Cachaca Based Cocktails Recipes

Cachaca Based Cocktails Recipes Divya Gugnani: When I think of Brazil, I think of beaches, sand, caipirinhas and of course, Cachaca. It’s now the fastest growing spirit’s category in the US. I'm Divya Gugnani here at the Encore Liquid Lounge in Chicago at the Shake Your Way to Brazil Mixology Challenge. So, let’s go behind the burner and meet the bartenders. So I'm here with bartender Rico Wisner. Rico, what are you mixing? Rico Wisner: We’re doing the “Punch from Ipanema.” Divya Gugnani: It sounds good to me. Let’s do it. Rico Wisner: So first of all, we want to take a mixing glass. Divya Gugnani: One for me and one for you. Rico Wisner: And we’re going to go ahead and start. You want to start with your non-spirit base. In that way if you mess up, you’re not wasting alcohol. So, right here we have Hibiscus Rooisbos tea syrup. Basically, you make it the same way you do with simple syrup. You just start with hot tea instead of hot water. It’s the same thing. So we’re going to do an ounce and half of that, all right. So then, we’re also going to go with passion fruit peering for another ounce and a half. So next, I'm going to go ahead and do half ounce of lime juice. It’s usually about half of one depending on the size of the lime. They don’t want to nestle when you do a ton of lime on this drink. A lot of times we’re using sweet and sour. We’re trying to balance the passion fruit. When you're using a true passion fruit, you’re getting a lot of that tartness and kind of that sourness coming straight from the passion fruit. And then we’re going to use a half ounce of Domaine de Canton, Ginger liqueur. This kind of helps incorporate the spice into a classic punch recipe. We’re pretty much just talking spirits and citrus, sugar as well as a bit of the water or tea. And then of course, we’re going to have the cachaca. Divya Gugnani: It’s time for the star, Cuca Fresca. Rico Wisner: All right, so we’re going to go ahead and do two ounces of cachaca. The passion fruit also helps to kind of give it a nice little frappé to the top. So we’re going to take our little lime—nice, thin sliced lime— just slide it right there on the side. Divya Gugnani: It looks so pretty—pretty enough to drink, I think. Rico Wisner: It sounds like a plan. Divya Gugnani: Cheers. Rico Wisner: Cheers. [Foreign Language] Divya Gugnani: So I'm here with bartender Francois Vera. Francois, what are you making for us? Francois Vera: We’re making us a “Ginger Dream.” Divya Gugnani: It sounds like a dream. Let’s see of it taste like one. Francois Vera: Well, the first thing we’re going to do, we’re going to chill the glasses. It’s very important. We’ll make a cold drink. You don’t want to pour it into a warm glass. Divya Gugnani: So I'm stirring the ice in the glass to chill the glass. Francois Vera: Chill the glass. Grab some mint about depending on the size. Three leaves will be okay. if they are small, you can do four or five. Now you're going to get your muddle. Divya Gugnani: Yes. Francois Vera: We’ll going to just slightly muddle the mint very lightly. You don’t want to press too hard. Okay, that’s all you need. Divya Gugnani: So what am I doing right here? I'm just kind of getting the oil out of the mint to get the flavor? Francois Vera: Yeah. If you press too hard, you’re just going to destroy the leaves and it’s going to make an ugly cocktail. It is better to just kind of like—not always come up. Just a little— Divya Gugnani: Muddle lightly. Francois Vera: Yeah. And now we have here— Domaine de Canton is usually core. It’s a great product. We’re going to get a three quarter ounce. This one is the Gold Cuca Fresca, my favorite cachacha. I'm from Brazil actually by the way. Divya Gugnani: So if the Brazilians like it, you know it’s a good stuff. Francois Vera: That’s the best cachaca I ever had in my life honestly. So we’re going to go two ounces of the Cuca Fresca Gold. Divya Gugnani: Okay. Francois Vera: Now the first thing we’re going to do, you’re going to shake to dry it. it just kind of worked more a little—that mint that stay here. Divya Gugnani: Okay. And why do you dry shake it? Francois Vera: We dry shake just to blend the ingredients and then you add ice because you don’t want to— Divya Gugnani: Dilute it? Francois Vera: You don’t want the ice to dilute so much. And this tin-to-tin, it’s going to make your drink colder and much faster than coupe glass. Divya Gugnani: So that’s a great step. Francois Vera: So, yeah. So I'm going to shake the venate so feel that the tin on the outside is really cold. Let’s put the drink there. Divya Gugnani: And with the ice in it. You’re not straining it? Francois Vera: You don’t have to strain it. You just put the other thing here and then a little bit of Bundaberg. This one is an Australian Ginger beer. There you go. Divya Gugnani: I like two garnishes now. Okay, cheers. Let’s drink. This is the fun part. So I'm here with Gabriel Orta. Gabriel, what are we shaking up? Gabriel Orta: So we’re doing a “Cuca Negra” as my drink. It’s a – Drink. We’re going to going to grab a nice and three tablespoon of rosemary sprig. We’re going to smack it here— Divya Gugnani: So that’s a good tip. You want to release the oils by smacking it. you want to smoke it in the plate. Divya Gugnani: You see the smoke coming out. It’s good enough so we’re going to— Divya Gugnani: I smell that. Gabriel Orta: We’re just going to put it like that. So while the grass is infusing in the smoke—the rosemary smoke then we can go ahead and make our— Okay. The next step is a Cuca fresh blackberry. We got our blackberries. Three is enough just to get some of the flavor out. We’re going to muddle them so— Divya Gugnani: Okay. So I'm going to muddle it with my muddler a little bit. Gabriel Orta: The blackberries are very fragile so what you’ll need is a little bit. Now we’re going to use our fresh lemon juice. Divya Gugnani: And squeeze that out. Gabriel Orta: We’re going to squeeze it. we’re going to do about three quarters of an ounce. Divya Gugnani: Sometimes my lemons are a little. Yours are at room temperature which is why the juice is all coming out in the center which is good. Gabriel Orta: Yes. And you can always put it in hot water. You put the lemons in hot water and that’s going to make it get softer and ready for the juice. Divya Gugnani: Or what you can do is just kind of rub the skin and the whole lemon against the counter and heated up a little bit. Gabriel Orta: This is the homemade bitters. This is the bitters that I make. And now we’re just going to do about splashes of that. We got one more ingredient—a little bit of egg whites, just a little, tiny, bit. Divya Gugnani: And that’s for texture. Gabriel Orta: That’s for texture—exactly. And Cuca it is. Divya Gugnani: How much are we going to put in? Gabriel Orta: We’re going to put about an ounce and three quarters. Now we’ll shake it on love and good to go. Divya Gugnani: Okay. Fill up your glass with ice. Fill it in. Gabriel Orta: Now, this is the fun part. The glass has been fused in. Did you see the smoke come out? Divya Gugnani: Yeah, the smoke smells amazing. Gabriel Orta: Smoke from the rosemary? Divya Gugnani: Look at that. so now I know why it’s called Cuca Negra because its got that dark color. Gabriel Orta: In my garnish, I wanted to do something very simple. My kind is kind of complicated. It’s like I want to do like just a simple rosemary sprig on the top. Divya Gugnani: It’s time to drink. Gabriel Orta: Indeed. Divya Gugnani: Let’s do it. Gabriel Orta: Cheers. Divya Gugnani: Cheers. Stay tuned to behind the burner. We give you the tips, tricks and techniques that are lighting the culinary world on fire. 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