker and half fill with ice

Shake vigorously and strain in to a highball glass filled with ice

Top up with a dash of soda 

Highball Glasses by Toasted Glass

This is a variation on the Singapore Sling, a cocktail made famous by the Raffles Hotel in Singapore. There are so many different interpretations, all claiming to be the original, but this definitely isn't. The original did not use soda and featured lemon rather than lime, not to mention, the ratio of gin to Heering was more in favour of gin. The original was a very sweet cocktail, but this is not, particularly if you leave out the simple syrup. To be honest, on this occasion, I preferred it with, as it still wasn't too sweet when served over ice.

Knock Down Ginger

Ingredients

1oz gin (I used Hendricks)

1oz Kings Ginger

1/2oz lemon juice

1/2oz orange juice

1/4oz Fever Tree ginger beer

Add all of the ingredients, apart from the ginger beer, to a cocktail shaker and half fill with ice

Shake vigorously and strain in to a chilled cocktail glass and add the dash of ginger beer

Cocktail Glasses by Toasted Glass

Originally this recipe was made without the ginger beer, but it didn't quite have the warmth you would expect with the addition of Kings Ginger. As Mr TG noted, it was a bit like a very strong vodka and orange, which is odd because it's made with gin, but his senses may have been slightly impaired by then. Anyway, a quarter ounce of Fever Tree ginger beer was just what it needed and so it was renamed, the Knock Down Ginger.

I picked this next recipe because of it's inclusion of Cherry Heering and because the name, Flying High, sounded fairly auspicious. The cherry flavour is quite intense in this one, so if you're not a fan of that, it's probably not for you. The egg white gives the drink a nice texture, but the colour does let it down a bit. After I had tested it, I put it in the fridge, to wait for Mr TG to come home and offer his insight and strangely enough, the drink cleared and looked far more appealing. Incidentally, Mr TG was rather partial to this one.

Flying High

Ingredients

1 1/2oz gin (I used Hendricks)
1oz Cherry Heering
1/2 oz lemon juice
1oz orange juice
1 egg white
dash of Angostura Bitters

Add all of the ingredients to a shaker and shake without ice for 20 secs

Open the shaker, add ice and shake for a further 20 secs
Strain into a chilled cocktail glass

This next recipe was devised, purely on a whim, without much forethought and it turned out to be rather exceptional. Of course, the fine ingredients are the stars here, but I'm rather proud of my effort all the same.

The King's Chase

1oz Chase Marmalade Vodka

1oz King's Ginger

1 1/2oz orange juice

1/2oz lemon juice

1 egg white

Add all of the ingredients to a shaker and shake without ice for 20 secs

Open the shaker and half fill with ice

Shake vigorously for another 20 secs and strain into a chilled cocktail glass

Cocktail Glasses by Toasted Glass

Although there is no added simple syrup in this cocktail, both King's Ginger and Chase Marmalade Vodka are sweet, so the addition of lemon juice stops it veering into sickly territory. I used a full two ounces of juice in this one because I wanted something refreshing, without resorting to serving it over ice. The addition of egg white adds a silkiness to the texture without altering the flavour and gives the cocktail a little more substance. 

So, of all this week's cocktails, The King's Chase was a clear winner for me and I will definitely be making it again. I can highly recommend investing  bottles of both Kings Ginger and Chase Marmalade Vodka. The Cherry Heering is delicious too, but I've yet to try a cocktail, made with it, that really blows me away. Perhaps I need to come up with my own....watch this space.

Have a great week, drink responsibly and please have a look round some of the other posts for more cocktail inspiration x