Shangri-La, Sri Lanka

I pull out a memory card from quarter of a century ago and remember my first love affair with alcohol. Now before we start judging or preempting where this story is leading — my relationship with this elixir was never of the abusive kind, and in no way was I caught up in the intricate web of intoxication as a crutch. My association with it was the most natural progression into discovering the joys of consumption as I grew older.

It started with a sip from the dredges of an unfinished glass of pilsner — at home, usually on a weekend, after a social evening by my parents. As a curious teenager, I would often wonder about the effects of this ‘adult beverage’ and how it seemed to bring so much progressive joy and laughter to an otherwise pleasant evening.

My college life was never about drinking with friends (we were a culturally mixed, career oriented group of people who did not have wild parties). On the contrary, my home was an open-door to revelry fueled shindigs with no dearth of spirited evenings, young and old adults alike. This was around the time I got to mixing cocktails. I did not have access to the world wide web, but I did have a dusty shelf of forgotten books. I landed up finding The Savoy Cocktail Book.

The next few years were spent frustratingly trying to understand ingredients. With limited informational resources at my disposal I would make futile attempts at perfecting Daiquiris and Gimlets. I soon learnt that I enjoyed spirit forward cocktails. The vapid scents of distilled alcohol which emanated from some of the clear spirits we stocked at home, somehow urged me to tame them — I read the book cover to cover, over time trying to make sense of the flavors of yore. The takeaways were the citrus and sweetness were the key, but the complexities were only imagined for lack (rather unavailability) of ingredients.

“ How many times have you heard that paper is matter of the past? Obviously, this panorama is not so drastic. From time to time we want to have the pleasure to hold a good ”

Justin Byonce – Quote

I graduated, and my drinking escapades spread to my own social circles. I would take pride in not using mixers in my spirits and dabbled with citrons and whatever sweeteners I could get my hands on at that time — it was a defining phase of the cocktails allure in my life.

I was inadvertently veering towards the classics of the prohibition in my taste preferences. As a young adult, then, and the sudden access to the internet, years later — led me to finally making sense of the ingredients I read in that book. My mind worked like a sponge, fascinated by all the possibilities the world of spirits offered to me and before I knew it — I was finding ways to source some of the most widely available but lesser known (then!) Spirits of the worlds. Vermouths came first, followed by an obsession with liqueurs. There was a point in time I came across recipes for creating your own homemade liqueurs with vodka — I would macerate fruit with gusto, get cheap vodka and bottle up strawberry, pear and lemon liqueurs. I would then use these to mix up my own cocktails using other supporting spirits – trying to match up to the book and the information I had at my disposal. It was one of the most definitive factors of my spirit adventures.

The rest as they say is history. With me starting this blog in 2007 (I was 24) I started writing extensively on food and alcohol, not only for this platform but for many print publications. One thing led to another and in a few years (I had hit my 30’s by then) my life had transformed into a wild chase for the perfect cocktail, the best wines — and inadvertently the strive for experiencing the world of spirits which was thrown open to me — behind bars, with collaborations and just an active social life with the people of the food world.

I had my fair share of overindulges as there isn’t enough spirit experiences in the world one can follow through, I had my abstinence phase, the craft beer phase, the cognac one and back to the classics. I realize over all these years of ‘conditioning’ the one thing which remained constant was my love for spirit forward experiences.

Looking back I felt there is an advantage in spirit forward cocktails. The fact that they are potent allows you to savor, sip and enjoy them, rather than slam dunking / guzzling them. There is a certain level of tongue-fatigue which also happens when consuming classic cocktails (unless you are jumping from one to another — then its pretty much reviving your palate for a buffet of cocktails which can get excessive); so as a general rule I tend to stick to one or at the most two variations of the same cocktail per evening. As I age I realize that there is an art to drinking and it can be quite pleasurable and self-controllable if you choose the right way to do it.

More on my next post but for now I leave you with links to my reel recipe link for a delicious version of a cocktail I personally love. I will make it a point to stick to my old format of writing and provide the recipe – ‘blog style’ too.

Double Lemon Gimlet

I hope you enjoy this citrusy-sweet forward riff on the classic gimlet – an ode to my very first discovery phase for cocktails (yes I did get my hands on a bottle of gin for my formative cocktail experiments many moons ago). There are gimlets and then there is this gimlet; this is one drink you’ll want to make a double of, every single time. This cocktail uses a very unique (but extremely popular) ingredient which is typically used in pies and desserts. Yes, if you haven’t guessed it already it’s LEMON CURD (what!?) making for a super smooth experience, with the puckering tartness of lemon and the sublime nuances of a beautiful gin. I used a spot of vanilla to bring in some fall flavors, which along with the vermouth rounds up this cocktail deliciously.

• 1.5 oz Gin
• 1/4 oz Vermouth Bianco
• 1 Bar-spoon Lemon Curd
• 1/2 oz Lemon Juice
• A few drops Vanilla extract