Island Christmas

This cocktail was my attempt at taking a tiki drink and making it for Christmas.

The result was strangely the most Christmas tasting drink I have ever had in my life. The spices in the wassail pulled the whole thing together. It’s tart, sweet, flavorful, comforting, and somehow also light and refreshing. This particular drink ended up being our best selling drink at the Winter Nights pop-up bar.

The balance in this drink really comes from the flavor and tartness of the wassail and the bright acidity of the acid adjusted pineapple juice. I adjusted the pineapple to have the acidity of lime juice. This meant that I was able to get the cocktail to be bright and flavorful like it had lemon juice in it, but with the sweet flavor of pineapple instead. I will link the recipes of the the pineapple juice and wassail below.

Island Christmas

Difficulty: Moderately difficult (requires creating multiple ingredients)

Ingredients

• 1.5 oz Apple Vodka

• .5 oz Triple Sec

• 1.5 oz Pomegranate & Cranberry Wassail

• 1 oz acid adjusted pineapple juice (adjusted to lime)

• .25 oz Brown sugar syrup

• top with ginger ale

Instructions

1. Combine all ingredients in a shaker tin

2. Fill the tin with ice

3. Shake vigorously to aerate the pineapple juice and chill/dilute the cocktail.

4. Pour into a collins glass and add about 2 oz of ginger ale.

5. Fill glass with nugget or crushed ice.

6. Garnish with some pineapple fronds.