Rule 37. Try one new drink each week.
The Rule 37 series of posts chronicle my attempts to accomplish this feat every week.
For the recipes of R37s past, click the Htf do I make these drinks? tab.
Walters.
Um. Yeah. That’s the name.
Not a Sir Walter. That’s a different one.
This one is just plain Walters.
I found this one in the “Complete World Bartender Guide,” a paperback book of recipes I acquired recently as a birthday present, along with about seven other booze-related tomes. Plenty of firepower for future Rule 37s.
This one calls for Scotch, and I have many to choose from. Since it’s being mixed, I don’t want to use anything super pricey, and should probably go with a blend. However, I’m going to use a single malt because I can. I’m going with the standard bottle of Glenmorangie 10yr for a couple reasons: A) It’s tasty, but I don’t feel too bad about mixing it, since it’s widely available and decently priced. B) It was a birthday gift from the Lady Friend last year, and she’ll be excited to see me use it. C) I suspect this drink will taste a bit orangy, and that rhymes with Glenmorangie. If you’re saying it right. Don’t believe me? Ask a real Scot:
He does almost 50 of these pronunciation guides.
Also, he was the police captain in Super Troopers.
Though I don’t think Brian Cox would dare mix a single malt, let’s go ahead and see what happens.
Walters
Um, yeah.
From the “Complete World Bartender Guide” edited by Bob Sennett, who I bet hasn’t tried 2% of the drinks in this book.
– 2 oz Scotch
– 1 oz fresh orange juice
– 1 oz fresh lemon juice
Mix ’em up, shake ’em hard. Lots of pulpy fruit juice, so this drink had better be shaken well.
The book just says “combine with ice; shake well, strain and add ice” and has a little illustration of an Old Fashioned and/or Rocks glass. With an alleged “more than 2,400 drinks” in this book, I guess there’s no room for embellishment, though to be fair, I guess there’s not a whole lot more to say. It’s only three ingredients, so just shake and serve. I would highly recommend FRESH juice. Lemon is easy enough, but I was tempted to use some Tropicana rather than drag out my little plastic juicer for the orange component. Trust me… you’re going to want to spring for the fresh juice in this one. Maybe you could get away with it in a Fog Cutter, or something where there’s plenty of other ingredients, but not here.
Anyway, I made a double, and put it into a big ol’ rocks glass with big ol’ chunks of ice.
Ok. Aroma-wise there’s just a lot of fruitiness going on. I smell both the lemon and the orange, but the poor whisky is lost in there. This is where a big peat bomb would assert itself, but let’s not use those with all this fruit juice. I’m already feeling a bit ashamed for using a single malt rather than one of the blends I have on the bar.
…and the taste. Yup. A lot of fruit juice, and not much Scotch. I’m getting a little booze astringency, and some honey flavors, but the one-two citrus punch of orange and lemon is really drowning out the whisky. A more aggressive ratio, like the 3:1:1 would certainly help, as would a bigger and bolder Scotch. The 2:1:1 recipe here is just fruit juice with some Scotch hidden underneath. I could serve this to an AA meeting and they wouldn’t know the booze was lurking in there. The Lady Friend insists she picks up the elements of Scotch in both the aroma and taste, but I’m not getting it. On multiple tastings there’s the slightest hint of smoke, like someone lit a match across the street, and almost a touch of bitterness. I’m sure the ice isn’t helping matters either. Cold temperatures dampen taste and smell, which is why Scotch on the Rocks is a bad bad choice. Perhaps if this was made as a hot winter drink, it might bring a little more whisky sensation forward, but warm orange juice just sounds icky. Verdict: don’t waste the Scotch. Or use a much more powerful ratio.
Unless you don’t really like the taste of Scotch, in which case this would be a tasty tipple. Wifey would like this one.