Recipe: Treaty of Tordesillas (a.k.a. “Your Half”)
July 13, 2012 by Mr. Boozenik
Filed under Recipes
Sometimes the cocktail suggests the name, sometimes the name suggests the cocktail. This was one of those latter cases. I got it in mind to come up with a cocktail to commemorate the 7 June 1494 treaty which split the New World between Spain and Portugal. So I created a cocktail featuring some Old World and some New World ingredients, with rum from the Spanish side of the divide, and cachaça from the Portuguese side.
The result is a tropical, sweet, tart, and slightly earthy and warm cocktail.
Recipe: Treaty of Tordesillas (a.k.a. “Your Half”)
1 oz. Novo Fogo Silver Cachaça
1 oz. DonQ Gold Rum
1 oz. pineapple juice
½ oz. lime juice
½ oz. raw agave syrup
⅛ oz. serrano pepper tincture (see below)
Shake with ice.
Strain over fresh ice in a double old fashioned glass.
Garnish with a lime wheel, or if you’re bold, with a split serrano
The serrano pepper tincture is a very easy home-made ingredient.
Serrano Pepper Tincture:
4 serrano peppers
2 oz. of pure grain alcohol (you can use high proof vodka or rum, if pure grain alcohol is not available)
Seed the serranos.
Place in a thick bottomed muddling glass.
Muddle gently.
Pour in alcohol and let steep for 30 minutes to 1 day (to taste).
Strain and set aside for applying to this cocktail, or others, in small amounts.
For those who cannot find raw agave syrup, rich simple syrup can be substituted, but at some loss to the flavor of the overall cocktail.
Mr. and Mrs. Boozenik: I applaud this effort. This is a very refreshing cocktail and the story is excellent to boot. A serrano pepper simple syrup might reduce the number of ingredients in this drink. But I like the idea of the tincture, which certainly lasts longer. I would be interested to know whether the serrano tincture keeps its punch longer than the serrano syrup, which loses a significant portion of it after 1 week or so.