The Spirit World

I always like to have a few different cocktails that I can spring on folks who don’t think they like gin, the Pegu Club is one that I often use, but the Jasmine is probably the one that I use the most.

Before I spring the Jasmine on somebody however, there is one question I have to ask them.

“Do you like grapefruit juice?”

The Jasmine tastes amazingly like grapefruit, even though there isn’t any in the recipe. Originally I thought this flavor was simply coming from the Campari, Cointreau, and Lemon Juice, but then I tried it once with Tequila instead of gin, and it no longer had that same grapefruit-ness flavor. It was amazing how much of a role the botanicals of the gin played in this little masquerade.

The Jasmine is considered a modern classic, it was created by Paul Harrington, author of “Cocktail: The Drinks Bible for the 21st Century”, and made its debut on the Hotwired Cocktail website (now, unfortunately, defunct).

Jasmine

• 1 1/2 ounces gin
• 1/4 ounce Cointreau
• 1/4 ounce Campari
• 3/4 ounce lemon juice

Shake with ice. Strain into a cocktail glass.
Garnish with a lemon twist.

This is one of those drinks that almost everybody loves as soon as they taste it, assuming of course that they like grapefruit juice. I, however, couldn’t resist making a few changes to the original recipe.

Changes you say? Isn’t that sacrilegious?

My issue with the recipe as listed above is that I felt there was too much lemon juice in it. It starts out nice enough, but by the time you are finishing it, the acidity is just a little too strong. If you look closely at the recipe, you’ll see that it is just a slight variation of our friend the sour. (See: Margarita, Sidecar, Daiquiri, Pegu.) Spirit, sweet ingredient, sour ingredient, we are just adding a new twist to this one with the Campari. But if you also look at those other recipes, you’ll see that the proportions of the Jasmine are slightly askew, with the sour playing a very dominant role, even getting a little backup assistance from the Campari. So I chose to jiggle this recipe around a little bit, taming down the sour, and boosting the sweet.

Jasmine

• 1 1/2 ounces gin
• 1 ounce Cointreau
• 3/4 ounce Campari
• 1/2 ounce lemon juice

Shake with ice. Strain into a cocktail glass.
Garnish with a lemon twist.

You’ll notice this is a fair bit different from Paul’s original recipe. But it raises the question as to how far can you modify a recipe and still call it by the same name? My general rule of thumb is to ask if somebody very familiar with the “original” recipe were to order it in a bar, and you served them your modified version, would they complain that you made it wrong? In this case, I think this second recipe still holds true to the original flavor profile, it just builds out a better balance and allows the final sip to be as good as the first.

Give both of these recipes a try, and perhaps attempt a few variations of your own, and let me know what you think.