from The Love of Cocktails
During the COVID lockdown, I got really into using the leftover tops and bottoms to make syrups for my cocktails. This recipe features my scrap-based-Cucumber-Lime Cordial. The cocktail combines a Jummai sake with Hendrick’s Gin carrying floral notes of rose, cucumbers and tart green apples. It’s a green-on-green celebration!
Ingredients
Drink:
1 oz Jummai sake
1 oz Hendrick’s Gin
¾ oz Cucumber Lime Cordial
½ oz green apple juice
¼ oz lime juice
Rinse of absinthe
Cucumber
Cucumber Lime Cordial:
2 large limes
1 ¾ cups white granulated sugar
1 ¼ cups cucumber juice (from about 1 ½ large English cucumbers)
Directions
Chill a 7-oz coupe glass in the freezer.
In a cocktail shaker, combine all ingredients but the absinthe and cucumber ribbon. Add enough ice to cover the liquid in the shaker, plus a bit more. Cover and shake vigorously for 10-15 seconds.
Rinse your chilled coupe glass with absinthe.
Strain cocktail through a Hawthorne strainer into the chilled coupe glass. Garnish with the cucumber ribbon on a skewer.
Cucumber Cordial: Use a microplane and zest the skin of the limes and place in a medium bowl. Add in the sugar. Mix well and set aside for 15 minutes.
Cut the zested limes in half and juice with an elbow juicer to get 1/3 cup lime juice.
Transfer lime juice, cucumber juice, and sugar and lime zest mixture into a Ninja-Foodi power blender (or similar). Blend on low-medium setting until sugar is dissolved (about 5 minutes).
Strain cordial through a fine sieve into a separate container, then seal and refrigerate for up to 3 weeks.
Cucumber Ribbon: Run your potato peeler lengthwise down an entire cucumber and remove the very top skin. Repeat the process again so you have a long strip with skin on the edges and flesh in the middle.
As if you are making a fruit roll-up, start from one end and slowly roll the strip into itself. Stop 1/8 of the way down the strip. Take a cocktail skewer and skewer through the middle of the roll to anchor it. Fold the rest of the cucumber strip back and forth into the skewer, making an accordion or wave-like appearance. Do this until the strip is completely secured by the skewer.
Nada’s Tips & Tricks: A refreshing spring drink to get the party started…perfect for those first back deck lunches!
Contents and images used with permission by Figure 1 Publishing. Photography by Jessica Blaine Smith. https://www.figure1publishing.com/book/for-the-love-of-cocktails/
