It’s Mixology Monday time again! This month’s theme comes courtesy of Stewart Putney of Putney Farm. The theme is Inverted which really got us to thinking. It’s a challenging theme to say the least. Shaun really wanted to do something with an inverted foam. In other words a foam that sits on the bottom of the drink. After last weeks success with Darwin’s Finch, freezing sorbet into the bottom of the glass seemed like a good place to start. Christa was thinking more along the lines of an inverted blended tiki drink, so the ingredients meld together gradually instead as you sip, and there’s no ice to dilute the flavors but it still stays cold. On to the drinks!

Invertita

• 1 oz gin
• 1/3 oz Aperol
• 1 tsp. Amaro Montenegro (substitute other amaros depending on taste and availability)
• 1 oz blood orange sorbet, divided in half (again we used the Ciao Bella)
• 2 oz Prosecco

Freeze 1/2 oz blood orange sorbet into bottom of the glass.  Put first 3 ingredients and 1/2 oz sorbet in a shaker, let the sorbet melt and then shake with ice. Pour over frozen sorbet. Top with 2 oz Prosecco.

Very light and refreshing. Opens with sweet/spicy herbal notes from the amaro and some fizziness from the wine,  plus an alcohol bite from the gin. Creaminess from the sorbet moves into the dryness of sparkling wine.  Then there’s a big hit of zesty blood orange. Finishes with some bracing bitter herbal notes. As the sorbet melts, the drink sweetens up and gets creamier but you still get a nice balance from the dryness of the sparkling wine.

Rogue Wave

• 2 oz gold rum
• 1/2 oz cognac
• 1/2 tsp absinthe
• 1 dash Spanish bitters
• Fruit ice cubes; 1 cube each of guava, passionfruit, and lime, each a mix of 1/4 oz fruit juice and 1/4 oz simple syrup blended and frozen.

Stir first four ingredients very briefly with ice, pour into an old-fashioned glass and add the fruit ice cubes.

This is a fairly stiff drink that begins spirit-forward like an old fashioned and devolves into a tiki drink. Starts off with the richness of the rum, lots of vanilla and caramel flavors, then some spiciness from the cognac and the faintest hint of anise from the absinthe. The finish picks up the chamomile from the bitters and the first hints of fruit from the cubes. As the cubes dissolve, citrus and tropical fruit notes join the party, and the drink grows sweeter as well. The contrast of the fruit brings out more of the barrel funk in the rum, and the lime makes the absinthe pop a bit more. Once the cubes are melted, lush tropical fruit flavors dominate.

Thanks goes out to Stuart for giving us such a challenging theme this month. It’s always good to stretch one’s self and really try something new and interesting. We’re really happy with how each of these drinks turned out and how they evolve as you drink them. They each take a bit of advance planning, but they’re well worth the effort in our opinions.