Arnaud’s Special Cocktail

From Arnaud’s Restaurant in New Orleans comes Arnaud’s Special Cocktail:

• 2 ounces Scotch
• 1 ounce Dubonnet Rouge
• 3 dashes oranges bitters

Shake in an iced cocktail shaker, and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange twist.

This cocktail features an obscure apéritif called Dubonnet Rouge. I’ve been waiting to make cocktails with it since I’ve been running low on room in the refrigerator, and like vermouth I assume it should be kept chilled.

Doctor Cocktail

Not to be confused with the author, here is the Doctor Cocktail:

• 2 ounces Jamaican rum
• 1 ounce Swedish Punsch
• 1 ounce fresh lime juice

Shake in an iced cocktail shaker, and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a lime twist.

Salt and pepper, peanut butter and jelly, rum and lime – some things just go together. Such is the case with the Doctor Cocktail.

This is a tribute to rum and lime. The drink has only three ingredients – those two with the addition of the rum-like Swedish Punsch.

Diki-Diki Cocktail

A drink with a Tiki name, the Diki-Diki Cocktail:

• 1.50 ounces Calvados
• 0.50 ounce Swedish Punsch
• 0.75 ounce grapefruit juice

Shake well with ice, and strain into a cocktail glass.

While this drink sounds like it would be part of the Tiki tradition, it isn’t. Those drinks tend to be sweet and rather strong, while this is a nice, simple cocktail.

The main spirit, Calvados, is an apple brandy which is offset by the spicy rum-like flavor of the Swedish Punsch. I used fresh grapefruit juice which lessens the sweetness of the Calvados just a bit.

The Secret Cocktail

The Secret Cocktail, also known at The Pink Lady:

• 1.5 ounces dry gin
• 0.5 ounce applejack
• Juice of 1/2 lemon
• 1 egg white
• 2 dashes real pomegranate grenadine

Shake it up with all due vigor in an iced cocktail shaker, strain into a cocktail glass, and serve with a cherry

Okay, so as I get close to the end of this experiement – my plan to make every recipe in Ted Haigh’s classic Vintage Spirit’s and Forgotten Cocktails book – I’ve been thinking about the next challenge. I do plan to make the drinks in the “Extra Credit” section, but as I’ve learned more about cocktails in the last year or so I’ve also branched out. I’ve read Wondrich’s Imbibe!, Wilson’s Boozehound, and the amazing Death & Co. recipe book. (Just for completeness, I do own a copy of Liquid Intelligence and I have The Dead Rabbit on my wish list.)

The Fred Collins Fiz

With lemonade from England I was finally able to make the Fred Collins Fiz:

• 2.0 ounces bourbon or rye whiskey
• 0.5 ounce simple syrup
• Juice of one lemon
• 1 teaspoon orange curaçao
• 6.0 ounces lemonade

Mix the bourbon, simple syrup, and lemon juice in an iced cocktail shaker and shake. Strain into a large bar glass that is half filled with shaved (or finely crushed) ice. Add the curaçao. Pour the lemonade into a collins glass and port the contents of the bar glass into it.

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The Amarosa Cocktail

From halfway around the world comes The Amarosa Cocktail:

• 1.0 ounce Amaro Cora
• 1.0 ounce gin
• 1.0 ounce kirschwasser

Stir well and enthusiastically. Strain into a stemmed glass of your choice, but use something pretty, because this cocktail has a very pretty color. Twist a small lemon peel directly over the drink and drop it in.

Okay, I’m not a huge fan of amaro. I just find it to bitter, and while I love what it can do in a cocktail, I was very worried about drinking an amaro-centric libation.

The Filmograph Cocktail

The successful search for another odd ingredient resulted in The Filmograph Cocktail:

• 2.00 ounces brandy
• 0.75 ounce lemon syrup (substitute fresh lemon juice unless you like to drink maple syrup out of the can.)
• 0.50 ounce kola tonic

Shake in an iced cocktail shaker, and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a lemon wedge.

The odd ingredient here is the kola tonic, a staple of South African drinking. The resource guide in the book recommends Rose’s Kola Tonic, which is apparently very common in Canada. I didn’t think it would be that hard to get, since Rose’s Lime Juice is readily available even in my small town, but I was wrong.