Hold onto your hats, ladies & gents, you're about to dive deep into a recipe a good year and a half in the making, minimum. Granted, the darned non-cocktail schedule tends to get obnoxious at times, hence the delayed write-up for this year's Tiki month. As you'll see, some of that obnoxiousness flows over into the recipe, but if you're looking for nice and easy cocktail recipes *points to the What's Bubbling Up section to your left* honey, you're in the wrong place. This is wild-and-crazy-experimentation-because-I-can land. 'Cause someone has to do it, darnit!
With that in mind, I give you an uncanny piece of Tiki triangulation that's a hodgepodge of ingredients painstakingly researched, fought for, preserved for the right day, melted and refrozen, and wrung within the very inch of its life (many times over).
But first, some thanks are in order. To JFL at Rated R Cocktails, for his explorations on Planters Punches, a deeply helpful guide to getting the structure down. To Rumdood for his advice on Brugal rums. To Doug at The Pegu Blog for the right-place-right-time idea of blending then (maybe) straining your Tiki drink. To Elana at Stir & Strain, I basically converted your Bourbon Vanilla Caramel Sauce into an orgeat; as someone who was flailing about how to get started with a caramel, moreover, I'm grateful that I didn't have to look far to find a delicious, easy-to-follow recipe which turns out well; I strongly recommend everyone click through, memorize her technique for making caramel, and follow it to the letter, it's a wonder of kitchen science to behold as the sauce develops. Finally to Doug Ford for a (somewhat) recent post on Planter's Punches, which gave a needed kick in the boot and added perspective to get back on this horse.
This is perhaps the initial cocktail I had in mind when dreaming of a more sophisticated and moody, less economic and office-friendly version of the Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini Punch. Yellow polka dot bikinis themselves are reminiscent of leopard or cheetah-skin one pieces you see on jungle ladies and that got my wheels spinnin', not just on ideas expressed through cocktails, but the use of kicked-up orgeats to take those flavors to new levels. Push it to one extreme and you get the bombastic coffee-macadamia nut orgeat Giganta of DC Comics fame. Pull it much closer to life-size and you have the delicate tisane-almond orgeat mixed with proto-tiki elements of Jane Porter. And in between? The sultry
*Wait, WHAT?! After over a year of build-up and we're still not getting Jane of the Jungle? Y'know, dear readers, I'm kinda impatient with it too. But after finishing this cocktail recipe last summer, I took a step back to observe it and it doesn't quite fit the moniker. Surely, there's Jungle to be had in spades here, but it's not the missing link I would want to bridge Jane Porter and Giganta. This recipe is somewhat of a tangent in-between a true Jane of the Jungle --as extended into Tiki from Jane Porter-- and Giganta, and, yes, one could split hairs ad infinitum. But, I think it works out. Jane of the Jungle, forthcoming 2032 at the rate I'm going, is meant to be more compact and strong - a fully realized tropical goddess. Whereas this cocktail is still something of a breezy punch, a more exotic companion to Itsy Bitsy. Therefore, I give you...
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| Flower of Temptation garnish featured above |
Jane's Girdle
5 sour cherries
1/2 oz lime juice
1/4 oz passionfruit syrup
2 tsp Rainforest orgeat
1 bsp orange oleo saccharum
1 oz Brugal XV rum
3/4 oz Plantation 5 Barbados rum
3/4 oz armagnac
2 dashes pimento bitters
6 oz weak Earl Grey pellet ice
Combine all in a blender, adding ice last.
Blend for five seconds (count 'em; it's ok to have unpulverized ice).
Pour all into a chimney glass and fill with crushed (plain water) ice.
Garnish with a passionfruit "orchid" or "flower of temptation" (passionfruit end + fresh sour cherry) and lime "vines."
So balancing this particular undergarment had taken a lot of trial and error. There had been an extra 1/4 oz of sweet (passionfruit syrup + Rainforest orgeat), the intention being that the Earl Grey ice would balance -- though in early versions the inconsistency in the melting ice made it at times too sweet and other times too astringent. I excused the extra bit of sweet on the grounds that, in prior Tiki research by others in the mid-to-late 'naughts, when you have a blended-ice cocktail you generally want that extra sweet because it balances the melting ice (counter-intuitive to the craft cocktail mindset up to that point). Sometimes though, as with writing or any other craft, you need some time away from the original formulation in order to see the creation as it is, without any of your earlier prerogatives (in my case the emphasis on Rainforest orgeat) getting in the way of getting it right.
Pulling down the bright-sweet elements into a near-equal parity with the sour elements kept the cocktail consistent throughout its (very drinkable) duration. You have the overall emergent flavor that's a combination of the spirits and oleo saccharum complementing the orgeat, with brightness from the lime and passionfruit (a call-back to Itsy Bitsy), and earthy/spice notes of the cherry, orgeat coffee-nutty butteriness and bitters sneaking through as the drink goes on. (plus, an added bonus as the drink gets down to dregs: blending the cherries and keeping the pulp in keeps even the dregs flavorful)
A breakdown of the ingredients
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| Take the end off a passionfruit, remove pulp, cut slits, curl and... |
Brugal XV: coffee dark and dry - the foundation.
Plantation 5: robust and bright with a big orange note.
Armagnac: the more rustic, wild cousin to cognac - a good match for the cherries.
Sour cherries: aka, pie cherries (think Morello, Montmorency, etc..). My farmers market only had these for one week two summers ago, and then nothing, but I caught a good quart or more of them and pitted/froze them for precisely this sort of purpose (knowing all the while that very few others would probably do the same). I wouldn't recommend canned pie cherries, in water at least, as a substitute - processing takes the gusto out of them and they need that freshness to provide part of the Sour element. If limited to sweetened options, try using a bit of tart cherry preserves and substituting some strips of orange zest in the brewing tea in place of the oleo saccharum.
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| Voila! Passionfruit orchid garnish! |
I opted for pellet ice combined with a good blending here because the integration of the tea was my greatest concern. If not well-incorporated, a sip could could vary wildly between dry tea and over-sweetness. Early tests which involved the cocktail simply being shaken with large tea ice also diluted into something too dry in the end, even if the early sips were just-right. With flavored ice, sometimes you don't want the drink to evolve much over the course of time. Why do tea ice at all then? Economy, mainly. Adding liquid tea, then regular ice to chill and dilute isn't as controllable either, and the subtle cold astringency of the tea ice particles contrasts well with the vivacious punch - enunciating each ingredient more.
Orange oleo saccharum (approx 2-2.5 oz): Using a vegetable peeler, take half the zest (with minimal white pith) of a medium orange. Add the zest and 1/4 cup demerara sugar to a sealable baggie, seal, toss, and gently rub the sugar into the zest, then let rest at room temperature (preferably overnight) until wet and developing a syrup purely with the orange oils. When ready, add 1 oz (2 T) water, reseal and agitate to help dissolve the sugar. Further resting may be needed to help the dissolution. Store in the refrigerator until ready to use, but no longer than 2 days.
The oleo saccharum should be used to moderate the Earl Grey tea ice to your taste and help account for potential variations, somewhere in between a barspoon (3/4 t) and 1/4 oz (1/2 T). A little hint of orange also helps highlight the tea's bergamot and the Plantation.
Rainforest Orgeat (approx. 3 oz):
Long story short: I really liked this Rainforest Nut flavor that Green Mountain Coffee used to do. Initial thought: using a flavored coffee as a water base for orgeat could be intriguing. Consequential thought: aw [fiddlesticks], not even I could make this after my last bag ran out. Ok, well, what about incorporating fresh elements into a rough flavor profile based on what's described on the bag (vanilla, caramel, cashew, Brazil nut)? [caveat: the bag leaves out a major flavor note - amaretto!]
So: a cashew/Brazil nut orgeat with a coffee base....and caramel as the sugar??? ...and the coffee nut milk could function as the dairy in the recipe? Mwahahaha!
1 oz each cashews and Brazil nuts
1/3 cup strong-brewed coffee (rich medium roast desirable here), cooled
Make the nut milk, at least 2 processes/wringings. I've trended towards a Frog Princesse-style orgeat process of late - the cold-processing avoids any gumminess and helps enunciate the flavors. Either pre-chop the nuts or combine with coffee in a blender and blend until loose-but-not-terribly-fine-chopped - it's ok to have some large chunks. Let rest 1-2 hours, then wring liquid through cheesecloth. Re-combine liquid and nuts and repeat for 1-2 processes more. Reserve final nut milk.
1/3 cup vanilla sugar (or regular white sugar + 1 inch of seeds scraped from a vanilla bean pod)
1/2 oz/1 T water or same coffee from the nut milk
5 drops lemon juice
3 drops orange blossom water
Make the caramel (note Elana's recipe above. I'm paraphrasing here, but for more details on process, please refer there). Combine sugar, water and lemon juice in a small pot on the stove and stir to combine. Bring to a gentle boil without stirring (seriously, you'll cause crystallization). Observe it as it progressively darkens/goldens, 10-20 minutes. If you're using coffee, you're going to have to utilize your sense of smell to tell you when you hit your desired caramel "darkness" - it's not too crazy, I've done this, you just need some patience and a non-stuffy nose. Once the desired darkness is reached, add half the nut milk to the caramel, stir to incorporate, then the remainder. Stir another 3-5 minutes (no more) while it thickens - thick enough so that it leaves a coating on a utensil, even if it appears thin. Let cool. Fortify with neutral spirit and add orange blossom water.
....aggghh...so yeah, there might've been a reason it took awhile to get this recipe out. But bookmark it for this summer when sour cherries are fresh, if you like. It's worth it.
