07 Aug Mint

Is there a cocktail garnish as ubiquitous as mint?

A good mint sprig, pressed slightly along the side of the glass, opening to greet you next to a mountain of crushed ice, is the easiest way to make a jaw drop to the floor when placing a drink in front of a customer in a professional setting, or impress a guest or significant other in a domestic setting. If they don’t take a picture of it, you should take it personally.

I don’t have a lot of superstitions behind the bar, but there was one omen I took pretty seriously. If the mint was looking bad that day, you were going to have a bad night behind the bar. It is for this reason that I took extra steps to guarantee the prolonged freshness of our mint, as this is an herb prone to rotting if stored incorrectly.

Additionally, this is an herb prone to bruising and bitterness if treated incorrectly. Mojitos are forgiving, with their high sugar and citrus contents, and a pulverized handful of mint, twisted to oblivion with a serrated wooden muddler at the bottom of a shaker has become the de facto industry standard for the consumption of white rum. Juleps require a bit more dignity, and a bad julep will ruin your favorite horse racing event.

Juleps are my favorite cocktail, something I don’t say lightly. They’re simple, yet technically challenging, and a good julep will make your entire summer if you execute it correctly. The format is just simple enough small mistakes turn into large ones, and can easily ruin a drink if you’re not careful.

The ice needs to be crushed just right. The mint needs to be expressed, but not bruised. The vessel is important: to drink a julep out of anything other than a julep tin is a crime against the seasons. Straw placement is important; you should have to stick your face in a bouquet of herbs with each sip for the correct multi-sensory experience. If you don’t want to use a straw, use a julep strainer. Weirdly, this is what they were made for.

And now, an overly complicated recipe on how to make a deceivingly simple cocktail. It’s worth it, trust me.

Mint Julep

Ingredients

2.0 fl oz bourbon
0.5 fl oz brown sugar syrup
2 mint sprigs (about 6-8 medium sized leaves each, one for muddling and one for garnishing)

Equipment

Julep tin
Lewis bag w/mallet (for crushing ice)
Ice (about 3 cups)
Barspoon
Muddler (if your barspoon has a flat/wide top, you can use this)
Short metal straw (optional, highly encouraged)

1. Crush Ice.  Place the ice into a lewis bag, seal, and beat senseless with a mallet, or large sided wooden tool. The goal here is to break up the ice into very small pieces, and draw as much moisture away from the ice as possible, to make them absorb as much julep flavor as possible. When you’re done with it, the ice should be pebble-sized. Set aside, leaving in the bag until you’re ready to work with it.
2. “Muddle” Mint.  In a julep tin, take a small sprig of mint (about 6-8 leaves) and very gently muddle into the glass, releasing the fragrant mint oils white taking care not to bruise the leaves themselves. It should almost be like a light tapping of the leaves themselves, with no twisting of the muddler at all. You should start to smell an intense mint flavor from your position above the tin.
3. Add sugar syrup and bourbon. Stir lightly with a barspoon for about 10 seconds, then carefully remove the mint sprig, taking care not to remove too much liquid from the tin.
4. Pack with ice. Slowly add ice, about ½ cup at a time, stirring frequently with each addition until a frost has formed along the outside of the glass. Gently work the liquid up along with the ice, until you reach the top. Form a snow cone-like head on the top of the julep tin.
5. Add mint bouquet. Take reserved mint bouquet, and while holding the mint in your dominant thumb and forefinger, start to slap the mint around the sides of the glass, expressing as much oils around the edge of the drinking vessel as possible. After a couple good thwacks, pinch the base of the mint sprig and slide gently into the side of the cup, leaving a good amount of leaves exposed to greet the imbiber while still remaining snug against the inside of the tin. Add a small straw down the same side as the mint sprig, and serve immediately.