What rhymes with “orange”? Nothing. What goes with orange? For New Orleans’ mixologists, the only limit is that of their imagination. We approached some of the city’s finest to get a sense of how they construct a cocktail when given such a common element as a starting point.
Sean Thibodeaux, Clever
The Bloody Mary has her fans, but Sean Thibodeaux is not one of them. “I hate them,” he says. He does like the idea though of something spicy and eye opening, which is why he developed the Aztec. This heat-seeking missile of the morning combines Plymouth gin, jalepeno-infused Chartreuse, Regan’s Orange Bitters, and the oil from the zest of an orange into an at first bracing, ultimately smoothing cocktail. The cocktail also riffs on the Martinez, one of the original cocktails. The orange flavor lurks throughout the drink in the background, always there but never overpowering the luscious, spicy Chartreuse or the focused bitters.
Allison Negrotto, The Court of Two Sisters
When Allison Negrotto thinks of orange cocktails, her mind immediately goes to one of the great, all-but-forgotten classics, the Navy Grog. Not only does it represent the embodiment of orange for Negrotto, but also shows the generational divide between drinkers.
“Today, young people order vodka, cranberry and orange instead of saying Sea Breeze,” Negrotto explains. A Navy Grog puts a Polynesian twist on the original boat drink of the British Navy. The rum rations given to Her Majesty’s Navy bordered on the non-potable. So, clever sailors combined their daily ration with lemon juice (to ward off scurvy), sugar and cinnamon. Today, a Navy Grog blends light rum, orange juice, sour mix and orange Curacao, making more palatable rum even more so.
Neal Bodenheimer, Cure
Sometimes the decision to use orange in a cocktail purely rests on economic principles. At Cure, the barkeeps and apprentices use a large amount of zests and peels of oranges to flavor cocktails, but not much of what Bodenheime describes as the flabby juice. So he issued a challenge to his bartenders to come up with a cocktail that used at least three-quarters of an ounce of juice. The winner was bar manager and partner Kirk Estopinal’s New Kind of Water. The refreshing combination of Lillet Blanc, St. Germain, orange juice, Angostura bitters, and a little bit of vinegar on the rim of the glass makes for a delicious summertime cocktail.
Alan Walter and Sharon Floyd, Iris
Alan Walter and Sharon Floyd tend the boutique bar at Restaurant Iris, where their concoctions have combined ingredients such as pine needles and strawberries with rum for a taste of Ponchatoula. Walter and Floyd also used orange juice as a way to use extra oranges. Their creation, The Twin Span, utilizes orange juice and lemon juice to tone down the herbal notes of the chartreuse in the cocktail. Served up in a jewel-like glass, the cocktail was “really a lark. Just something we tried and our friends liked it. So it is here now,” Walter explains.
Star Hodgson, Loa
Star Hodgson chose to use the Gaelic embodiment of Aphrodite—A’ine—for inspiration to craft a cocktail based on the St. John’s Eve Festival. “When I think of summer, my mind immediately thinks of orange blossoms dangling on the trees,” Hodgson says. Into a glass she muddles peaches, an ounce and a half of Tanqueray gin, four drops of orange blossom water, lemon juice, and simple syrup. After mixing the cocktail, she burns the zest of an orange over the glass to give it an aroma and a mythical quality. “It is cleansing, rebirth by burning the zest of the old to bring out the white flavor of the orange blossom,” Hodgson says. Tasting the result of Hodgson’s lyrical mixology, one is immediately transported to a spring evening in New Orleans with sweet olive, jasmine and citrus trees in bloom. The kick from the gin will put you in an even better mood.
This little experiment proved a few things. Cocktails and the people who make them are no longer bound by the rules laid out by Mr. Boston. And the screwdriver is the Salisbury steak of cocktails.
