defensio

1 oz La Favorite Rhum Agricole Ambré
1/2 oz Cointreau
1/2 oz Campari
1/2 oz Noilly Prat Dry Vermouth

Stir with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with an orange twist.

For my after dinner cocktail at Rendezvous, Scott Holliday wanted to make me a drink that his sous-chef Ben came up with. It was a take on the Lucien Gaudin Cocktail that they found in Ted Haigh's Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails where the gin was substituted for an aged rhum agricole. Lucien Gaudin was a famous fencer in the 1920's, and they named the variation the Defensio after the Latin root for fencing.
The Defensio started with an orange and Campari nose with hints of the rhum agricole peeking through. Cointreau and the rhum appeared on the sip followed by a bitter swallow from the Campari and an aged funk of the La Favorite. Like the Lucien Gaudin, the pairing of orange liqueur and Campari had a wonderful synergy, but the rhum in the Defensio added a funkiness and minerality to the mixture that worked rather well. The mineral element paired with the Campari shifted the conversation to another spirit we were just discussing, Chinaco Blanco Tequila. We surmised that it would work just as well in a Lucien Gaudin or perhaps a Negroni variation.