veracruz sling

1 1/2 oz Kahlúa
3/4 oz Lime Juice
1/2 oz Orange Juice
1/4 oz Angostura Bitters

Shake with ice and strain into a rocks glass. Top with 1 oz club soda. Garnish with a floated coffee bean.

Last night for Thursday Drink Night in Mixoloseum's chatroom, the theme was Kahlúa. While any Kahlúa recipe was fair game, there was a challenge to come up with a Kahlúa Brunch Drink to be served for four days straight at the Tales of the Cocktail coffee bar in July. While the thought of resubmitting the Stamos Gin Fizz was tempting, it was doubtful that they would want to be churning out too many of those heavily shaken beasts all morning long. Instead, I toyed around with a pair of flavor combinations that have worked well with coffee flavors, such as Kahlúa, in the past. One was coffee and lime such as in the Port Antonio and the Zambito, and the other was coffee and Angostura Bitters such as in No. 9 Park's Orinoco. To round out the drink, I added the breakfast note of orange juice to enrich the citrus complexity and a splash of soda water to lighten up the drink. The healthy amount of Angostura Bitters might seem odd especially in a breakfast drink, but the bitters are a well known stomachic and have been touted by the likes of Charles H. Baker, Jr. in the Trinidad Fizz. Perfect for the mornings after Tales of the Cocktail's late night parties.
The floated coffee bean garnish added an extra element of coffee aroma to the Kahlúa liqueur. The sip was filled with fruit flavors from the citrus and from the cherry wood notes in the Angostura Bitters. Moreover, the lime and Angostura functioned well to balance the sweetness of the Kahlúa, and the soda water made for a lighter and more effervescent potion.

Later in the night in the chat room, I came up with another drink. It started as a joke homage to the 1970's bartending great Stan Jones given the three equal part nature that included cream and a liqueur not to mention the float of Galliano. Turned out to be rather good and it got some compliments from those who made it!

Caballero
• 1 oz Tequila
• 1 oz Kahlúa
• 1 oz Cream
• 1 Egg
Shake without ice and then with ice. Strain into a rocks or cocktail glass. Top with a 1/4 oz of Galliano.