For Christmas, my sister-in-law expanded my cocktail library by giving me two books I’d had on my list for quite a while: Grog Log and Intoxica!, both by Jeff “Beachbum” Berry. For the uninitiated, Berry is the reigning king of tiki drinks, with an approach to researching the history of these drinks as rigorous as any living cocktail historian, Ted Haigh and David Wondrich included. The drinks Berry’s collected in these books include classics from Trader Vic and Don the Beachcomber– who pioneered the whole Polynesian/tiki thing back during the Depression years.

I’ll explore the Grog Log and Intoxica! in greater depth later, but for now, suffice it to say that I’ve spent a not inconsiderable amount of time over the last couple of months tracking down the ingredients for, and putting together, some of the most notable tiki drinks in these two books. Here’s the one I’m sampling tonight: the Demerara Dry Float.

Berry credits Don the Beachcomber with creating this one around 1941. The notable additions I had to make to my liquor cabinet to make this drink included a bottle of Lemon Hart Demerara rum–which I’d been meaning to pick up, anyway, and just needed a good excuse–and a bottle of passion fruit syrup, a common ingredient in many tropical drinks. Berry heavily recommends the syrup marketed by Trader Vic’s; but I couldn’t reconcile myself with the idea of paying more in shipping than the bottle was worth if I ordered online, and I couldn’t wait for the new Trader Vic’s to open in Bellevue, scheduled to happen next week. So, I picked up a bottle of Monin’s, which seems servicable for the time being.

The thing I like about this drink–and with many tiki drinks–is the kind of baroque complexity in the glass. Ideas of mixological structure and balance are thrown completely aside in many of these drinks, but if you keep a close eye on the proportions in your mix–I’ve found it necessary to pull back a bit on Berry’s recommended amounts of syrup and sugar, to keep the drinks from being too sweet–you can create something that’s pleasantly unexpected, a cocktail that’s not afraid to let its hair down. I’ll be exploring drinks from Berry’s books a lot more in the months to come.

Demerara Dry Float

• 2 1/2 ounces fresh lime juice
• 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
• 1 1/2 ounces passion fruit syrup*
• 1/4 ounce sugar syrup*
• 1 ounce Demerara rum
• 1/4 ounce 151 Demerara rum
• 1/4 ounce Maraschino

Shake everything except the 151 rum with ice, strain into double old-fashioned glass filled with crushed ice, and carefully float the 151. Do not stir.

* This is Berry’s recipe–I found it necessary to completely leave out the sugar syrup, and to increase the lower-proof rum to about 1 1/2 ounces to get the flavor I was looking for. It also looks like a lot of syrup, but there’s a mighty dose of citrus in this drink, which needs something for counterbalance.

Tags: Drinks, Rum, Tiki by Paul
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Okay. Maybe that whole idea of “Perfect Balance” had some element of wishful thinking about it. As I mentioned when I first approached the Golden Dawn, the idea of a cocktail composed of equal parts–five of them, at that–was compelling and, ultimately, irresistible.

But as a couple of folks noted in the comments, as intriguing as this recipe from Ted Haigh’s Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails may be, the result is still quite sweet. Too sweet, some would–and did–say, and after thinking about it further, I’ve grudgingly come to the same conclusion.

But all is not lost with the Golden Dawn; a quick survey of the bookshelf shows two similar cocktails of the same name, both of which are worth investigating*. Both recipes come from Ted Saucier’s Bottoms Up, an excellent (and risque) cocktail manual from 1951. Each drink was an award-winner in its day, and both eliminate Cointreau from the mix, which results in a much less sweet drink (though it does obliterate that five-part harmony that originally caught my attention).

Golden Dawn (version #2)
created at the Grosvenor House, Park Lane, London, and recipient of the top prize at the International Cocktail Competition in 1930

• 1/4 gin
• 1/4 Calvados / applejack
• 1/4 orange juice
• 1/4 apricot brandy

Shake with ice and strain into chilled cocktail glass; garnish with a cherry and drizzle a dash of grenadine into the bottom of the glass.

Golden Dawn (version #3)
created by Walter Madigan, beverage editor for the Hotel Gazette; runner-up, International Cocktail Contest, 1939

• 2 parts gin
• 1 part orange juice
• 1 part apricot brandy
• dash grenadine

Shake & strain into chilled cocktail glass

Removing the Cointreau really tones down the drink’s sweetness; personally, I prefer version #2, as the Calvados adds some extra complexity to the drink. Keep in mind, though, that orange juice really lacks the sharp tartness of lemon or lime, so even with the reduced liqueur, the Golden Dawn will always have an element of sweetness about it–it’s simply in the drink’s nature. (Your choice of orange and grenadine type will also affect the drink’s sweetness–even when using dashes, a homemade grenadine results in drinks remarkably less cloying than those made with a commercial brand like Rose’s.)

So if you’re still brushing your teeth from the first encounter with the Golden Dawn, one of these variations may suit your needs. If not, well…we gave it an honest try.

* Bottoms Up also lists a third Golden Dawn recipe, this one not even remotely like the others:

1/2 jigger lime juice
1 jigger orange juice
1/2 jigger Jamaica rum
1 jigger bourbon
1 teaspoon sugar
Ice

Place in electric mixer; strain into hollow-stemmed champagne glass which has teaspoon grenadine in bottom of stem.

Tags: Calvados, Drinks, Gin by Paul
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A sample cocktail from George J. Kappeler’s Modern American Drinks. I don’t know if this is a Kappeler original, and I haven’t checked to see if it’s in other cocktail manuals, but this one caught my eye as something period-appropriate, with the added benefit that I happen to have the ingredients on hand.

Here’s Kappeler’s wording on the recipe, followed by my recipe (in my usual format):

Fill a mixing-glass half-full fine ice, add two dashes gum-syrup, three dashes Peyschaud [sic] or Angostura bitters, one-half jigger apple brandy, one-half jigger Italian vermouth. Mix, strain into cocktail-glass, twist small piece lemon-peel on top.

And my preparation:

Star Cocktail

• 1 ounce apple brandy (I used Laird’s Applejack)
• 1 ounce sweet vermouth
• 3 dashes Peychaud’s or Angostura bitters (I used Peychaud’s)
  
• 2 dashes gum syrup

Stir with ice and strain into chilled cocktail glass; garnish with lemon twist.

A couple of notes: first, at the beginning of the book’s recipe section, Kappeler defines a jigger as holding two ounces–this is different from the contemporary definition, in which a jigger contains one and one-half ounces–hence the measurements in my recipe.

Second, Kappeler calls for apple brandy–I assume that in 1895, the type of apple brandy he’d most readily have on hand would be domestic (ie, not Calvados), and quite possibly Laird’s (as they were certainly in production during that time). While Laird’s applejack is not currently a “pure” apple brandy, as it contains a substantial portion of neutral grain spirits, in 1895 it was still composed purely of apple distillate, and it’s the closest thing I have on hand to a domestic apple brandy. Should you have access to Laird’s bonded apple brandy, you should certainly use it in this drink (it’d probably be nice with a Calvados, too).

The Star is a very gentle cocktail, with the slight bitterness of the vermouth nicely touched by the fullness of the Peychaud’s. I think the applejack fades into the background a bit too much–all the more reason to break out the real apple brandy deal when giving this one a try.

Tags: Applejack, Books, Calvados, Drinks, Vermouth by Paul
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I sincerely doubt this was a favorite at the legendary round table. A bit too indirect and a bit too fruity to be a regular tipple of the Parker, Benchley and Woollcott group, I suspect.

Still, this one tastes like history. It’s a deceptive cocktail–a counterintuitive blend of three distinctly flavored ingredients that, when combined, erase the individual characteristics of each while forming something altogether new. A low hint of spice and herbs, with a gentle pineappley aroma, the Algonquin is drier than a glance at the recipe might lead you to expect.

A handy drink to know about when you’ve got some extra pineapple juice on hand but don’t feel up to the work of mixing an eight-ingredient tiki punch from the Grog Log.

Algonquin Cocktail

• 1.5 ounces rye
• .75 ounces dry vermouth
• .75 ounces pineapple juice

Shake with ice and strain into chilled cocktail glass.

Technorati tag: cocktails, rye.

Tags: Drinks, Rye by Paul
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So much of mixology is simple mathematics. Creating a drinkable cocktail is typically nothing more than reaching the right proportion of ingredients in the mixing glass (sure, the method of chilling, type and brand of spirit, and a number of other variables enter into the equation, but stay with me here).

Of course, this means you have to keep a lot of different formulae in your head if you want to have plenty of drinks in your repertoire. Fortunately, you happen across the occasional drink that achieves perfection through a perfect–and equal–balance of ingredients. The Corpse Reviver #2 is one such cocktail–equal parts gin, lemon juice, Lillet and Cointreau, with a drop or two of absinthe-type liqueur dribbled in–and the Golden Dawn is another.

This comes from Ted Haigh’s Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails, and is the first drink I made after I gave up on tracking down a bottle of the elusive Marie Brizard’s Apry, and bought a bottle of the second-rate Bols apricot brandy, just so I can expand my mixing options. But I digress.

The Golden Dawn is the first cocktail I can recall that calls for equal parts of five different ingredients, two of them base spirits: Calvados, gin, orange juice, apricot brandy and Cointreau (as a spoiler, a little grenadine is trickled into the finished drink). Haigh credits the United Kingdom Bartenders Guild for coming up with this mix in the 1920s. Sweet but not cloying, and layered with flavor, the Golden Dawn is a delicious–and easy-to-remember–addition to the mixological playbook.

Golden Dawn

• 3/4 ounce Calvados (or applejack)
• 3/4 ounce gin
• 3/4 ounce fresh orange juice
• 3/4 ounce Cointreau
• 3/4 ounce apricot brandy

Shake with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a stemless cherry, and drizzle a little grenadine (don’t stir!) into the finished drink.

Technorati tag: cocktails, Calvados, gin.

Tags: Calvados, Drinks, Gin by Paul
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