novara

1 1/2 oz Gin (Knockabout)
1/2 oz Campari
1/2 oz Passion Fruit Syrup (Trader Tiki)
1/2 oz Lemon Juice

Shake with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. I added a lemon twist.

On Friday before dinner, I opened up the Big Bartender's Book and found a rather tempting cocktail created by Jamie Boudreau called the Novara. Jamie based the drink off of Kaiser Penguin's Orange Viola that appeared in Imbibe magazine a few years ago. For a name, Jamie made reference to Novara, Italy, where Campari was created back in 1860.
The Novara began with a lemon and Campari aroma. The sip was a fruity combination of the lemon and passion fruit, and the swallow contained the Campari and gin notes. What was most intriguing was that the components melded into a rather tangerine-like swallow. It was the most interesting modulation of Campari that I had experienced since the Carnivale (a/k/a Pisco Disco); in that drink, the pairing of Campari and Maraschino liqueur tricked me into thinking that the amaro was Aperol instead. Jamie also found the combination in the Novara fascinating and compared it to what he experienced in Paul Harrington's Jasmine.