Old Fashioned Amber Food

OLD FASHIONED AMBER

Steps:

• Fill a cocktail shaker with ice. Add the bourbon, sugar and bitters and shake well. Strain into 4 rocks glasses and top each with half a bottle of ale. Rub the rim of the glass with the orange peel and then add it to the drink along with a cherry if using.

CLASSIC OLD FASHIONED

Steps:

• Muddle the orange slice, 2 cherries, bitters and sugar if using in a large liquid measuring cup until syrupy. Add in the bourbon and a few ice cubes and stir vigorously for 20 seconds to chill the drink and dilute the bourbon. Fill 2 rocks glasses with one large cube. Strain the drink into the glasses. Squeeze an orange peel above each glass to release the oils, then add to the glass along with 1 or 2 cherries.

NEW OLD FASHIONED COCKTAILS

Steps:

• Add half the whiskey and 2 ice cubes to a rocks glass. Stir. Add the sugar syrup, Angostura bitters and 2 more ice cubes. Stir. Add the rest of the whiskey and 2 more ice cubes. Stir.
• Add 2 more ice cubes, then pinch the citrus zest so the aromatic oils spray over the drink, then drop it into the glass. 3 TWISTSRum old fashionedThe silky-sweet rums of Latin America are particularly good for this - try the amber-coloured Ron Zacapa from Venezuela. Instead of Angostura bitters, try using Angostura orange bitters, and garnish with an orange twist. Tequila old fashionedAnejo tequila has lots of vanilla and caramel notes that work very nicely in an old fashioned. For the sweetener, use agave syrup instead of sugar syrup, although agave syrup tends to be sweeter, so you may need slightly less. Garnish with a lemon twist. Smoky old fashionedTo add a hint of smoke, infuse your sugar syrup. Simply make a 2:1 sugar syrup and while it's still warm, put a Lapsang Souchong teabag in the syrup and leave to infuse for half-an-hour. Then make your old fashioned as normal.