Science Of Drink

The Lucien Gaudin Cocktail is one of key-cocktail for my blogging. Some years ago this cocktail was found at Slakethirst (now defunct) and I was fascinated by it.

The Lucien Gaudin is an interesting cocktail which consist of four components – gin (as main alcohol), vermouth (deluent), cointreau (sweetener) and Campari (for piquant taste).

Lucien Gaudin Cocktail

30 ml gin
15 ml vermouth dry
15 ml cointreau
15 ml Campari
Stir. Cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange twist.

The Lucien Gaudin Cocktail is awesome drink with compose bitter-sweet palate. It is great aperetive.

P.S. The Lucien Gaudin Cocktail is so popular in mixosphere – about Lucien Gaudin Cocktail wrote drohnenton (russian), anonimous с (Slakethirst), Robert Hess (DrinkBoy) for The Spirit World, Rick Stutz (Kaiser Pinguin), Paul Clarke (Cocktail Cronicles) for Serious Eats, Chuck Taggart (Looka!), Jessica (сocktail virgin slut). Not bad! It is like great MxMo roundup :)

Some day ago one of my favorite cocktail-blogger Dr. Bamboo posted some words about marvellous liquor – the Midori. And my cocktail-friend from St. Petersburg, Russia nabocov wrote about Melon sour (Midori-based sour). Actually it is strange thing – three blogers on one week wrote about Midori…

I explore some cocktails with the Beautiful Green Liqueur last week too. First of all I prepared one of the signature Midori cocktails – the Japanese Slipper. This cocktail was invented in 1984 by Jean-Paul Bourguignon at Mietta’s Restaurant in Melbourne. This cocktail has very strange recipe with Cointreau liqueur as main alcohol.

Japanese Slipper

25 ml Cointreau
25 ml Midori
25 ml fresh lemon juice
Shake. Pour into cocktail glass. Garnish with a maraschino cherry.

The Japanese Slipper Cocktail has light sour-sweet fruit taste. It is good cocktail for summer or tropic beach. If you replaced cointreau with vodka you may obtain more powerfull drink.

Next my cocktail is Suntory Cocktail. Suntory, as you know, is a large japanese beverage holding, which launched Midori worldwide. This recipe was found in The Craft of the Cocktail by Dale DeGroff.

Suntory Cocktail

30 ml citrus-flavored vodka (Absolut citron)
20 ml Midori
20 ml fresh grapefruit juice
Shake. Cocktail glass.

The Suntory Cocktail has sweet candy taste with fruit-melon palate. Admirable cocktail.

The theme of MxMo XLVI (February 2010), which hosted at Thinking of Drinking (actually it is a great blog with great name, the name of this blog is (realy!) the description of my life), is Absinthe. Great choice, Sonja!

The absinthe is one of the great alcohol beverage in the world. It has interesting and dramatic story, mystic way and cloud of pseuds. I do not have real absinthe in my bar, actually. Now I has one of the popular imitation of absinthe – italian liqueur caled XENTA Abseta (with real wormwood contetnt as specified) and historic substitute of absinthe – Pernod. Pernod is one of my favorite liquors, some cocktails with Pernod, like Monkey Gland or Gloom Riser are my favorite cocktails.

Usually absithe consumed with a lump of sugar and ice-cold water (Absinthe drip). In this way also consumes Pernod and pastis (for pastis like Ricard sugar is optional).

For this MxMo I prepared two interesting old cocktails with Pernod. First cocktail is famous Chrysanthemum Cocktail, which was found at CocktailDB:

Chrysanthemum Cocktail

30 ml dry vermouth
30 ml Benedictine
15 ml Pernod
Stir. Cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange peel.

The Chrysanthemum Cocktail has unique taste. In the palate are sweet notes, a lot of herbs notes, mint, light honey, star anise… It is awesome cocktail. Actually I was fascinated by Chrysanthemum Cocktail with my first sip.

Also I use in this cocktail XENTA Absenta. The result is not so great, but an interesting too.

If you don`t have the Benedectine in your liquor cabinet you may use in the Chrysanthemum Cocktail sweet vermouth instead Benedictine. The Chrysanthemum Cocktail turn into Duchess Cocktail in this way.

Duchess Cocktail

30 ml sweet vermouth
30 ml dry vermouth
15 ml Pernod
Stir. Cocktail glass.

The Duchess Cocktail has sweet, herbal and anise flavor similar to Chrysanthemum Cocktail. The palate of the Duchess Cocktail is not so rich as Chrysanthemum but so interesting.

The Golden Cadillac Cocktail is one of the famous after-dinner cocktail from Alexander`s family. It was invented at Poor Red`s Saloon in El Dorado, California, near Sutter`s Mill, which was Gold Rush territory, hence the name (or only half of the name :) ). It has composition similar to Alexander – spirit, liqueur, cream. Simply and very tasty. This kind of cocktail is great stuff for St. Valentine`s Day evening.

Golden Cadillac

30 ml Galliano
30 ml creme de cacao white
30 ml cream
Shake vigorously and pour in a cocktail glass.

Salvatore ‘The Maestro’ Calabrese garnish some of creamy cocktail with ground-cherry. I think that is great idea. A ground-cherry is very interesting and good-looking garnish for cocktails.

The Golden Cadillac Cocktail has sweet, creamy taste with chocolate and vanilla with a hint of spices palate. It is admirable cocktail.

My next choice for Valentine`s evening is modern Creme Brulee Martini. This recipe was found on the so interesting site – Cocktail Times. It is so rare chance to use in cocktails another interesting italian hazelnut liqueur – Frangelico.

Creme Brulee Martini

45 ml vanilla-flavored vodka
30 ml Frangelico
15 ml Cointreau
30 ml half and half
Shake. Pour in a cocktail glass and garnish with a vanilla stick.

I use Absolut Vanilla in my cocktail. The result are excellent. The Creme Brulee Martini is sweet creamy cocktail with comlex palate. It is like an ice-cream from my childhood.

The Paradise Cocktail was invented by Harry Craddock and it is a pure classic. This cocktail has absolutely classic composition – gin as main alcohol, apricot brandy (actually is not a brandy, it is sweet fruit liqueur) as sweetener and orange juice as diluent.

This recipe was found on The Pocket Bar Book by Mickhael Jackson (this recipe is so similar to the IBA-version).

Paradise

45 ml gin
30 ml apricot brandy
30 ml fresh orange juice
Shake. Serve in cocktail glass and garnish with a thin orange wedge.

I use Gordons London Dry Gin (47%) (or Befeater London Dry Gin (47%)) and liqueur BOLS Apricot. The Paradise Cocktail is admirable drink. It has smooth and sweet fruit taste with light bitternes in aftertaste.

Extremely interesting results was obtained with apricot liqueur by Nannerl. This austrian liqueurs are very natural and has very organic taste. The Paradise Cocktail made with Nannerl Apricot Liqueur and Bombay Sapphire Gin has great sweet and fruit palate.

Also I prepare this cocktail with liqueur DK Apricot brandy. This liqueur has very artificial taste. Actually it is bad choice for this cocktail.

On my Favorite CocktailDB I found next recipe of the Paradise Cocktail. It seems that it is version from The Savoy Cocktail Book by Harry Craddock.

Paradise

45 ml gin
20 ml apricot-brandy
20 ml fresh orange juice
1 dash fresh lemon juice
Shake. Cocktail glass.

This version is so similar the above. If you use good gin (like Bombay Sapphire), good liqueur (like BOLS) and fresh-squeezed orange juice from ripe, fresh fruit you obtain great cocktail with fresh and right taste.

This modern version of the Paradise Cocktail I found in The Craft of the Cocktail by Dale DeGroff.

Paradise (Dale`s DeGroff ver.)

60 ml gin
20 ml apricot-brandy
20 ml fresh orange juice
2 dash orange bitter
Shake. Cocktail glass. Garnish with a flamed orange peel.

This cocktail is very aromatic. It has so compose and piquant taste.