Aquavit Archives | Long Road Distillers

A Note from Long Road: Recently, we launched a Guest Blog series, “Behind the Bar with Long Road”, to take you on a journey behind the bar with our talented team and to give you a glimpse into the creative process behind innovative and enticing cocktails that feature our spirits. Be sure to check out our earlier posts by Jenney Grant and Joey Robles-Zepeda. This week’s post comes to us from SE Michigan cocktail creator Carley Bologna. We’ve admired her creations from afar – and so should you – by following her on Instagram @cocktails.with.carley.

All MI Love: A Sunny Day Cocktail with Carley
by Carley Bologna, Craft Cocktail Recipe Creator & Menu Consultant, Cocktails with Carley

All MI Love is a warm, sunny-day-inspired cocktail filled with herbaceous and floral notes, honey, and fresh citrus. It is meant to embody all of the best parts of Michigan summers. If you’re from here, you know what I mean. The parts of the year we all wish we could bottle up and save. The golden hour sunshine, the fresh lake air, the wild flowers in the woods. This drink tastes like that.

For spirits, I used Long Road Sovereign Gin and Aquavit, as well as Yellow Chartreuse, St. Germain, and Crème de Violette. Non spirit ingredients include: fresh lemon juice, plum bitters, a homemade cardamom honey syrup, and an orange for garnish.

ALL MI Love Cocktail Recipe:

This is a complex sour style cocktail, so we’re going to do a bit of a balancing act in the base of the drink:

The Base:
- 1 oz Long Road Aquavit
- 3/4 oz St. Germain
- 3/4 oz Yellow Chartreuse
- 2 dashes plum bitters
- 1 oz cardamom infused honey simple syrup *
- 1 oz fresh squeezed lemon juice
Shake all of the base ingredients with plenty of ice
Strain the base mixture into a Collins glass or a highball glass filled with ice

The Float:
- 1 1/2 oz Long Road Sovereign Gin
- 1/4 oz Crème de Violette
To complete the cocktail, pour the ‘float’ ingredients directly on top of you base cocktail
The reason the float works so well is because we’ve created a base cocktail that is more dense than the ingredients floating on top. Playing with density allows us to create the gorgeous layering effect.

Garnish with a fresh orange slice

*Cardamom Infused Honey Syrup:

To make the honey syrup recipe you will need honey, hot water, and green cardamom pods. Pick your favorite honey with the most flavor. I recommend a raw Michigan honey.

In a glass jar combine:
- 1/4 cup raw Michigan honey
- 8-10 green cardamom pods
- 1/4 cup hot water
Stir ingredients until combined
Let cool until the syrup is room temperature, about 20-30 minutes
Remove cardamom pods and store syrup in a glass bottle for 5-7 days in the fridge

All of these ingredients play so nicely together. The savory cardamom pairs so well with the savory components of the aquavit such as the dill, fennel, and caraway. The honey compliments all of the floral notes in the Sovereign Gin, the St. Germain, and the Crème de Violette. The Yellow Chartreuse adds a vegetal and herbaceous note that helps to marry the savory, sweet, and floral. And of course, the acidity from the fresh citrus and the sweetness of the honey both help to brighten, elevate, and balance the entirety of the cocktail.

This cocktail pairs phenomenally with sharp white cheese and jams, charcuterie, and fresh summer fruit.

I hope you enjoy this recipe!

The Aquavit Gimlet: My Deserted Island Cocktail
by Jenney Grant, Director of Operations and Education, Long Road Distillers

When leading tours or teaching a class, folks love to ask me about my favorite spirit that we make or my favorite cocktail. My answer is usually: “This is like asking me which of my three children is my favorite; I like all our spirits, different days call for different flavors.”

Although this is not an outright lie – I do have a taste for different Long Road spirits at different times – unlike forcing me to choose between my kids, if I could only take one drink to a deserted island there is always a spirit and cocktail that jump into my mind: the Aquavit Gimlet.

When I was trying to convince Jon and Kyle that they should hire me at Long Road, I remember Jon showing me around the distillery and sharing a sample of Aquavit with me. I had worked in the craft distilling and brewing industry for 5 or 6 years and was always inspired by the growth, product development and quality this young Michigan industry was putting out. Then I tasted Aquavit, with a slight sweetness of red winter wheat, savory spice of dill, caraway, fennel and anise and the bold confidence of a 90 proof spirit. It was beautiful, different than anything I’d tasted from a Midwest distillery. And so, so well done.

It solidified my mission to work at Long Road Distillers. Not only are we a company that chooses to make 100% of our spirits from start to finish with a commitment to using Michigan-grown agriculture, but Aquavit showed me we would also take risks, not settle for doing things half-cooked, and be inspired by the world around us to make world class spirits in Michigan.

So after leaving my director level job and taking a part-time position at Long Road, I started training and trying cocktails. Long Road has built its award-winning bar program through making every alcohol-based and non alcohol- based ingredient in our bar kitchen. It allows us to pair the distinct flavors of our spirits with one of a kind mixers and flavors.

When it was suggested that I try the Aquavit Gimlet I wasn’t super excited. My grandma used to make pitchers of gimlets; she used the Collins brand powdered gimlet mix and vodka (think Tang, or Kool-aid for alcohol). A gimlet is usually gin or vodka, fresh lime juice and simple syrup. It’s a 2:1:1 cocktail. I like a traditional gimlet, but with vodka or gin, it’s not the most exciting cocktail on a menu. But it’s always nice, balanced and refreshing. A gimlet with Aquavit on the other hand…

Balance. Simple. Enough. That is what the Aquavit Gimlet is to me. The depth of aquavit paired with bright bitterness of fresh lime and rounded with a subtle sweetness.

My preferred way to drink a gimlet is shaken and served up, in a chilled martini glass with a lime wheel. But in the summer, I enjoy batching it out on my grandma’s deck, and serving over crushed ice, still with a lime wheel. Most people would probably consider a gimlet a summer drink, and I think that is valid, but to me the simple balance of an aquavit gimlet represents an easy choice: uncomplicated, and enough any day of the year.

Aquavit Gimlet Recipe

2 oz Long Road Original Aquavit
1 oz fresh lime juice
1 oz simple syrup

Add all ingredients to shaker with ice. Shake vigorously. Double strain into chilled martini glass and garnish with lime wheel.

Alternatively, shake all ingredients with ice and single strain into collins glass. Top with crushed ice and garnish with lime wheel.

Cheers!

Tag Archive for: Aquavit

Behind the Bar With Long Road: A Sunny Day Cocktail with Carley

Behind the Bar with Long Road: Jenney Grant’s Deserted Island Cocktail

Join Our Journey

Grand Rapids Location

Grand Haven Location

Less Traveled