FYI: This is an archive of my Tonight's Negroni email newsletter.
Hey gang! Check it out! I've taken so long to write another installment of Tonight's Negroni that I have enough open tabs and saved links to do a link list! You love link lists!
What...? Why are you looking at me like that? You know I love you, baby. Really I do...
It's just sometimes I don't really have that much going on with me and I need to pull from other sources.
You'll like them, I swear. Promise. I picked them out just for you!
- Remember when I kicked this thing off and I told you all about the things that make the Negroni interesting? Well, I was focused on fairly practical reasons at that point, but did you know the history -- and in particular the origin story -- of the drink is pretty interesting in and of itself? It is!
- Then there was the time I told you to make batches of cocktails to take to parties, right? That was super helpful advice, if I do say so myself. (Also, I still love José Andrés.) Nowadays, the next level version of that is to pack in a shitload of tiny little bottled cocktails, which is pretty damned fantastic if you can actually motivate yourself to go through the trouble.
- PROTIP: The secret is to add water to what would ordinarily be a water-free drink, bottle it, and then chill the bejesus out of it. It's the same as stirring/shaking with ice if you get the right proportion.
- And with the final inline reference to the archives, I will first point you to this New York Times article which seemingly unironically refers to a "Negroni menu". At which I will respond with a fist-shaking "I knew it!"
- It's too late for you lovely people to enjoy the one discussed at the link, but let's all get on board with the term "alcoholiday", shall we? Yes, we shall.
- This is of note to me. Not because I am personally interested in paying a dude a bunch of money to teach me things I happen to already know, but because of reasons...
- Of more general interest to me: bitters-heavy cocktails. I confess, most of these recipes are old hat to me, but you probably need to know about the wonder that is Pink Gin, and I am super interested in trying The Sawyer.
But if bitter ain't your thang...
Zombie
If the Spring/Summer overlap was the Age of Negroni, is seems like late-Summer-moving-into-Fall is all about Tiki drinks. I'm not sure if that's mostly a Denver thing or if it's all across the nation (signs point to yes), but if you like sweet and fruity, wild and boozy cocktails, a tiki revival should be right up your alley.
Another differentiator between tiki drinks and most of the cocktails I enjoy drinking and discussing is the shear complexity involved. While my typical Negroni night cap is just a part each from three bottles in a rocks glass with some ice, a lot of tiki drinks use multiple varieties of rum, a fruit juice or two, some liqueur or cordial you've never heard of and certainly can't find, plus fancy syrups and other concoctions.
Heck, half the time the ingredients for a tiki drink are as hard (or harder) to make than a lot of cocktails!
So given that, consider this recipe more of a demonstration than a suggestion to DIY. Unless you've got the guts.
- 1½ oz Gold Puerto Rican rum
- 1½ oz Aged Jamaican rum
- 1 oz Lemon Hart 151-proof Demerera rum
- ¾ oz Fresh lime juice
- ½ oz Don's mix (See what I mean?!)
- ½ oz Falernum (Right?!)
- 6 drops Pernod
- 1 tsp Grenadine
- 1 dash Angostura bitters
- ¾ cup Crushed ice (You remembered to make a ton of crushed ice, right???)
- Put everything in a blender.
- Blend on high for no more than 5 seconds.
- Pour into a tall (Collins) glass.
- Add ice to fill.
- Garnish with mint sprig.
Now, before you even start to hit reply, I freely acknowledge there are easier ways to make something that you can legitimately call a Zombie. However, I'm also willing to believe this version from Jeff Berry's Beachbum Berry's Potions of the Caribbean is canonical. It's a remarkable book, too.
Besides... I was making a point, damn it.