Doc Daneeka Royale (Death & Co. Recipe)

What is up with the Catch-22 reference in the name? This is the famous fictional doctor who gives name to the insanity catch underpinning the novel. Maybe this is a drink for paranoids, or maybe it is a balm for paranoia. Either way, it was an interesting take on a French 75 with maple syrup used as the sweetener and grapefruit bitters to provide a bitter lifting notes. 

This cocktail is an all-around fruity and bitter drink that is far more complex than the French 75. A squeezed grapefruit peel adds even more citrus bitterness on the nose, and dry sparkling wine (Aria cava) and herbal gin (MurLarkey ImaGination) do not let up on dry and spicy notes. The direction the flavors take on your tongue is up, only up. Sourness and tang give way to a bubbly tingle that isn't solely produced by the sparkling wine. What a fun and dangerous drink!

• 2 oz. gin (MurLarkey Imagination used)
• 1/2 oz. lemon juice
• 1/2 oz grade B maple syrup
• 1 dash bittermen's hopped grapefruit bitters (Fee Brothers' grapefruit and celery bitters used)
• dry champagne (Aria cava used)
• 1 grapefruit coin

Combine all liquid ingredients except for champagne in a shaker with ice. Shake and strain into a chilled champagne flute or coupe and top with champagne. Squeeze the grapefruit zest coin over the glass and discard. 

Dick and Jane (Death & Co. Recipe)

 

More champagne cocktails! I've been looking forward to using hibiscus flowers packed in syrup in a cocktail, and this cocktail presented itself as a likely candidate. It calls for hibiscus syrup, which provides sweetness and this lovely red color. The flowers themselves are chewy and sweet like brandied cherries, so I decided to use one as a garnish. 

There's something for everyone in this champagne cocktail. ImaGination gin and Peychaud's bitters for those New Orleans French 75 drinkers and St-Germain and hibiscus for a nice floral drink with bubbly. The nice thing is the recipe is not overly sweet and the color and garnish suggestion makes it look more royal than a Kir. 

• 1 1/2 oz. gin (MurLarkey ImaGination used)
• 1/2 oz. St-Germain
• 1/2 oz. lemon juice
• 1/2 oz. hibiscus syrup
• 2 dashes Peychaud's bitters
• dry champagne
• 1 long, thin lemon twist (and optional hibiscus flower) garnishes

Combine all ingredients except champagne and garnishes in a shaker with ice. Shake and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Curl lemon twist and drape it over the glass. 

Bitter French (Death & Co. Recipe)

 

This cocktail is a basic mash-up of a Negroni and a French 75. I happened to have a bottle of brut cava last weekend and put it to good use in five cocktails. This one was immediately fascinating because I like both of the cocktails that this recipe is derived from. 

• 1 oz. gin (MurLarkey ImaGination used)
• 1/4 oz. Campari
• 1/2 oz. lemon juice
• 1/2 oz simple syrup
• dry champagne
• 1 grapefruit twist 

Combine gin, Campari, lemon juice and simple syrup in a shaker with ice. Shake and strain into a chilled champagne flute and top with champagne. 

 

Melancholy Summer (Death & Co. Recipe)

 

This might be my favorite summer drink in the Death & Co. cocktail book. At least it's my favorite so far and maybe the best combination of sherry, gin, cucumber and cantaloupe I've ever had. This is a cocktail that is so well constructed that every ingredient has a special part to play and you can appreciate them all at once. 

Manzanilla sherry is known for its funny, melon-like nose that makes it especially good to drink with cantaloupe. La Gitana is one of the best. 

Suze--a new aquisition--is a bitter gentian spirit that really grounds this drink with herbal bitterness as well as some citrus notes. 

Gin, MurLarkey or otherwise, is in here because it is more than a blank canvass that is vodka. Herbs and fruits are a big part of ImaGination and essential to making this amazing cocktial work. 

• 2 cucumber wheels
• 1 oz. Lustau Manzinalla sherry (La Gitana used)
• 1 oz. gin (MurLarkey ImaGination used)
• 1/2 oz Suze liqueur
• 3/4 oz. cantaloupe juice
• 1/2 oz. lemon juice
• 1/2 oz. acacia honey syrup
• 1 cucumber ribbon garnish

Muddle cucumber wheels in the shaker tin before adding the remaining ingredients and ice. Shake and double strain into a chilled Nick & Nora glass (Coupe shown). Cut a cucumber wheel and spear it on a cocktail pick as a garnish. 

Schuman's Alley (Death & Co. Recipe)

 

The name is a nod to Tin Pan Alley. This cocktail amounts to an embellished Upside Down Martini. All the usual characters appear, from blanco and Americano vermouth to yellow Chartreuse. Of course there's the gin--MurLarkey ImaGination--and a dash of allspice and grapefruit bitters. It's a hit squad of flavors in a rich and fruity wincocktail that takes longer to drink than you'd expect. 

This drink, like any Martini, benefits from lifting bitters with citrus and spice. These minute ingredients help other flavors rise to the surface. Some changes to the recipe in my home bar are to be expected for bitters. My allspice dram isn't especially bitter, but I figured it would be fine. The Fee Brothers grapefruit bitters aren't hopped like the Death & Co. recipe specifies, but a dash of my homemade celery bitters has a similar effect to the hops and I often use celery and grapefruit in tandem to mimic hops and citrus. 

• 3/4 oz. contratta vermouth bianco (Dolin blanc used)
• 3/4 oz. Dolin dry vermouth
• 3/4 oz. Cocchi Americano
• 1 oz. gin (MurLarkey ImaGination used)
• 1 dash Bittermens hopped grapefruit bitters (1 dash Fee Brothers grapefruit and 1 dash celery bitters used)
• 1 dash Dale Degroff's pimento bitters (homemade allspice dram used)
• 1 lemon twist

Combine liquid ingredients in a mixing glass with ice. Stir and strain into a chilled Nick & Nora glass (coupe shown). Twist the lemon peel over the drink, roll it up and skewer it on a cocktail pick and drop it in. 

Waterloo Sunset (Death & Co. Recipe)

One of the most fabulous spirits and juice cocktails in a rocks glass ever! That's high praise, and well worth the effort when you make this cocktail. I love how vegetel, citrusy and herbaceous this drink is. The flavor goes from fresh mint and lime juice to a spicy gin and watermelon center and finishing with a numbing peppery taste backed up by more mint. It was a very cool (and hot) experience. 

There's a lot of steps to this drink. There's the infusion of Szchuan peppercorns in gin. Then juicing, then muddling and making the syrups. And it is a cocktail involving two gins. I used my Szchuan pepprcorn-infused MurLarkey ImaGination gin as the first ingredient and my homemade dry gin as the second spirit (which keeps the peppercorns from being too spicy.) I also juiced the watermelon rather than pay for a large jug of watermelon juice this time. (I know you can freeze it, but I don't need that much watermelon juice when a few pieces of fruit will do.)

Once you have all that ready, we can proceed with the recipe.

• 7 mint leaves
• 1/2 oz. cane sugar syrup
  
• 1 oz. Szechuan peppercorn-infused gin (MurLarkey used)
• 1 oz. dry gin (homemade with asparagus botanical used)
• 1/2 oz. Dolin blanc vermouth
• 1 1/2 oz. watermelon juice
• 3/4 oz. lime juice
• mint sprig garnish

Muddle mint leaves in the syrup in the shaker before adding ice and the remaining ingredients. Shake and double strain into a double Old Fashioned glass over a large piece of ice. Garnish with the mint sprig. 

 

Fernet Branca Cocktail

You don't have to love Fernet Branca to appreciate the balance of bittersweet notes in this mostly gin cocktail. I consider this cocktail to be quintessentially Italian and I wanted an Italian-tasting gin like MurLarkey's ImaGination gin. This has rosemary and basil as botanicals and it is so herbaceous while it remains very dry in a cocktail.

The real dry and bitter flavor comes from Fernet Branca. The sweet vermouth, however tames the menthol flavor of the spirit, for those who are not fans of that, but you do get more caramel and earthiness that otherwise is overpowered when you have Fernet by itself.

• 2 oz. gin (ImaGination gin used)
• 1/2 oz. sweet vermouth (Cocchi Dopo Teatro used) 
• 1/2 oz. Fernet Branca

Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass with ice. Stir and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. 

Laurali

This pretty cocktail is named after a lovely green island on the Rhine River. It uses kummel in its attempt to associate it with Germany's national caraway spirit.

Green creme de menthe has a tendency to overwhelm a cocktail with the scent and flavor of mouthwash. It is rare that the balance is right to make for an appetizing cocktail. This is one of those rare occasions.The gin and kummel come through and give an earthy lower register to the airy mint notes. The honey in the kummel is warming and delicious as well and takes the flavor profile out of the mouthwash zone.

• 1 1/2 oz. gin (MurLarkey ImaGination gin used)
• 1/4 oz.kummel
•  1/2 oz. green creme de menthe
• 1/4 oz. lemon juice

Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake and double strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Ladbroke Road Cocktail

This bright fizzy drink is going for everything English from strawberries to gin. The British love their gin! What better way to enjoy it than with fresh fruit and a long refreshing soda drink. Ladbroke probably refers to Ladbroke Grove tube station in London, a posh area near Notting Hill. Or else it might be the village of Ladbroke in Warwickshire, but I tend to think the former as it is better known.

A note on the bottle pictured left: the label doesn't correspond with a product that I know of. This was an image I printed, perhaps of a now defunct producer of flavored moonshines. What you see here is a Vitae rum distillery bottle with the printed label on top. I have the recipe for this here.

I'm finding that I enjoy these liqueurs I'm making at home more than store-bought ingredients. Often you pay too much for them or the quality is poor compared to what you can make in your kitchen if you have the fresh fruit and good booze.

• 1 1/2 oz. gin (MurLarkey ImaGination used)
• 1 oz. homemade strawberry liqueur made with Vitae Platinum rum 
• dash triple sec
• club soda 
• lemon peel
• whole strawberry

Combine liquid ingredients except soda in a shaker with ice. Shake and strain into a Collins glass full of fresh ice. Top with soda and stir gently. Garnish with the strawberry and lemon twist.

George V Cocktail

A kingly cocktail requires royal ingredients--I mean Lillet and Royal Combier. This cocktail fits well within the classic French gin cocktails using wine and cognac-based spirits. Orange and spice rule here. Lillet blanc is an orange bitter and fortified wine. Royal Combier has north African spices and oranges in its cognac and eau de vie blend. Finally, orange bitters punch up the baking spices like clove and allspice and bring the orange flavor to the front.

• 1 1/2 oz. gin (MurLarkey ImaGination used)
• 1 tsp. oz. Cointreau (Royal Combier used and recommended)
• 1 oz. Lillet Blanc
• several dashes orange bitters (Hella used)

Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass with ice. Stir and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Appian Way

This is such a beautiful name for a beautiful cocktail! The Appian Way is named after the Roman road built between Rome and Brindisi by Appius Claudius Caecus. This drink bursts with Italian herbal spirits like Strega and ameretto. You get mint, saffron, lemon, basil, vanilla and almond among many other spices.

Again, when making Italian cocktails, I go for MurLarkey ImaGination because it has basil and rosemary botanicals and it really mixes well with sweet liqueurs for a classic gin cocktail experience.

• 1 1/2 oz. MurLarkey ImaGination gin
• 1/2 oz. Strega
• 1/2 oz. amaretto
• orange slice

Combine liquid ingredients in a mixing glass with ice. Stir and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with the orange slice.

Marnier Martini

There's so many Martini variations: many that don't even use the word Martini, but are pretty much the same thing. Still others that carry the name have nothing in common with the classic recipe--I'm looking at you Espresso Martini. The Marnier Martini is more traditional than most. Sometimes the addition of a garnish, whether it be a pickle, a beet, or roasted vegetables, can make a huge difference. For the Marnier, the garnish is anchovies and anchovy vinegar.

Let's start off by saying that this is a cocktail for seafood lovers. You really have to enjoy the briny and salty flavor of anchovies. Whether you use vodka or gin, the overall profile, while light, is going to have ocean funk--hence the name.

To make the anchovy vinegar, simply take a few tiny anchovy fillets and pat them dry. Soak them in enough white wine vinegar that they are submerged (1-2 ounces only unless you plan on making a ton of these). Leave them to soak for at least two days until the anchovy flavor infuses into the vineger. Use the rest of the anchovies in the can for stuffing olives if that is your thing. I find an olive is a great delivery system for these guys, since they don't look too appetizing floating in the drink.

• 2-3 oz. Gin (MurLarkey ImaGination used)
• anchovy infused white wine vinegar (several dashes to 2 tsp. according to taste)
• olives (preferably stuffed with anchovies