Finished the full cycle of infusing vodka with grapefruit and ginger. Decided to try out some vodka tonic with it. Can’t say it was a big hit. The bitterness showed thru too much and the ginger in tonic water mixing with ginger in the infusion was not a good idea. Will try with soda water tomorrow.

Used the grapefruit and ginger infused vodka to make the first cocktail. The color difference will tell you it is infused vodka and not flavored vodka – which would have been clean in color. Also, Tito’s does not have a brown color – that happened to be an empty bottle I had handy.

So, this has my first ever infused vodka with Angostura bitters, lime juice and tonic water.

As I watch my vodka get infused, made a Rye Whiskey cocktail. Is it a crime that I did this while talking to my dearest friend – Mark Meade from Lexington – the Mecca of Bourbon Whiskey?

Got grapefruit and ginger freeze dried. Put Tito’s in it. Will find out how this turns out…

Made a Whiskey Sour after a long long time. Used Bulleit Bourbon.

Last week, Hunt mentioned that he had tried a Negroni with a Old Tom gin instead of a regular gin and that he rather liked it. Old Tom gin is a precursor to today’s gin (often called London Dry) and is usually aged in barrels unlike gin.

To go back a little more in time, I tried mine today with Genever. Which is the original source of today’s gin. In fact Old Tom gin is considered the bridge between Genever and modern day gin.

The effect was indeed remarkable. I think it was the ageing (the wood aroma) that you could feel on the nose that made the difference.

Normally, a fall evening should start with an Old Fashioned for me. But I remembered a discussion I had earlier this week with my friend and an absolute aficionado of classical brown alcohol drinks – Hunt – and decided to go with a Manhattan. Unlike him though, I refuse to have my Manhattans with any other kind of whiskeys than the ryes!!

I thought of throwing in a Luxardo brandied cherry for the garnish, but the concept of anything sweet did not sit well with me after the cold motorbike ride and the cold boat ride.

Just to change up from all those Paan series cocktails, went with a Single Malt version. Used Rampur Single Malt Whisky from India with King ginger liqueur.

Okay, this turned out even better but I am still not there. Made all the changes I said I will do in the previous post. Additionally, instead of Sambuca or Absinthe, I used Licor Beirao form Portugal.

There is a bit of a bitter tinge in the end of the palate that I do not care about. So, the next take will be to do everything the same but not use tonic water at all. I suspect the quinine in the tonic water is leaving the bitter taste.

Will report back.

Tried the following variations from the previous version.
(*) Added a dash of simple syrup.
(*) Instead of adding Sambuca, I rinsed the inside of the glass with absinthe
(*) Stirred the gulkhand after every ingredient was added (instead of shaking).
(*) Initially, I threw in some tonic water too.

The drink came out even better than last time. But still not perfect. I will go back to the Sambuca again.