#cherryherring

I often look to the internet or my favorite restaurant/bar for interesting cocktails and I'm often presented with fun ingredients I don't posses. Then I try to find or recreate the stuff from scratch to make some of these cocktails. I once made my own cranberry shrub - straining it was the hardest part. Maybe a post on that another time, it's better for Christmas cocktails.

Lately, I've seen more and more cocktails using Cherry Heering - an ingredient I'm not familiar with, nor its strange spelling. But then I found out its named after some Danish guy. Cherry Heering, created by Peter Heering and produced in Denmark since 1818, is a ruby-red liqueur made by soaking lightly crushed Danish cherries and a blend of spices in neutral grain spirits, then cask-maturing the mixture for up to five years, adding sugar during the aging process. Ahh, so this is something I'm not making on my own. Sounds legit, and good. It's no wonder then that when I tried to substitute the liqueur with other similar ingredients like cheap cherry brandy, various grenadine substitutes, or Luxardo maraschino liqueur or cherries - the results were miserable. Medicinal comes to mind. Think Louden's Cough Drops sitting in your manhattan rather than a great dark cherry. Now I know why, Cherry Heering is a far more complex and aged liqueur adding more twists to the cocktail of choice than any of the above could. Gotta love aging! In honor of the Cherry Heering, we bring you this: 

COCKTAIL: Remember The Maine! (Great name, references history!)

2 oz. rye whiskey

1/2 - 3/4 oz. sweet vermouth (based on level of Vermouth you like)

1/4 oz. Cherry Heering

2 generous dashes of Angostura bitters

Absinthe (as a rinse)

Place absinthe in a chilled coupe and swirl to coat the glass. Toss the rest of the absinthe. Don't try to be miserly and leave it in, it alters the drink too much and you'll feel dumb for doing it. Use your favorite mixing container filled with large ice cubes, and combine the rye, vermouth, Heering and bitters and stir until cold. Strain into a the coupe and garnish with a citrus peel, lemon ideally.

***I was going to take my own pictures, but found these online - far better than anything I could have taken, so using 'em!***