English Autumn

I made this cocktail for a live jazz afterwork happening at the bar, and the launch of the fall/winter menu.

I started with the idea of autumn related flavor, wanting something more for the transition for a very soft autumn like we had in Paris. Since the cocktails I made for the previous afterworks were featuring vodka and whiskeys, I wanted this one to be a gin based cocktail.

So with my base spirit in hand, I looked at what would be on the winter menu for mixers and we havec a very nice, organic pear juice that could tame the strength of my tanqueray and end the drink on a fruity, soft texture.

On that highball idea of pear juice with a kick, I moved to add fall spicy taste people are used too in the now way to famous Pumpkin Spice Latte from Starbucks. I know it’s cheesy but I wanted my cocktail to be relatable for people. I was already substituting the Pumpkin with Pear, so I moved to the spices and added half a barspoon of cinnamon in the pear, which tasted fantastic on it’s own, but completely masked the gin. So, back to the gin.

I was left with two options, either switch the gin for a more herbal one, pushing one with more of a cloves dominance like a Monkey47 Schwarzwald or a Bathtub gin from Ableforth but I took the creative road and infused my Tanqueray with a classic green tea (non aromatic) I have at the bar.

The green tea infusion actually makes the gin very smooth to taste, from the genever kick to the liquorice aftertaste induced by the tea. Really making the spirit shine in the drink by filling all the flavors gap I had.

For trying it at home, here’s my take on the infusion :

• 1 bottle of Tanqueray London Dry Gin
• 2 green tea bags

Just put all that in a sealed container and wait, tasting from time to time given the strength of the tea taste you want. I left mine for 25 minutes approximately, getting a nice golden hue on the gin because of it.

The drink was really starting to be tasty and balanced, but i just wanted to complete the circle and add some red fruit notes to make the summer to fall transition in the tastes. Because the pear juice was already very sweet and I didn’t wanted to overpower the gin taste again, I went to make a pomegranate syrup (1/4 sugar ratio) in which I added orange peels for bitterness, just a drop in the shaker would be perfect.

If you’d like to replicate it, I used 500ml of pomegranate juice from The Berry Company, 125g of sugar put them in a saucepan an brought to a boil. Once it was cooled, It put in an orange peel and brought to a boil again. When I say an orange peel, I actually mean  the peel of a whole orange.

Bitterness, light red fruit sweetness, tartyness, this have it all.

The last detail was that the pear, when you brought the glass to your mouth actually hides everything, being really sweet, it creates a dissonance with the cinnamon and genever. So to revert that, I garnished the top of the drink with grated nutmeg, giving it a more peppery scent that would be more in line with the taste, not creating a surprise on the first sip.

Final proportions I used are :

• 5cl Gin
• 3cl Pear Juice
• 1cl Pomegranate Syrup
• 1/2 barspoon of cinnamon (powder)

All of this in a shaker then pour in a martini glass without straining, to keep the pear juice pulp for texture.

Cheers!