[billybob appleseed]

2 oz Tea-Infused Bourbon
1/2 oz Cider Syrup (*)
1/2 oz Martini & Rossi Dry Vermouth

Stir with ice and strain into a cocktail class. Twist a lemon peel over the top.
(*) To make the syrup, boil down cider in half. Add an equal amount of sugar. For the tea infusion, use this as a guide.

For my second drink at Ben Sandrof's Sunday Salon, I inquired about one of the ingredients he previously mentioned that he might be making for the night, namely tea syrup. While Ben got distracted by the other syrups he had made for the night, he did have a black tea-infused Bourbon at his disposal. Instead of a tea syrup, I wondered what he could do with that whiskey combined with an apple cider syrup he had just made. The options of going shaken with lemon juice or stirred with dry vermouth were bandied about. Since I had just had a citrus drink, I thus opted for the vermouth.
The drink started with a pleasing combination of lemon and tea on the nose. A fruity apple sip was dried out by the tea, vermouth, and barrel flavors on the swallow. When I let Andrea try it, she commented that there was a "spread out Bourbon taste on the swallow that ends with buttered corn."