I made some more cocktails from Asian Cocktails the past week. (Part I is here if you missed it.)
My selection of cocktails was somewhat random. It was basically three cocktails that I could make from what I had on hand…
The first one I tried was the Hokkaido.
Hokkaido
1.5 oz gin
1 oz sake
0.5 oz triple sec
I thought the combination of the juniper flavor of the gin with the starchy rice flavor of the sake was a bit odd. The triple sec did make it pleasantly sweet, but still… the combination was really not my favorite. I think there’s too much sake in this drink, and not enough other stuff that goes well with it.
Even though I was hesitant to try another bourbon drink, I found one that looked like it could be OK, the Oriental cocktail:
Oriental Cocktail
1.5 oz bourbon
0.75 oz sweet vermouth
0.75 oz triple sec
0.5 oz lime juice
Despite the bourbon in this cocktail, I actually didn’t find the bourbon taste too strong. I think the sweetness and tartness from the triple sec and lime juice really helped to cut down that taste. I could’ve just done without the bourbon at all, but it still wasn’t a bad bourbon drink. Better than a Manhattan for sure. I have no idea what makes this cocktail “Oriental,” though. Supposedly, some American engineer gave this recipe to a Filipino doctor who cared for him, as a way of showing the doctor his gratitude, but that doesn’t explain where the engineer got the recipe in the first place…
I happened to have a bottle of Odwalla Mango Tango on me, so I tried making a mango margarita:
Mango Margarita
1.5 oz mango juice
0.5 oz lime juice
0.5 oz Cointreau
1.5 oz tequila
The recipe said to rim the glass with chili salt, but since I’m not a huge fan of salt, I omitted it. It was a nice mango flavor, but I wanted more. I should have added more mango juice, maybe twice as much as the recipe called for. I like my margaritas to be fruity, probably because I don’t really like the taste of tequila that much.
I promised to try some of the more adventurous cocktails from the book, but it seems I’ve failed. I should try making some lemongrass syrup, that will probably allow me to make some of the more exotic drinks…