Welcome To Wonkette Happy Hour, With This Week's Cocktail, False Spring!

Because Ohio weather sucks.

Nick and Nora glasses are the best.

Greetings, Wonketeers! I’m Hooper, your bartender. Last week in Ohio, we had an epic bar crawl. Then we had 70-degree weather. Then we had wind, snow, 20-degree weather, and an asteroid. I should know better than to hope for an early spring by now. Ohio takes a perverse joy in raising your hopes for good weather before crashing back to earth. I got mad, I sulked, I wrote a cocktail about it. Let’s enjoy a False Spring together while it lasts. Here’s the recipe.

False Spring

2 oz Another Hendrick’s Gin

1 oz Creme de Cacao

¾ oz fresh lime juice

1 dash cocoa bitters

Orange blossom water

Splash a small amount of orange blossom water into a Nick and Nora or small coupe glass. Swirl the orange blossom water until the inside of the glass is thoroughly coated, then discard the excess. Shake the remaining ingredients in an iced cocktail shaker. Double strain into the Nick and Nora glass. Garnish with a mint leaf.

I know that some of you out there are still gin-averse. I’ve tried explaining that we’re well past the age of Beefeater and Tanqueray. Gin does not resemble drinking Pine-Sol anymore. Lesly Gracie cracked the formula in 1999 when she distilled the original Hendrick’s Gin. This cucumber and rose concoction opened everyone’s eyes. Gin didn’t need to be about juniper and sadness. Citrus gins roamed the planet. Hendrick’s kept releasing astonishing herbal concoctions. Good things happened. It’s okay to move on from your formative drinking years. Gin’s safe to drink. I promise.

But if none of that convinces you, this bottle will. Hendrick’s has released another Hendrick’s. It is called: “Another Hendrick’s.” (Clearly, the lads at Hendrick’s are Monty Python fans.) It is, to be blunt, completely different from Hendrick’s. Hendrick’s features rose and cucumber. Another Hendrick’s features orange blossoms and cacao. Yes. Cocoa gin. We’ve come a long, long way from the bottle of Gordon’s gin that made you sick in college.

To be clear, this isn’t “chocolate gin.” It isn’t brown, thick, or sweet. The cocoa shows up late in the tasting notes, with floral notes and enough juniper to brighten the drink without becoming “pine” flavored. It’s as much a texture as a flavor, a base layer that supports the floral notes Ms. Gracie’s woven together in this wonderful bottle.

I firmly believe that Ms. Gracie is a rock star among distillers. When a guitar virtuoso steps onto your stage, you don’t try to compete with them. You strap on the bass guitar, listen closely, and do your best to support their artistry. This cocktail is basically a gimlet, one of the oldest gin cocktails in the world. The structure is the same as a daiquiri or a lemon drop martini. The power move comes from using creme de cacao instead of sugar as a sweetener. Creme de cacao, in moderation, doesn’t taste like chocolate. It adds sweetness and earthiness to a drink, but it doesn’t provide Hershey-bar notes. In this glass, it draws the gin’s cocoa finish to the middle of the flavors, where it meets the orange-blossom aromas of the prepared glass. The cocoa bitters smooth out some of the drink’s bumps, harmonizing the taste. It’s a very different sort of gimlet, floral and earthy in places where you’d expect crisp, spiced notes. There are worse ways to endure a last gasp of winter.

Let’s talk ingredients:

Ingredient shot. That’s one heck of a bottle.

Another Hendrick’s: In a pinch, use a citrus gin like Citadelle Jardin d’Ete. But don’t pinch. Treat yourself. This gin is unusual; you don’t want to make a G&T with it. But with soda water, this is an absolute treat. Go ahead and indulge here; Lord only knows, we could use a little treat right now.

Creme de Cacao: Gifford’s is best. Paramount is a lot easier to find. Don’t use the brown stuff. Brown gimlets are bad.

Lime juice: So help me if you *dare* sully Ms. Gracie’s beautiful work with lime juice from a plastic squeeze bottle, I will give you such a pinch. Fresh squeezed. Please. I’m asking nicely.

Cocoa bitters: One shake only. We don’t need the flavor of the bitters anywhere near the limelight.

Orange blossom water: Be very, very sparing here. I’d strongly consider using an orange blossom water mister to spritz the glass. Rinsing the glass is a rough-and-ready way to achieve the same effect without breaking out another tool.

My home bar is Hemingway’s Underground, the hottest cocktail bar in pretty little Medina, Ohio. I’m behind the stick Wednesday-Saturday, 4-10. Last call’s at midnight. Swing on by, and I’ll make a drink for you… or anything else from our little Happy Hour here at Wonkette.

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