Generally speaking I don't like rum. Why? I blame Rum Cola's. I mean which person goes to a bar and decides to willingly mix Bacardi with Coke. What a gastly tasting beverage that is...until I went to the liquor store. After chatting a bit with the sales person, we decided to buy Sailor Jerry. Fair priced, tasty rum. To be more specific, a spiced rum. When I first took a sip it could clearly taste vanilla and cinnamon, but not too sweet. Well balanced. Really suitable for anything, pure or in a cocktail. Which of course the last one we did.
Sailor Jerry
This rum was actually created by Sailor Jerry fans. Norman "Sailor Jerry" Collins spent half his life sailing and the other half tattooing sailors. His style of tattooing was quite specific, Asian colouring and that combined with American design. Each bottle has a "tattoo" on the inside of the label. Quite the inspiration, if ever you need any.
Background
The Caribbean is probably the heart of the rum world. Where rum came up together with sugar. That's why Sailor Jerry is distilled and will always be distilled there. Adding different spices to a rum was a tradition many sailors took to. The first rums where mainly quite harsh, so they added spices to liven it up, and improve the flavour.
Queen's Park Swizzle
This cocktail originated from the Queen's Park Hotel in Trinidad in the 1920's. It is seen as the forefather of modern swizzles. In many ways it is like a mojito, but this one's is slightly easier to drink. I'd see myself drinking this whilst on a sunny holiday, as long as their are palm trees. With the right ingredients this drink is refreshing, sour, sweet, pungent, and tasty. Very tasty.
How?
- 8-10 mint leaves
- 4 ounces of Sailor Jerry rum
- 2 ounces of freshly squeezed lime juice
- 3/4 ounce of simple syrup.(orgeat syrup would be pretty cool, but haven't tried it yet)
- Angonstura bitters
- Plenty of crushed ice
Gently bruise the mint leaves in a highball glass. Add crushed ice practically to the top of your glass. Add the rum, lime juice and simple syrup. Swizzle that stick* in the glass. Top it off with some Angonstura bitters, add more ice to top the glass off, because most of it will have gone down already. Garnish with a mint twig.
*Swizzle that stick
What the bleeding hell is a swizzle stick?
Swizzling is a way of stirring your drink, handy when you want to get your glass frosty.
You hold between you palms of your hands and stir up and down your drink. Just above the mint in this case. It, of course, mixes the different ingredients, and is a unique way of making your cocktail. You're not exactly stirring your drink with the swizzle stick as only parts of your drink get mixed at a time. The motion is controlled in small parts. Enough blabbermouthing....
Enjoy!
Niklas X
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