Classic Cocktails Revisited

[Palinka (RIP)]

Maid in Cuba

Ingredients

60ml Clear Bacardi 151 (or Superior) Rum
30ml Lime Juice
15ml Sugar Syrup
8 Mint Leaves
3 Cucumber Wedges
Chilled Soda Water (or Chilled Sparkling Mineral Water)
4 "Spritzes" of Absinthe (for the glass)

Recipe

Crush the cucumber and mint in the bottom of a cocktail shaker with the rum, lime juice and sugar syrup.
Shake hard with ice and double strain (through the cocktail shaker's strainer and then a fine mesh sieve) into a chilled coupe glass that has been spritzed (on the inside of the glass) with the Absinthe.
Top with a splas of the chilled soda water. Garnish with a mint leaf and a cucumber slice, and drink.

Raspberry and Orange Sgroppino

Ingredients

2 small scoops of raspberry sorbet
25ml of fresh orange juice
20ml of vodka
40ml prosecco

Recipe

Gently whisk together the raspberry sorbet the orange juice and the vodka.
Add the prosecco, stir gently and pour into a Martini glass. Garnish with a Basil leaf and drink.

The Puritan

Ingredients

50ml dry London gin.
15ml extra dry vermouth
5ml yellow chartreuse
1 dash orange bitters

Recipe

Pour all the ingredients into a cocktail shaker filled with ice and stir.
Strain into a chilled Martini glass, garnish with a twist of pink grapefruit zest and drink.

Enjoy!
Cheers!

[Smatter Noguts]

All of which begs the qestion, 'how many obscure liquors can my household bar hold?'
I have a great variety of used-once-only tiki stuff that will no doubt be in the estate sale after my passing.
A thread on the essentials of a well stock bar exists somewhere in the archive,o wise one, point the way!

[Palinka (RIP)]

...A thread on the essentials of a well stock bar exists somewhere in the archive [...] point the way!

There are several candidates for the thread you are thinking of:
Your own bar?
I'm going to build a bar, need advice
Home Bar Envy
Or Build A Bar
And from The Magazine, there is The Home Bar Handbook or useful advice from the article on How to Open Your Very Own Speakeasy
Hopefully, one of these is the thread or article about which you are thinking. If not, let me know and I'll do some more digging around the archives.
In the meantime, mix yourself up a good jug of your favourite cocktail and enjoy a trawl down memory lane.

[oettinger]

Palinka aka the old post grave digger. Please, dig some more just for the fun of it. Maybe we should open a thread in the pub for "links only" to random old threads. This boards search function works really really great, two or three words, no problem. Try it folks, see: "milk bourbon" http://www.drunkard.com/bbs/viewtopic.p ... n#p1085311

Back to topic, the ingredients are not that outlandish. But mint leaves are hard to come by. Other than that you got my mouth watered if not foaming!

[Palinka (RIP)]

...mint leaves are hard to come by...

Mint should be one of the easiest ingredients to find. It grows naturally in the wild. You can probably find some in your local park (if in doubt, rub a leaf between your thumb and index finger; if those fingers subsequently smell minty, you've found mint). It is also very easy to grow. Get a mint plant from a local garden centre (Amazon will even deliver living plants). Make sure that it is in a good pot, put it in a semi-sunny spot (a window ledge that doesn't get direct sunlight will do), water and feed it occasionally, and you'll have enough for minty cocktails, for a long, long time.