Burns Night - Timorous Beastie

January 25 is the birthday of Scotland’s national poet, Robert Burns. Each year we celebrate Burns Night with whisky, poems, bagpipe music and (because I don’t have any haggis, neeps and tatties myself tonight) a YouTube video of the traditional ‘Address to a haggis’. If you've never seen this before, search for some more on YouTube. They are very entertaining. 

A beautiful whisky to celebrate this day is Timorous Beastie, one of the Remarkable Malts from Douglas Laing. Why? Because this whisky is named after a mouse which appears in Robert Burns’ poem “To a mouse”. 

This whisky is a blend of Highland whisky from Dalmore, Glen Garioch, Glengoyne and others, matured in ex-Bourbon barrels for a big, sweet and spicy flavour profile. We raise our glass to a man who contributed a great lot to Scottish culture.

P.S. This is also a great whisky for an Old Fashioned. Just add sugar, bitters and an orange peel.

Slàinte mhath.

Disclaimer : All pictures and texts are copyrighted by Geert Conard and Esito Management & Communications unless stated otherwise in the article. While some items might have been gifted by the producer or distributor, these are in no way paid promotions or recommendations.

NC'Nean Clover Club

In Belgium Nc’Nean is still a lesser known whisky distiller. I think we need to change that because they do have a great story and even The Guardian says it’s one of the Top10 distilleries to visit when you can (… because it’s a bit remote). NC’Nean is the UK’s first ever organic whisky distiller. They love to create experimental spirits and pioneer with sustainable production. The distillery is located at the Scottish west coast. Across the water on the Isle of Mull lies Tobermory, another one of my favourite distillers who also produce a delicious gin. 

Back to NC’Nean. The first products they made were not whisky, but botanical spirit and an aged botanical spirit. This also started yeast experiments, because they didn’t want to use the exact same yeast as all other distillers. The Botanical Spirit originated as the ‘new make’ for their whisky (it needs to age for at least 3 years before you can call it whisky), but was enhanced with locally grown herbs and spices. One of those spices is juniper, but still you also can’t call it a gin because it doesn’t tick all the boxes for those regulations. The spirit is somewhere in between gin and unaged whisky. 

NC’Nean is an abbreviation for Neachneohain, the Gaelic queen of spirits. In the back of my ‘to do’ cabinet I found a bottle of NC’Nean Botanical Spirit from Batch 1, on the bottle the name was still spelled NCN’Ean. It seems the name was changed later on because it was too hard to pronounce. Well, it’s still not so easy, is it? Let’s make a nice drink with this spirit. 

You could use this botanical spirit as if it was a gin. Mix it with a premium tonic, a splash of bitters and garnish with grapefruit. Or use it in a tasty cocktail like this variation on the classic ‘Clover Club’. 

NC’Nean Clover Club

Ingredients
50 ml NC’Nean Botanical Spirit
25 ml Fresh lemon juice
20 ml Raspberry syrup
1 eggwhite

Method
Add all ingredients to a shaker with just one (1!) ice cube. Shake hard to develop some nice foam. Then shake again with some more ice for just 10 seconds. Strain in a chilled coupe. Garnish if you please, but I think it’s overrated for this one. 

Disclaimer : All pictures and texts are copyrighted by Geert Conard and Esito Management & Communications unless stated otherwise in the article. While some items might have been gifted by the producer or distributor, these are in no way paid promotions or recommendations.

Port Sangaree - Graham's 2Oy old Tawny

A few weeks ago I shared the recipe for the ‘Port Garibaldi’ highball cocktail with a base of Graham’s Six Grapes Port. Today I’m using another bottle from this great brand : Graham’s 20y Tawny. And again I’m going to use a recipe by Master Mixologist Ran Van Ongevalle.
Please do enjoy this delicious slow-sipping after-dinner cocktail. 

Port Sangaree

Ingredients
60 ml Graham’s 20y Tawny
30 ml Remy Martin 1738 Cognac
Mint leaves

Method
Muddle 3 mint leaves slightly on the bottom of your mixing glass. Add both the Port and Cognac and stir with ice. 

Double strain (Hey, that sounds familiar) into your cocktail glass with fresh ice. Garnish with fresh mint. 

Disclaimer : All pictures and texts are copyrighted by Geert Conard and Esito Management & Communications unless stated otherwise in the article. While some items might have been gifted by the producer or distributor, these are in no way paid promotions or recommendations.

Deanston Kentucky Cask Matured

A new bottle of Deanston whisky came to our office and the label states in very large writing “Kentucky Cask Matured”. This does raise an eyebrow, because most Scotch whisky is matured in ex-bourbon barrels (sometimes finished in other casks) and most of those ex-bourbon barrels are sourced from Kentucky. So let's neglect the shiny marketing and look at what's in the bottle. 

The color of this whisky is light golden, indicating that it’s still a young whisky. Lots of fruit in the nose. Not very exciting in the mouth. A bit of honey, butter and dough. Hints of fruit. 

Conclusion, it’s certainly not a bad whisky, but I have tasted better already from Deanston. I guess this whisky will appeal most to people who enjoy a refreshing longdrink in the evening. It does have that alcohol-kick which works pretty good with mixers like coke or ginger-ale. I mixed up a simple Horse’s Neck and absolutely liked it. If you want to enjoy a better Deanston dram in this price range, I would recommend the Deanston Virgin Oak, bottled at 46,3% instead of 40% which gives it a lot more body. 

Deanston Horse’s Neck

Ingredients
50 ml Deanston Kentucky Cask matured
120 ml Fever-Tree Ginger-Ale
A lime wedge
A dash of walnut bitters

Method
Build this drink in your longdrink or highball glass. Add ice cubes to your longdrink, add the whisky and bitters. Pinch the juice from a lime wedge. Top with Ginger-Ale. Give it one quick stir. Garnish with a dehydrated lime wedge. 

Disclaimer : All pictures and texts are copyrighted by Geert Conard and Esito Management & Communications unless stated otherwise in the article. While some items might have been gifted by the producer or distributor, these are in no way paid promotions or recommendations.

Ceder's Cucumber Delight

Most of our followers should know by now that I’m not a big fan of prohibition months like ‘Sober October’, ‘Dry January’ or ‘Tournee Minerale’. I still believe in enjoying tasty drinks all year long, but with moderation. Use some common sense when enjoying your favourite spirit or cocktail. 

But even then, some days alcohol is not really an option because I still have to drive to a meeting or need to pick up my daughter from her violin lessons. On such days a nice mocktail can be enjoyed. I do like non-alcoholic vermouth-style aperitifs and non-alcoholic Gin-replacements. Today I’m talking about Ceder’s Crisp, which is a non-alcoholic gin-replacement. It’s distilled with Swedish water and South-African botanicals such as juniper, lemon, cucumber and camomile. Ceder’s also has three other flavours available. 

Ceder’s & Tonic

50 ml Ceder’s Crisp
150 ml Premium Tonic
Garnish with a slice of cucumber and a sprig of mint

To be really honest when I smelled and tasted the pure liquid, I really didn’t get the juniper. The cucumber was much too overwhelming. I did get a hint of the camomile however. I decided to work with this and enhance the cucumber into a drink that would be really perfect at lunchtime. 

Ceder’s Cucumber Delight

Ingredients
50 ml Ceder’s Crisp
15 ml Lime juice
15 ml Lemon juice
10 ml House of Broughton Natural Cucumber syrup
10 ml Martini Floreale (Non alcoholic vermouth)

Method
First coat the inside of your glass with a few strips of cucumber. Fill up with ice cubes. 

Shake everything together with lots of ice. Strain into you cocktail glass.
Garnish with fresh mint. 

Disclaimer : All pictures and texts are copyrighted by Geert Conard and Esito Management & Communications unless stated otherwise in the article. While some items might have been gifted by the producer or distributor, these are in no way paid promotions or recommendations.

Deep Chocolate Negroni

It’s been a while since I did something with X-Gin, the chocolate flavored gin which my wife likes so much. While she’s having her X-Gin & Tonic, I want to stir up a real chocoholic after-dinner cocktail.

Deep Chocolate Negroni

Ingredients
30 ml X-Gin
25 ml Sweet vermouth
25 ml Campari
10 ml Marie Brizard Chocolat Royal (Chocolate liqueur)
1 dash Angostura Cocoa Bitters

Method
Stir together in a mixing glass with lots of ice. Strain in a tumbler with fresh ice. Garnish with cocoa nibs and optionally serve with an After Eight chocolate. 

Disclaimer : All pictures and texts are copyrighted by Geert Conard and Esito Management & Communications unless stated otherwise in the article. While some items might have been gifted by the producer or distributor, these are in no way paid promotions or recommendations.

Singapore Sling

Let's start the year with a more complex cocktail, before we return to our mission of easy cocktails that everyone can make at home.

In classic cocktails you have “old classics” and “modern classics”, but in both you have the “more common” classics and the “maybe not so common” classics. These are the cocktails that you definitely have heard of and you’ve seen them appear on the menu of your favorite cocktail bar… but in reality it’s a drink you haven’t really tasted that often. While you probably have tasted several glasses with a Whisky Sour, Old Fashioned or Daiquiri, I bet you haven’t tasted that much Singapore Slings. Am I right? 

The Singapore Sling is a recipe which is easily tweakable, so they will taste slightly different each time you sip them in a bar. The Singapore Sling was created in the early 1900s at the bar of the Raffles Hotel in Singapore. The oldest recipe in my book collection only mentions lemon juice, Dry Gin, cherry brandy and soda water. Benedictine was optional. The recipe has evolved a bit since that time… 

Too many ingredients? I’m pretty sure you can order this great cocktail for home delivery from many cocktailbars. It’s also available from the BarBasille cocktail-webshop. 

Singapore Sling

Ingredients
30 ml Bombay Sapphire Gin
20 ml Cherry Heering 
10 ml Benedictine 
10 ml Cointreau
1 dash Angostura bitters
30 ml Pineapple juice
15 ml Lemon juice
10 ml Grenadine

Method
Shake all ingredients with enough ice for 15-20 seconds. Strain in a chilled cocktailglass with fresh ice. Garnish with pineapple, mint, cocktail cherry… or a flower. For me a flower refers best to the old Singapore. 

Disclaimer : All pictures and texts are copyrighted by Geert Conard and Esito Management & Communications unless stated otherwise in the article. While some items might have been gifted by the producer or distributor, these are in no way paid promotions or recommendations.