#filibustergin

Whiskey / Gin Milk Punch

Today I wanted to tackle several milk punch recipes at once. They are all very similar in that they require sugar, milk, nutmeg and a spirit. Strangely the New York Bartender's Guide differentiates between a classic milk punch and a whiskey milk punch with separate titles and measurements (parts as opposed to ounces) but the recipes are pretty much the same. The Whiskey Milk Punch and Milk Punch both call for three ounces of blended whiskey. Now I have rye and bourbon blends, but I think that when a recipe calls for blended whiskey, it means Irish or Canadian whiskey. Why? The smoothness makes it less of a flavor factor. Otherwise you can make a Bourbon Milk Punch (This one oddly served neat in an Old Fashioned glass) with that flavor profile. These drinks are subtler than that. Then there's the Gin Milk Punch. I know what you're thinking. Why would anyone like milk and gin? Actually I've found this combination to be great in other dessert drinks, and actually the nutmeg helps with the spice profile a lot. It's less important that gin has spicy flavors and more noticeable that this is a holiday drink with hints of juniper. That said, pick your gin carefully. I prefer a prohibition style gin over dry gin for dessert drinks. They have funky sweet notes that go well with creaminess. Filibuster Gin (Not Available outside the distillery) is aged in two barrels and flavored with only four botanicals. It is close to whiskey in that way and makes a great milk punch.

Alexander’s Sister

It was bound to happen. The creamy Alexander cocktail needed a spin-off dessert drink with mint flavor. The good news is that this gin drink, which is usually great to enjoy in the winter months, is even more festive with creme de menthe. Juniper in gin and mint make for an amazing holiday cocktail to be enjoyed with cookies. A good creme de menthe makes all the difference. I like it with higher proof stuff. So if you are shopping and see a 15-percent alcohol creme de menthe, pass it up and get one closer to 40-percent. It keeps the drink drier and less cloying. The recipe says to use either the green or the white creme de menthe, but if you have green and it's almost Christmas, then flaunt it.

Loudspeaker

Cloister

I wanted to try the Cloister again with yellow Chartreuse instead of the green stuff. I have to say it makes a big difference and I really liked how sweet (not bitter) and refreshing the drink became with the change. Yellow Chartreuse has more honey and a lower proof, which is nice. I also used fresh squeezed grapefruit juice for this so it is really yummy and balanced now that I have all the right ingredients.

Angler’s Cocktail

Sometimes it's nice to have a bitter gin cocktail on the rocks. There's no messing around with a lot of ingredients and really not much mixing at all. The shaking seems like an automatic move, not a requirement. That's the only reason I can see why this drink would be called an Angler's cocktail. It's not that there's anything fishy going on with the recipe or the presentation or that fishermen enjoy their gin this way. It's just that, like with fishing, an angler can't be bothered with superfluous steps or actions. Something simple and to the point--a decidedly bitter one--is the way to go.

The bitterness of Angostura and orange bitters is really pronounced here. It adds lots of tropical spices to your gin. For this reason, you want to let the bitters shine and you'll need a gin that is ok with that. Too much going on will crowd the drink. A wet American gin like Filibuster Dual Cask will do the trick.

Silver Fizz

There are many Fizzes out there. Most are gin and soda drinks and a lot of them use egg in some form to get a head of foam on them. Almost all the Gin Fizzes in the New York Bartender's Guide are served on ice, though this wasn't always the norm back in the busy heydays of the Fizz cocktail. The thing to remember here is that gin used to be the main clear spirit and as such it didn't always have the extremely spicy characteristics of liquors we have now. Most had only a few botanicals, mainly juniper, and left it at that. Filibuster Dual Cask gin is great for a pre-Prohibition style gin with a smooth character. It makes for an extremely creamy Silver Fizz--a cocktail named after the fact that it is made with egg whites.

Lone Tree Cocktail

Ooh, I like this photo. The Lone Tree is pretty much the same style of gin and vermouth drinks like the Martinez, and so it is a Martini variation. I decided to go with an aged gin, though. Filibuster Dual Cask gin fits the bill here. And the rest is pretty simple. I did opt to use my own orange bitters here instead of Hella orange bitters. This is because my orange bitters are extremely orange zest flavored with much less of the baking spices that Hella uses. I made these bitters so long ago--they keep forever--that I forgot what I used in them other than lots of orange peels.

Torpedo

This drink belongs to the "(Naval) Bomb" category of cocktails that often involve brandy. Drinks like the Depth Charge or Depth Bomb are designed to hit you hard with flavor and alcohol. The main component is apple brandy, as you can see from the bottle of Laird's in the foreground. In the background is this funky aged gin from Filibuster. Only a quarter tsp. of gin is in there, but lots of flavor pops out from it, particularly that aged and prohibition style gin spice flavor. Two thumbs up for the Torpedo!

2 oz. apple brandy (Laird's used)

1 oz. brandy (American brandy used)

1/2 tsp. gin (Filibuster Dual Cask used)