I’ve been playing around with salt and pepper in cocktails as well, so this provided a nice excuse to make a few more.  Salt and pepper in cocktails is nothing new – you are probably familiar with a salted rim on your margarita, or fresh black pepper in your bloody mary.  But these ingredients have been finding their way into all sorts of cocktails as more prominent players over the last few years.  A true cocktail, dating back to the origins of the concept, should always be properly “seasoned”. What distinguished the cocktail of yore from otherwise ordinary booze was the combination of the spirit with sugar and “bitters”, those medicinal elixirs made of bits of bark, spices and seasonings.  Bitters are literally referred to as the “salt and pepper” of cocktails, even though they are usually far more complex.  

Passing Cars by Yours Truly

Let’s keep it simple (not really) and focus on just the salt and the pepper, shall we?

For the salt cocktail, I present one of my own creations, the “Passing Cars”.  This savory and satisfying solution is created with a base of gin created in the “old style”.  Ransom distillery teamed up with cocktail historian David Wondrich to recreate the type of gin found in the mid 1800’s, pre-prohibition cocktail heyday.  Standout features of this gin are a maltiness due to a base wort of malted barley and the infusion of botanicals in corn spirits, which is then aged in barrels – sounds a bit like bourbon, no? This unusual gin is then combined with lemon juice, Cynar (an artichoke(!) based Italian Amaro) and parsley syrup and finished off with, of course, a salt water solution. 

For the pepper cocktail, I borrowed a smoky, peaty and peppery scotch creation from New York’s Up and Up bar.  Inspired by the “Rob Roy” (previously featured here), creator Matt Piacentini describes how his “Peat’s Dragon” flaunts a “super concentrated” black pepper tincture amid a mix of Cutty Sark Prohibition and Talisker 10-year-old scotches, Lillet Blanc, Dolin dry vermouth and Grand Marnier.

Peat's Dragon by Matt Piacentini

So next time you reach for the salt and pepper shaker, it just might be for your cocktail! And don’t blame me if you find this all very puzzling – I blame the Sandfields.  Here’s to savoring the well-seasoned diversions in all our lives.  Cheers!

"Cocktail - Shakers"

Peat’s Dragon adapted from Matt Piacentini (The Up&Up, NYC)

1 oz Cutty Sark Prohibition whisky (I used High West Campfire Whiskey)

½ oz Talisker 10-year whisky (I used Compass Box Peat Monster)

½ oz Lillet Blanc (I used Cocchi Americano)

½ oz Dolin dry vermouth (I used Noilly Prat)

½ oz Grand Marnier (I used Pierre Ferrand Dry Curacao)

¼ oz black peppercorn tincture

Stir ingredients with ice and strain into a favorite glass.

*Black pepper tincture: Steep 4 oz of black peppercorns, then add in a blender with 1 liter of Everclear. Strain through a cheesecloth, and cut with equal parts water.

Passing Cars:

1 ½ oz Ransom Old Tom Gin

1 oz fresh lemon juice

½ oz Cynar

½ oz parsley syrup*

Few dashes of salt water solution

Shake ingredients together over ice and strain into a favorite glass.  Garnish with a sprig of parsley.

*Parsley syrup: Bring 1 cup water and 1 cup sugar to gentle boil.  Remove from heat and add a few bunches of parsley.  Steep for 5 minutes then strain out parsley before bottling.