leap frog

2 oz Plymouth Gin (Damrak)
3/4 oz Lemon Juice
1/2 oz Rothman & Winter Apricot Liqueur
1/4 oz Simple Syrup
2 dash Orange Bitters (Regan's)
6 leaf Mint

Muddle mint in simple syrup, add rest of the ingredients, shake with ice, and strain into a cocktail coupe glass.

Two Saturdays ago, I grabbed the PDT Cocktail Book off of the shelf and stumbled upon the Leap Frog. Jim Meehan created this drink as a riff on the Leaping Frog from Tom Bullock's 1917 The Ideal Bartender; his starting point was a recipe that was a shaken concoction of Hungarian apricot eau de vie and lime juice. The same drink idea appeared in the 1930 Savoy Cocktail Book as the Hop Toad with lemon instead of lime. Here, it appears that Meehan was inspired by perhaps a combination of the Pendennis and Southside to make the original recipe more palatable.
The Leap Frog offered up an apricot and mint aroma that led into a lemon sip with a hint of orchard fruit. Next, the swallow gave forth gin and apricot flavors with a mint finish.