Cocktail: Blood and Sand

Whisky in our cocktail? Yes please. This recipe comes from the book Cocktails met Tess by Tess Posthumus. 

Method

Pour the whisky, Cherry Heering, red vermouth and orange juice into a shaker tin.

Fill the shaker tin with ice cubes and shake hard.

Fine-strain the cocktail into the glass.

Garnish the cocktail with a wedge (of blood) orange* and a maraschino cherry.

Extra

Cherry Heering is a cherry liqueur from Denmark. For even more complexity, you can also choose to leave out the orange juice and muddle a quarter of an orange in the shaker tin instead. This way, you get the orange juice and the aromatic oils from the peel.

Then continue with step 1 and add the whisky, Cherry Heering and red vermouth. If you base this cocktail on a smoky whisky, make sure to use a robust vermouth as well, such as Carpano Antica Formula. This cocktail takes its name from the film of the same name by Rudolph Valentino from 1922 and was introduced by cocktail legend Harry Craddock.

*Citrus wedges & slices – dried as well

Wedges cut from citrus fruits serve more than just a visual purpose as a garnish. A lime wedge on the rim of the glass also adds aroma and – more importantly – it can be squeezed over the cocktail when the drinker wants their drink to be just a little more sour. So don’t cut the wedges too small. You can cut a maximum of eight good wedges from an average lemon and a maximum of six from a lime.

How to cut perfect lemon wedges:

First remove the ends of the lemon.

Then cut the lemon in half lengthwise.

Finally, cut each half into four wedges.

Another way to cut citrus is to cut it into round slices or half-slices. Fresh
citrus slices are a little out of fashion these days and are less often seen as a garnish. This
is because citrus wedges are easier to squeeze than slices. Citrus slices can, however, be dried very well in the oven, which changes the flavour of the fruit and the way you can use them. Besides being a great garnish, dried slices are also delicious added to tea or placed in a bottle of water. They rehydrate and slowly release a wonderful flavour.

How do you dry citrus fruits in the oven?

Preheat the oven to 80 °C.

Cut the citrus fruit into thin slices.

Pat the citrus slices dry on both sides.

Line a baking tray with baking paper.

Place the citrus slices on the baking paper and slide the baking tray into the oven.

Do not close the oven door completely, but leave it ajar by placing a heat-resistant spoon between the door. This allows the moisture to escape from the citrus slices more easily and makes the process a little faster.

Carefully turn the citrus slices over every hour.

The slices are ready when they are crisp and completely dried out.

Allow them to cool and store them in sealed glass jars or in resealable bags.

Use approximately the following times for drying citrus slices:

lime 4 hours
lemon 5 hours
orange 7 hours
grapefruit 8 hours

Cocktails met Tess
Tess Posthumus
€ 25,-
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Image: Saskia Lelieveld