For the next three days, we’re focusing on the three main spirits (no pun intended!) of A Christmas Carol, those being the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Christmas Present and Christmas Yet to Come. We thought it would be fun to take one type of cocktail and make three versions of it, one from the past (or a classic form of it), one from the present (or how it has been morphed into a contemporary cocktail) and one as it might be envisioned in the future. The base cocktail we decided to go with is a martini. It’s classic and yet extremely versatile. The past decade has seen an explosion of variations on a martini with some incredibly imaginative and delicious cocktails have come out of it.
For the Ghost of Christmas Past, we wanted to make the epitome of a classic martini. As a starting place, we looked to martini connoisseur and master spy, James Bond. In the book, Casino Royale, he invents his own martini (the Vesper) that is a combination of both gin and vodka. We held to the same basic ingredients but put them in equal proportions. Plus we used some incredible bright yellow gin from Quebec just for fun (and to give the drink a hint of sepia .. you know, like the past).
Ghost of Christmas Past Cocktail:
- 1 ½ oz Grey Goose vodka
- 1 ½ oz Ungava gin
- ½ oz Lillet Blanc
- Dillon’s Bitter Lemon or Bitter Pear bitters
- lemon rind
- cocktail glass
Pour the vodka, gin and Lillet into a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake until ice cold. Strain into a cocktail glass. Top with lemon rind. Add bitters, if desired.
Cocktail Notes:
We really wanted the spirits to speak for themselves in this cocktail so we used high quality gin and vodka. Everyone seems to have their own preference for gin and vodka. Ungava is quite smooth and has a delcious mix of botanicals. We also considered using Victoria Gin. Both are Canadian gins so they might be difficult to find. A smooth American gin such as Bluecoat or Botantist would be great as well.
We debated whether to add bitters as well as which ones to add. The cocktail is clean and smooth by itself but we did try a couple of them, Bitter Lemon and Bitter Pear. Kate likes the Bitter Lemon as it brings out the botanicals in the gin. Drew likes the Bitter Pear because it adds some peppery notes and tastes a little like a dirty martini without adding the olive juice.
Inspiration:
Seems like the animators at Disney may have had a few too many drinks when they were designing their Ghost of Christmas Past. Dude is creepy. But the flying through the snow .. awesome.
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