How to craft an enticing culinary cocktail

In midtown Manhattan, at Aquavit, chef Emma Bengtsson brings Scandinavian calm to a pulsating locale. This aura ensures no bad seat at the two-Michelin-star restaurant, yet the bar is about to exceed expectations with a new experience that intertwines cocktails and cuisine.

Inspired by Sous Chef Keisia Urquharta’s native Singapore, Bengtsson and head bartender, Jeff Arnold, are debuting a cocktail-tasting. “It's not so much an ingredient in a cocktail [but] it is a savory bite that comes alongside it that enhances the enjoyment of the drink,” shares Bengtsson about the four-course menu that will be served in the Bar Room at Aquavit, deemed Aquavit Travels to Singapore. The menu will feature a twist on popular South Asian dishes: laksa, dumplings, chicken satay, and pandan, all served with a corresponding bespoke cocktail.

The program aligns with the current trend for culinary cocktails, beverages crafted with everything from bone broth and parmesan cheese to tomato water and hot dogs. Though Bengtsson isn’t using these savory ingredients in the cocktails, she references the correlation of a small bite to a garnish, which “can improve the flavor of the drink.” There is a reason why people love olives in martinis, she furthers: “The saltiness adds umami to the flavor of the spirit.”

Utilizing ingredients to elevate a cocktail can be both innovative and resourceful. The former is self-explanatory as the modern consumer constantly seeks eccentric experiences—who wouldn’t want to film themselves sipping a cocktail that tastes like a hand roll, like at Shinji’s in Manhattan? Perhaps a more compelling feat of culinary cocktails is their role in zero waste programs, with bars around the globe giving a second life to scraps that may be wasted—like fermenting ingredients to add sour notes to a drink rather than using fresh citrus—which fittingly, emerged as a trend in Singapore in 2017. There, bar Native blends leftover pineapple skin with koji and leaves it to ferment for a month to result in pineapple shoyu (Japanese-style soy sauce).

Yet not just any ingredient can be thrown into a cocktail. You need to ask yourself a series of questions, says Matt Sramek, Corporate Executive Chef of Blue Bridge Hospitality, which includes Little Frenchie and Stake Chophouse. “What is the food's purpose in the drink? How does it contribute to the cocktail?” Sramek asks. “How does it round it out or give balance? How are you processing the food? Are you turning the food into a syrup or keeping it whole as a garnish?”

Sramek has a personal favorite ingredient to use in cocktails: applewood-smoked bacon in an old fashioned, both as a garnish and to elevate the liquid itself. “I cut the bacon into lardons, glaze, and bake them in the oven [to] make for a chewy and succulent garnish,” he explains. He then saves the bacon drippings and infuses them with rye for an overnight fat wash, a technique that adds flavor and viscosity to a spirit. The bacon in particular, “adds another layer of dimension with the smokey and porky flavor it imparts on the rye.” The leftover maple glaze used to glaze the lardons is utilized as the sweet component for the old fashioned.

Pickled piparra peppers are another savory ingredient that pair well in cocktails, and a preference of chef Katie Button, founder of the James Beard Award-winning Cúrate Bar de Tapas in Asheville, North Carolina. “It has a deeper savory quality, a little bit of heat but not too much,” says Button, who uses both the pepper and its brine in a variety of drinks. “It makes a much softer ‘dirty’ style martini and is the perfect accompaniment for a bloody Mary, but my favorite use is adding the brine to a margarita or mescalita.”

Regardless of the cocktail, Button advises to “go easy on the quantity.” Sample the brine separately to ensure you enjoy the taste then start with a splash of it in the desired cocktail and add more to your liking. She says the piparra can also be used to create a gilda, a classic pintxo snack of skewered pepper, anchovy, and olive, to serve alongside the cocktail and whet your appetite.

Though savory items are behind some of the most popular kitchen-inspired cocktails, there is also a place for sweet and floral ingredients. Fresh flowers, for example, are staples for pastry chefs, who use similar techniques to mixologists to create syrups, infusions, foams, mousse, and sabayon. “Some of the combinations are now becoming ‘classics’ not only in the kitchen but also for cocktails,” says chef Alain Verzeroli, culinary director at Le Jardinier, back in Manhattan, specifically pointing to elevated bar pairings like litchi and rose, cherry and sakura flowers, peach and elderflower, and violets and berries.

“Flowers have a natural color, an acidity, a bitterness, and a natural sweetness,” explains Verzeroli. “The techniques you apply to extract the flavors and color of a floral element are almost endless,” he says, adding to his list to highlight a sugar or salt-based composition, a maceration, homemade bitters, a floral liqueur, a mist, a sugared petal, or arranging petals in an ice cube.

The decision on how to incorporate a flower into a cocktail is decided by its variety, as “each flower requires a different approach, care and treatment,” says Verzeroli, who’s currently using chamomile and lavender syrup in two alcohol-free cocktails at their Bar Bastion. Le Jardinier is revered for menus that celebrate and respect the rhythm of nature, so using different flowers that are in peak season at different times allows the bartender to highlight each at the peak of its maturity. He also appreciates working with hibiscus, orange blossom, daisy, nasturtium and rose (the darker the rose, the stronger the taste). 

Whether experimenting with sweet or savory, remember that the most important component is to match the cocktail’s taste and profile, advises Verzeroli. “Use ingredients with subtlety and with the intention to bring an extra freshness, sweetness or texture.”