Last week, when I was in Portland, I went back to East India Co and made friends with Cain at the bar there. After letting him know that I loved the Tamarind Ginger Tantra – which was his favorite drink, I asked for his second favorite. Went with the Rangpur Chill.

This is Rangpur Chill with a slight variation. It has Tanqueray Rangpur gin, muddled Indian chillies, cucumber and sweet and sour. Additionally, I threw in a little of UV’s Sriracha Vodka to have a heightened smell of spice without making the drink too spicy. Rangpur is an area in Bangladesh which is famous for its limes. (actually tastes like limes but more orange-y in color). The gin is infused with it.

Inspired by the drink made in East India Co bar in Portland that I wrote of this week. As reported before, this has tamarind (I used paste), ginger, date, vodka and peach schnapps. Note that the bar had used ginger infused vodka. I used fresh ginger to get a better flavor.

The taste came out pretty good.

While various predecessors of this drinks – BIF, D&S, Little Club 1, Mig-21 to name some – existed since the 1930s, the final formulation of a Rusty Nail is credited to the bartenders at Club 21 in Manhattan in the early ’60s. And this got the final seal of approval when it was mentioned in New York Times by the chairwoman of Drambuie Liqueur Company.

This very traditional cocktail comprises of Scotch and Drambuie (which itself is a Scotch based liqueur very rich in herbs, honey and spices).

I think in French the phrase means Old Word. Gin fans might like this. This is made form gin, elderflower liqueur, lemon juice and sugar syrup. Because of the elderflower liqueur, there is a very nice sweet aroma – very much like lychee.

This is the last guava juice drink of the evening. For the simple reason that now I am out of it. (Preeti, I am sure you will be glad to hear this 🙂 ). This martini is made from Vodka. The guava juice does a very good job od hiding the vodka. An additional ingredient is raspberry liqueur. I used Chambord. That explains the slight tinge in the color. Finally to make it a little more tropical climate oriented, you add lemon juice – just a tad – to remind you of the citrus aroma. The flavor won’t come thru – the raspberry and guava will drown it. But the aroma will be there…

Still experimenting with the guava juice. This cocktail has Tequila in it. Ginger syrup and lime juice gives it a rich tropical dry climate feel to it. But I am not a big Tequila person. If you are – for example if you like margaritas and you like ginger, this could be great evening drink for you.

Yesterday, when I picked up some sugarcane juice from the place Sharmila had suggested, I saw that they carried guava juice too. So, I picked up a couple of them too.

This is my first cocktail of the day – Cape Sunrise. This is made from Malibu rum, guava juice and a drizzle of grenadine! Enjoy!

Hit the perfect spot this time. Tried rum with the sugarcane juice. And switched from limey and spicy to limey and sweet. First, rum and sugarcane are made for each other. In fact, rum was first made by fermenting sugar cane in the Caribbean when Columbus brought sugar cane from Spain to that region. Second, looks like sugar cane wants to stay sweet without trying to go for the edge of a spicy end.

I used Bacardi Limon Rum, sugar cane juice, a little simple syrup and Rose’s Lime juice.

Finally, hit the mark for me!!!

This has come out infinitely better. I think Vodka goes better with sugarcane juice than gin. The botanicals in gin seem to conflict too much with the strong taste of sugarcane. Moving to a martini glass with no ice has made it far more consistent.

I went with the same citrusy-spicy theme. Used Lime infused Vodka and some splashes of Sriracha Vodka (believe it or not, there is such a thing).

Great end result. Slight aroma of spice and great sweet and lime-y taste. This one you can try at home…

While we are at it, you can still claim this drink by giving it a good name…