The Cocktails Must Flow

The Woo Woo is a fruity cocktail made with vodka, peach schnapps and cranberry juice and served in a cocktail glass; versions exist which are made in highballs or shot glasses with slightly different ratios of the ingredients.

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The Perfect Martini is a variation of the classic Martini and uses equal measures of dry and sweet vermouth.

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The Salted Toffee Martini is a dessert cocktail of our own creation. We looked at several recipes and couldn’t find one that was nice enough, so a short period of experimentation later and we had this cocktail.

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We had a brief discussion on Twitter the other day when we agreed that I would post the ingredients for the cocktails we’ll be making on Friday 1^st April. We’ve selected the cocktails we’ll be making and below is a list of the spirits, bitters, mixers and garnish needed for the four cocktails we’ll be making. Rather than entirely giving the game away, so to speak, we’ve created two ingredients lists for you:

• Separate ingredient lists for the four cocktails we’ll be making, but without quantities or the cocktail names.
• Combined the ingredients into an alphabetical list so as to not “give the game away”.

We’ve hidden the two lists behind toggles so you can choose which list you want to use; this is a new method and we’d appreciate feedback on how well you think it works.

The Disaronno Lily is a light, refreshing cocktail made with amaretto, freshly squeezed lemon juice and red grape juice.

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A classic martini cocktail using scotch is our third cocktail of the evening: the Affinity, which is a variation of the Manhattan.

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Our second cocktail is another classic dating back to (at least) the 1920s; the Gimlet, which is made of gin and Rose’s Lime Juice.

The gimlet is a cocktail made of gin and Rose's Lime Juice. A 1928 description of the drink was: gin, and a spot of lime. A description in the 1953 Raymond Chandler novel The Long Goodbye stated that "a real gimlet is half gin and half Rose's lime juice and nothing else." This is in line with the proportions suggested by The Savoy Cocktail Book (1930), which specifies one half Gin and one half Rose's Lime Juice. However, modern tastes are less sweet, and generally provide for at least two parts gin to one part of the lime and other non-alcoholic elements (see recipes below).

The derivation of the name of the cocktail is contested. It may be named after the tool for drilling small holes (alluding to its "piercing" effect on the drinker) or after the surgeon Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Gimlette (27 November 1857 – 4 October 1943), who is said to have first added lime cordial to gin to help combat the ravages of scurvy on long voyages.

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We’ve made a few versions of the Chocolate Martini, including the White Chocolate Martini and the Cherry Chocolate Martini; tonight we have a banana flavoured one.

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I love mango, so the fourth cocktail of this evening is a Mango Martini.

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The third cocktail of this evening is the Tuxedo.

This is another classic cocktail related to the martini; the Tuxedo has had many variations since its inception in the 1880s.

The cocktail is named after the Tuxedo Club in Orange County, New York where it was first mixed. Tuxedo Park, the planned community where the club was built, is itself a derivation of the Lenape word tucseto. The form of menswear by the same name originated at the same country club around the same time.

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