Sharkbait’s Cocktail of the Week: Merry Leap Day

So I’m not sure where this surge of English themes I have going on recently, but here we are again with an English inspired cocktail this week. Well not inspired per se, but born from one of the world’s best cocktail bars: The American Bar at the Savoy hotel in London. The bartender there, Harry Craddock,  created a drink for the leap year in 1928 and then made sure to include it in the Savoy cocktail book published in 1930. What better way to celebrate the leap year this year than with the cocktail that was inspired by it? Exactly.

Leap Year

2 parts London Dry Gin
1 part sweet vermouth
1 part Grand Marnier
1 dash of lemon juice

Combine all ingredients in an ice filled shaker. Shake with ice and strain into a coupe. Serve with a lemon twist (optional)

Some notes to begin. Because this is from the Savoy, I decided to break out the good English Gin I have, directly from the UK and not available here (yet). Also for the measurements, I went 2 oz. gin, and 1 oz. everything else except the lemon juice. That was about a quarter ounce worth of fresh squeezed juice.

The aroma has a slightly citrus-y profile. I do get elements of the sweet vermouth in there as well. That does add an underlying sweet smell to the combined lemon/orange citrus sour front.

This is an excellent cocktail. It starts out with a palate of sweet and sour, but with a surprising amount of gin flavors underneath. I wasn’t quite expecting the gin to shine through as much as it does here. It’s quite nice actually. Additionally, the lemon/orange flavors and the vermouth keep the gin from overpowering the drink, which as we all know, can be done quite easily with gin based drinks. Too much and that’s all you get. I don’t get much of the Grand Marnier here, I think it gets overshadowed by the gin, lemon and the vermouth. Maybe a touch more would be good, but then again, this is a Savoy original, and they generally know what they’re talking about when it comes to cocktails at the American Bar where this is from. Oddly enough, the only time I picked up more of the orange flavors is at the very end when I was finishing the drink. It’s almost like it started to separate

The gin flavors do fade away a bit towards the finish, leaving you once again with the sweet and sour dominated flavor. Despite that, this is an excellent and very well balanced cocktail. I wish I had come across this before because I really enjoy this. As if I didn’t want to go have a drink here before, I definitely will the next time I find myself in London. Which hopefully will  be soon.

(Banner image courtesy Matthew Tetrault Photography)