Mixing with Scotch, the 'Water of Life'

Scotch is a spirit with history, perhaps more than any other distilled drink. Archaeologists debate whether our prehistoric ancestors created beer or bread first. The process of mashing up grains and allowing them to ferment - whether for cooking or drinking – leaves roughly the same traces 12,000 years later. Either way, distilling that fermented mash came soon after, which means that grain alcohol has a long, long heritage.

In Scotland, the first evidence of whisky making dates back to 1494, when the exchequer to King James IV documented a large quantity of malt sent “to Friar John Cor, by order of the King, to make aquavitae.” In Latin, that means “water of life.” In Gaelic, a language with which a Scottish cleric like Friar John Cor was probably just as familiar, aquavitae would be rendered as “uisge beatha,” which got shortened a couple of centuries to “usquebea” and eventually slurred into the word we know today, “whisky.”

And no “e” please, we’re Scottish – since the 1800s, the name “whiskey” is strictly bestowed upon distilled malted grains outside the northern portion of Great Britain. And, just as Scotland has cultivated a thistly reputation of independence, Scotch whisky has always had a reputation of being its own peculiar kind of spirit.

Well, here in South Florida, peculiar is taken as a mark of pride. For the Biscayne Tippler, the weirder a drink is, the more of a story there is behind it, and the story is half of what makes anything worthwhile.

We can’t make our own Scotch here, because we’re not in Scotland (and goodness knows, distillers in Japan and India have caused international incidents by trying to market their own quite drinkable aged whiskies as “Scotch”). But a few local bars in the Biscayne Corridor have taken on the challenge of not only pouring top-shelf single malts for the peat-on-the-palate connoisseur crowd, but brazenly daring to mix Scotch into cocktails.

We’ve all encountered someone who’s fallen head over heels for the smoky seaweed notes of a Laphroaig. And for many of us, the smell of Scotch on the rocks brings back memories of an elderly relative’s Johnny Walker, known more familiarly in certain South Florida sitting rooms as “Juanito Caminando.”

For Miami’s modern mixologists, though, the straight and narrow path of the old guard has given way to all kinds of experimentation.

The Local Pour

At Lost Boy Dry Goods(157 E Flagler St.) in downtown Miami, there’s a Penicillin on the drinks menu. This is one of very few “classic” Scotch cocktails, made of 2 ounces blended whisky, 3/4 ounce fresh lemon juice, 3/4 ounce honey syrup, two or three quarter-sized slices of fresh ginger and a spoonful of a top-shelf single-malt whisky (the International Bartenders Association calls for Lagavulin 16-year). Muddle the ginger in your shaker, add everything but the top-shelf stuff, shake well with ice, strain into a highball glass, then float the Lagavulin on top. It’s considered a classic, but only goes back to 2005, when New York bartender Sam Ross was experimenting with a traditional hot

toddy.

Bartenders at Miami Beach’s Urbanica at The Meridian Hotel (418 Meridian Ave.) pour a drink called a Bruto Sour, mixed from Talisker Storm (a particularly smoky Scotch whisky), Teeling small batch Irish whiskey, banana oleo (a syrup extracted from banana peels), braulio (a herbal amaro), Sicilian lemon and deep red malbec wine. If that’s not a

rich enough sipping drink, the Spanglish Craft Cocktail Bar + Kitchen (2808 N Miami Ave.) in Wynwood serves something called ¡Cuero Na’ Ma’! that’s mixed from Haig Club single grain Scotch, Courvoisier, sherry, Italian vermouth and lavender bitters, all combined and then aged in a leather bag for 12 days.

These would not be experiences for the idly curious – they’re complicated drinks.

The Increasing Allure of Scotch Whisky

Scotch is quite often complex enough on its own. Before the Prohibition era, it was usually dismissed as a weird little tipple beloved only by semicivilized Highlanders and those not daring enough to glug a rum ration, splash of brandy or jigger of bourbon into their glass. When America outlawed liquor, the bourbon and rye supply dried up and people began trying whatever imports were available (funny how that works out). Some developed a liking for that strange whisky from Scotland, made from distilled malt that’s aged in old sherry casks until it deepens to a rich, golden brown that tastes subtly like the peat fires and heather-clad glens of its country of origin.

The appreciation for Scotch grew such that one particular cask, put up by the Macallan distillers at the height of American Prohibition in 1926, should have been poured into 40 bottles selling for 62 pence each (or about .85 cents). Instead, it got misplaced in a warehouse until the 1980s, when Macallan began offering up those 40 bottles of Cask 263 for sale. In 1990, one fetched $8,740 at auction. In 2018, two bottles sold for more than $1 million each in Hong Kong. In October 2019, another sold for a whopping $2,056,100, three times more than the most expensive bottle of wine ever sold.

Even if a bottle of Macallan Cask 263 is a bit beyond your means (and who, one imagines, would dare drink a pony shot of something that valuable?), it’s possible to take that leap into Scotch mixology by starting with the basics and experimenting from there.

Classic Scotch Cocktails

There are really only five classic Scotch cocktails: A Rob Roy is a Manhattan with the American whiskey switched out for Scotch and a smidge less sweet vermouth. A Rusty Nail is the simple combination of two parts Scotch to one part Drambuie. A Blood and Sand consists of equal parts Scotch, sweet vermouth, Heering and fresh orange juice. The Glasgow is a forbidding mixture of Scotch, absinthe, dry vermouth and bitters. And then there’s the Chancellor.

Cocktail historian David Wondrich believes this odd cocktail had to have emerged from British universities, where an elderly chancellor – that’s Scottish for “college president” – would be likely to have a limited selection of spirits in his office … which plucky students might well find unlocked and unguarded after hours. The resulting blend is what Wondrich calls “a dry and slightly mysterious little fiddle.” Intrigued?

THE CHANCELLOR

INGREDIENTS

·     2 ounces blended Scotch whisky

·     1 ounce ruby port

·     1/2 ounce dry vermouth

·     2 dashes orange bitters

METHOD

·     Stir well with cracked ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

From there, begin your tweaking. This writer has been known to add a splash of fizzy water and a few ice cubes, making something close to a more complicated Campari and soda. Your path may lead in another direction. Travel it bravely.