Mix It Up

Photography by Seth Browarnik on June 3rd, 2010 in Food, Lifestyle

June 2, 2010 – To help cool you off in these hot summer days/nights we are featuring two specialty drinks from Sunset Lounge at Mondrian that we just shot as created by mixologist Angelo Vieira. Mondrian is launching “Crazy 8s” cocktails Thursday and Fridays from 6-9pm, as part of their new Happy Hour 8 dollar drinks. We will soon be featuring a specialty mixed drink by a renowned Mixologist weekly, as part of our Brain Trust.

Pisco Dusk Sour

Gran Sierpe Peruvian Pisco shaken with fresh crushed blackberries & cardamom pods, hand squeezed lemon juice, a touch of honey and frothy egg white, garnished with 3 drops of Peychaud’s bitters

The classic Pisco Sour cocktail is still to this day debated by Chile and Peru of its true origin. I really don’t care who invented it, all I know its a damn fine refreshing velvety drink and I predict its popularity will only keep on rising. One of my very favourite things to do with such classics is twist them and I added quiet a few but still maintained its original form. The marriage here with fresh fruity, tart black berries and fragrant, herb-like cardamon pods really enhance the Pisco notes itself. I chose honey instead of simple syrup to give the drink even more complexity for sweetness. Using fresh egg white as in the original binds all the ingredients and gives it a very smooth mouth feel. Everything is balanced off with fresh pressed lemon juice. I choose the peychauds bitters for its licorice, anise potency for garnish and it shines as well on the nose when you go in for a sip.

Sundown Sidecar

Hennessey VSOP Cognac shaken with crushed Lychees, fresh squeezed lemon juice and a touch of ginger liqueur, garnished with a Hawaiian raw sugar rim

Like many classic cocktail origins, the stories are always a little hazy and often have more than one tale behind them. But the recipe does resemble allot of the brandy crusta cocktail that predates the sidecar and most likely gave us all bartenders the idea to dip our glasses in juice or syrup and crust the rims with sugar, salt, pepper and what ever else you can think of. Going on with the theme here, I joined crushed fragrant leeches with ginger liqueur. The Cognac is very accepting of the ginger and the lychees give the drink length and hints of floral notes. The fresh hand pressed lemon juice balances it out and gives the cocktail a wonderfully refreshing character.

Angelo Vieira – Sunset Lounge at Mondrian