Green Deacon

1.5 oz Plymouth Gin
   1 oz Grapefruit Juice
.75 oz Plymouth Sloe Gin

Shake with ice and strain into a chilled coupe rinsed with St. George Absinthe.

Taking another recipe out of the PDT Cocktail book (feels like I'm trying to cook through every recipe in that book) I chose the Green Deacon.  I went for this recipe for two reasons, the first is earlier in the day I made a different recipe using sloe gin (the Sloe 75) and wanted to show Skyler what other things sloe gin could do.  The second reason I made this drink is that the drawing on the page caught my eye.

Ok this drink is odd and I'm still trying to figure out my opinion of it.  At the start the drink has a lot of anise notes from the absinthe.  They fade as the drink goes on but it makes a pretty large impression on the overall drink.  The smell on this drink is sweet with anise and citrus notes.  The taste begins with anise and moves to dark plum and grapefruit flavor.  Somehow these flavors made me think of a bunch of different things like watermelon and lipstick (don't ask me how).  After a while the drink settled down and the grapefruit began to come through stronger.  At this point the drink reminded me a lot of the Peralta because they're both heavily grapefruit driven and start w/ a spicy / herbal liquor note (rye in Peralta, absinthe in the Green Deacon).

Transatlantic Giant

1.5 oz Buffalo Trace (Bulleit)
  .5 oz Smith & Cross
  .5 oz Cynar
  .5 oz Sloe Gin
  .5 oz Creme de Cacao
3 dash Angostura

Stir and strain into a coupe glass

Sometimes I feel like I only make drinks because I get a new book in the mail.  Today I received my copy of beta cocktails and just had to try it out.  I'm pissed that I just heard about this book, because it was available in New Orleans when I was there over the summer for a convention.  I even went to the bar it was being sold at and didn't even know about it.  I still got thanks to their blurb page, but it would of been far more awesome if I got it there.

The book is interesting and I'll definitely be making a lot of drinks out of it.  Opening the package I was surprised by how small the book was, but it is pure recipes with 1-2 on each page.  The recipes are also pretty interesting with a lot of bitters and amaros.  Of course this means I really will have to buy a new bottle of Cynar because I noticed 4+ Cynar recipes in a quick scan. 

On to the drink.  I was prepared to dislike this drink.  Looking at the liquor bill there are a lot of flavorful ingredients and I feared it would taste like bourbon with a shot of grain alcohol added.  The reality was quite different.  On first sip the nose started with bourbon and transitioned to a funky dark fruit (plum-ish) smell.  The taste started with corn / cherry from the bourbon which then transitioned to a funky rum note.  Following close after the rum is a caramelized sugar and fruit note.  The drink finally finished with a rounded chocolate flavor.  After taking a few sips I began to see it a bit differently.  It started to remind me of an amaro.  I began to get an almost pepperminty spice off of the nose and the taste (taken in a quick swallow) reminded me a bit of Fernet Branc.