04 Oct Cienciano Cocktail Recipe

Cienciano Cocktail Recipe

I think this is technically our first mailbag column. And it mostly serves to prove that we’re terrible at mailbag columns. About ten months ago, our friend Liz found herself with a bottle of pisco and asked on our timeline for ideas of what to do with it beyond a Pisco Sour. Mailbag answers have the same standards of politeness as wedding gifts, right? Acceptable if sent within a year?

Pisco, by the way, is an un-aged, South American brandy. While the name Pisco Sour is familiar, we don’t run across pisco all that much up North. And since unaged brandy is otherwise unfamiliar, it can be, like with the similarly uncommon white whiskey, hard to figure out the right way to work with it. While thumbing through our beloved Cocktail Chronicles book, we ran across this promising recipe, and we thought we’d pass it along to Liz, or whoever ended up with her bottle of pisco.

The recipe particularly grabbed Brian’s eye because it contains not only pisco, but sherry, which he’s always looking to use well in mixed drinks. The funky, sour taste of dry sherry indeed takes the lead here. The Ramazotti takes a little of the edge of the sherry off, while adding a slight bitter edge of its own. It’s not a drink for everyone, but it’s a good one. If you’re a bitter-embracing sherry lover, you’ll think it’s a great one.

Ingredients

created by Seatlle’s Jay Kuehner

• 1 1/2 oz pisco
• 1/2 oz Amontillado sherry
• 1/2 oz Amaro Ramazotti
• 1/4 oz cachaca
• orange twist, for garnish

Instructions

• Stir all the liquid ingredients until well-chilled, about 30 rotations.
• Strain into a cocktail glass.
• Garnish