Sixteen: Centre

The galaxy is filled with wonderful things, not least the news that its centre tastes of raspberries and smells of rum. This is great news because both raspberries and rum are themselves wonderful things and because the centre of the galaxy is not actually made of raspberries and rum - rather it contains ethyl formate, a molecule that exhibits both traits. They're good traits to incorporate into a cocktail, too.

Centre

15ml handcrushed raspberry juice
10ml sugar syrup
1 dash Angostura Bitters
60ml Havana Club Especial

Place the raspberry juice, syrup and bitters in the base of a mixing glass. Add ice and stir. Add the rum gradually while stirring. Garnish with a couple of raspberries.

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To make the handcrushed raspberry juice, simply use a barspoon or muddler to force some fresh raspberries through a fine-strainer. You'll need about 10 or so to yield 15ml. Commercially available raspberry purée works as a substitute.

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There's a point to made, I think, about stirring drinks. The handcrushed raspberry juice is opaque so you lose the clarity that you associate with stirred drinks, but the idea behind stirring this drink is to give it the smooth texture you always get.

Fifteen: Mystère

Once upon a time, Cognac was the drink of choice for the higher orders of society and the undisputed leader among spirits, but that was before phylloxera decimated French wine production allowing whiskies and rums to come to prominence, and before the British government started to promote gin over imports from a country it frequently warred with. Cognac has heritage and tradition in spades which adds to the aura of luxury around the category, but it can also make the spirit seem fussy and impenetrable. Which is shame, because that previous dominance is based on the quality of the product rather than mere terroir or aging.

So, I made a conscious choice to make something with a Cognac base which isn't something I do that often. Vermouth seemed like a no-brainer, wine-based modifier with a grape-based spirit. Keeping the complementary theme, I used some Mandarine Napoleon - a brandy-based liqueur not unlike Grand Marnier, only Belgian and more mandarine-y.

Mystère

30ml Courvoisier VS
30ml Mandarine Napoleon
15ml Dubonnet Rouge
1 lemon zest

Stir all ingredients with ice and strain into an ice-filled brandy glass.

Thirteen: Medici

Lorenzo de' Medici is remembered as a patron of the arts and as a key figure in the Renaissance. His contribution to the world of spirits isn't as well known. The story goes that a brandy-based liqueur was created in his honour. And that's about it. Sorry.

The Medici link makes for good copy in a press release, but the major development came in 1938 when two brothers-in-law started producing a version of that same liqueur in Livorno, Italy. These days it's called Tuaca and thanks to American soldiers encountering it during World War 2, it's gained international exposure.

That exposure spreads as far as Britain, where Tuaca has an interesting link with the town of Brighton. In Brighton, Tuaca's become a verb.

To go out in Brighton UK and drink a ridiculous amount of Tuaca, get extremely wasted on it and do crazy things you normally wouldn't and don't remember (usually of a sexual nature!) Tuaca-ed, The Urban Dictionary

What's even more remarkable about Brighton's taste for Tuaca is that it's more or less entirely the work of just two people - Sammy Berry and Poul Jensen.

Poul said: "In 1998 the only place you could get Tuaca was in the St James Tavern. Within a year it was in about 30 pubs. Now you can buy it in 95 per cent of bars, pubs and clubs.

"Local off-licences called us up because people kept coming in and asking for it. They would turn on their heel when they found it wasn't there."

It's an amazing story. Since 2006, Tuaca has been sold and distributed in the UK by Bacardi Brown-Forman, who took on Sammy and Poul as brand ambassadors for it, and recently gained one of the greatest accolades available to spirits and liqueurs - its own Thursday Drinks Night at the Mixoloseum.

Medici

45ml Tuaca
15ml Crème de Mûre
15ml Punt E Mes
Lemon zest
Orange zest

Stir all ingredients with ice and strain into an ice-filled old-fashioned glass. Garnish with an orange zest twist.

Twelve: Kitchen Special No. 1

Being honest, I'm pretty cocktailed out at the moment. We're just put the finishing touches to a new drinks menu at work - featuring some of the drinks I've posted here - and I've been making the most of not thinking about combinations of spirits and liqueurs. That said, there are still times when I do want something a little more exciting than a beer or spirit/mixer. The problem here is that I'm genuinely awful at keeping my kitchen stocked. I'd save a pile of money if I actually planned meals rather than getting takeaways or eating at work. So, using whatever I had lying around the kitchen...

Kitchen Special No. 1

45ml Amsterdamsche Oude Genever
15ml Punt E Mes
15ml Elderflower Cordial
1 dash egg white

Shake all ingredients with ice and fine-strain into chilled martini glass. Garnish with a lemon zest if you've remembered to go shopping this week.

Eleven: Spring Orchard

We've just finished putting together a new cocktail program for the Paris bar at work and everytime we take on this kind of exercise, there's a point when someone says "we need x cocktails with this spirit in them," because we're only ever going to have y drinks ready, and y is always a number less than x. But, that thing they say about necessity? It's true. This drink also ended up being a chance to use Galliano. It's one of the those bottles that seems to be on almost every backbar without seeing a lot of use, and it's one that always prompts curiosity whenever I pick it up. The overriding flavour is vanilla, but there are also hints of anise and citrus which makes it an interesting alternative to vanilla-flavoured vodkas.

Spring Orchard

1/8th green apple (muddled)
25ml vodka
12.5ml Galliano
25ml red grape juice
12.5ml lime juice
1 barspoon elderflower cordial

Muddle apple in the base of a shaker. Add the liquids and shake. Fine-strain into a chilled champagne flute and garnish with an apple slice on the rim.