3 Simple Summer Cocktails

We put up with the rain all year in Portland, but it is well worth it for the spectacular summers filled with blooming flowers, bountiful gardens, back-yard barbecues, and of course- plenty of drinking! While grabbing a twelve pack of microbrew beers is a great route for outdoor entertaining, it's great to be able to offer your guests a boozier option that showcase summer flavors. KATU News, AM Northwest was kind enough to have me on their show to mix up some drinks. You can watch the full video clip at the bottom of the post. 

Lavender Lemonade:

1.5 oz Vodka (Crater Lake) or Gin (Corsair)

1 oz. Lavender Simple Syrup* 

1-1.5 oz. Fresh Squeezed Lemon Juice

Cucumber slice (optional)

Mint Sprig (optional)

Soda Water

Add first four ingredients to old-fashioned glass filled with ice. Top with soda water. Gently stir. Garnish with lavender sprig. 

Lavender Simple Syrup: Add 1 cup sugar to 1 cup water. Add zest of 1 lemon. Gently heat until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and add 1 cup lavender blossoms. Let steep overnight, and strain into food-safe glass jar for storage.

Caipirhina:

2 oz Cachaca (Novo Fogo) 

1/2 lime 

1.25 tbsp sugar

Remove the white pith from the lime and discard it. Cut the remaining lime in slices; toss them into the glass. Muddle them with sugar in the glass. Fill the glass with ice. Add cachaça and pour everything into a shaker. Give it a go; pour everything (including the ice) back into the same glass.

Cucumber Cooler:

1 1/2 oz. Gin (Corsair) or Vodka (Crater Lake) 

3/4 oz St. Germain

3/4 oz lime or lemon juice

2 slices cucumber

2 sprigs mint

soda water

Add first three ingredients and 1 sprig of mint and 1 cucumber slice to cocktail shaker filled with ice. Shake and double-strain into old-fashioned glass filled with ice. Garnish with cucumber slice and mint sprig. Top with soda water if desired.

(If you're reading this on a mobile device you can watch the video here.)

Honey Som Fizz

Honey Som Fizz:

1.5 oz Bourbon (Bulleit) 
.5 oz Som (Pok Pok Honey) 
.75 oz lemon juice 
.25 oz gum syrup (Small Hand Foods)

Shake all ingredients with ice. Pour into old fashioned glass on rocks and top with soda water.

We have been loving our iSi soda siphon, and making all kinds of cocktails, with an emphasis on accessible, less-alcoholic cocktails for easy drinking lazy afternoons. Pok Pok is one of our favorite Portland restaurants and offers some of, if not the best Vietnamese food in the area. One of the specialties that owner Andy Ricker brought from his many travels searching for authentic ingredients is drinking vinegar, previously only available at the restaurant in SE Portland (and now Whiskey Soda Lounge across the street, Ping in NE, and the soon to open Noi), but is now available for retail purchase in a variety of seasonal flavors for around $15 a bottle, branded as Som. Pok Pok, Whiskey Soda Lounge, and Ping all serve the drinking vinegars topped with soda water, as well as finding some very creative uses for Som in their craft cocktails. We found great success utilizing the honey Som in our tribute hot toddy cocktail, the Pok Toddy, and worked to highlight bourbon and honey's natural affinity in a cold fizz cocktail. The gum syrup is added for balance and mouthfeel, but could be swapped for simple syrup or even add extra Som, as it's quite sweet. However, we found the best balance adding a 1/2 oz. Som as the honey flavor is strong, and we didn't want it to overpower the bourbon. We are looking forward to trying this cocktail again with Bulleit's newest release, a 95% rye whiskey.

For non-locals who are the DIY type, you can make your own drinking vinegars with ingredients that should not be too hard to track down. The trickiest is most likely coconut vinegar, which can be found at most good Asian grocery stores. We made a satsuma drinking vinegar that turned out great by juicing 7-8 satsumas, reducing the juice over a low heat, adding palm sugar, (also available at Asian/Indian grocery stores, though cane sugar could be substituted), and finishing with the vinegar. we have been drinking the satsuma vinegar (3/4 to 1 oz.) topped with soda water during the day, for a delicious non-alcoholic housemade citrus soda (with health benefits), as well as the Darb Cocktail. You don't want the vinegar flavor to be too strong, though it should be noticeable. Start with less vinegar and experiment with amounts for your personal preference. The flavors are limited only by your imagination, and the quality only limited by the seasonality of the ingredients. Do you have a favorite drinking vinegar or Pok Pok cocktail? 

Picon Punch

Picon Punch:

Fill collins glass with ice 
Add 1 tsp pomegranate grenadine and 2.5 ounces Amer Picon (Torani Amer) 
Fill with soda water 
Float 1 oz. brandy on top (Hardy VS)

This is a beast of a cocktail. Good, but very strong. The recipe is from Ted Haigh Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails. In the edition I have, he notes that the Amer Picon in France was 35 percent alcohol, (Torani's Amer is 39 percent) and that this increase may result in a different cocktail than what the good Dr. was drinking. The cocktail is in the bitter family, something akin to a Americano with Amer acting as the star sporting a fancy hat of Cognac. This one may need to be tried a few times to be appreciated, and/or cut back on the spirits a tad.