“Why did I cite a cocktail that doesn’t exist in the Buffalo Trace review?” is a very pragmatic thought that comes up when one is writing a blog like this. And instead of retconning the post, I felt this represented an interesting opportunity to show how I personally develop new drinks. The drink in question was originally called the Nashville Sling. As I’ve never been to Nashville, let’s just rename this the Traverse City Sling, for something that is a little closer to home.

The term sling is the biggest clue as to the direction we’re going in. This refers to a class of sweet and light cocktails that are very fruit forward. In fact, if you say you want a drink at my place and don’t want to be too aware of the alcohol, chances are high this is what you’re getting.

2oz bourbon

3/4oz Cherry Herring

3/4oz Sloe Gin

1oz simple syrup

1.5oz lime juice

2oz Pineapple Juice

Layer into a highball, stir, fill with ice and top with soda water.

            At least, that’s the recipe that I will be attempting to try this weekend. And at the core of it, there’s a simple idea that anyone who wants to attempt to make cocktails should familiarize themselves with. “Understand a few basic formulas and start building your repertoire from there.” This will allow you a degree of controlled freedom in your mixology, and can also help you to understand a few new things. Let’s use a recent example.

            About two weeks before writing this, I was at the local liquor warehouse. I saw a bottle that caught my eye in the bitters section, and impulsively grabbed it. “Maraska Pelinkovac. Worst scenario, I use this for shots” is what I was thinking at the time. After opening it up and tasting it, and actually taking the time to think about it, it struck me as being about as bitter as Campari, but with a fruit flavor that is more reminiscent of Red Delicious apple. Upon further investigation, no fruit is involved in the manufacture of the product with the dominant flavor being wormwood. Though the brand’s most notable product is a cherry liqueur that I am now very interested in trying.

            Still, when thinking about how to properly assess the product for a use scenario, I kept coming back the comparison to Campari. In particular how the bitterness and what I had thought to be the fruit components would play into each other. “Negroni” I texted Tom while discussing the subject.

            At the end of the day, mixology exists in a bizarre purgatory between cooking and baking. Both tend to be rather formulaic. Like cooking you can substitute and ingredient or two in drink making and still end up with a good product. Like baking, if you make a mistake at a critical point, you’ve destroyed everything and need to start again. There’s a variety of template formulas that will require their own articles to properly explain, but for now, let’s continue with the bitter drink.

Getting back to my apartment I gathered what I believed would be the right components. Plymouth Gin for its heavy weight, and almost singularly juniper flavor. Dolin Blanc, at the time because I thought a sweet vermouth would be too rich for this drink. While using the Maraska Pelinkovac as a substitute for Campari. I followed the 3:2:2 ratio or 1.5oz Gin, 1oz Vermouth, 1oz bitter formula that is typical of a negroni style drink, and stirred it with a rock for about 15 seconds.

I was expecting a heavy, bitter, gin forward drink when I came up with this. What ended up being produced was almost the opposite. The Maraska and Gin disappeared into the background and provided the footing for the best aspects of the Vermouth to have been shown off. It was basically taking the best of the vermouth’s floral notes and layering them on top of the spirits. And the Babushka, as I’m currently calling it, will almost certainly be my go to “testing” drink for Blanc vermouths in the future as a result. Now, would I have arrived at this formula without understanding the Negroni as a template. Maybe. But I’ve been building drinks as a hobby quite literally for years, and thus, am just assuming I would’ve arrived at the conclusion of the combination, while only making the connection after the fact. Again, after years of practice.

Now, these are just two examples of cocktails that we’re working on for this blog. Even if the Babushka is functionally ready for its recipe to be published, there’s still some more testing that needs to be done, specifically on how the botanicals in the gin can influence the end result. And for those wondering, or if my PCP ever sees this, it is very rare that Tom or I test more than 1 or 2 drink recipes per person in a single evening. For this reason by our standards, spitting is very acceptable when testing and trying more than one drink. In the future when writing recipes for our “own” cocktails, we will include notes on how we came up with the drink. And hopefully, you’ll start to be able to develop a few of your own.