I’ve never been much of a cocktail guy. I don’t mind the odd one, but I usually can’t be arsed to order one, and certainly not to make one. However, if getting older / more poncey / the lockdown has led me anywhere, it’s to wanting to make a cocktail now and then. That said, I’m still too lazy to make anything fancy, and all my spare kitchen/bar space is taken up with wine and beer paraphernalia, so I have to keep it simple.

To wit: maybe the simplest cocktail of all. The Old Fashioned.

I love bourbon. I like sugar. I got my hands on some angostura bitters. Orange peels: no problem. So I gave it a go.

A note on sugar: rather than use a traditional sugar cube, I put a Dickinson twist on it and used maple sugar. It seems a nice touch, but it’s subtle, so I need to use more (and find a way to muddle it more effectively).

I’ve tried making a couple and they weren’t bad. I can tell I don’t have it nailed just yet, but I was reluctant to practice too much until I had more bourbon in the house. Until today all I had was a lovely bottle of Angel’s Envy my brother sent up from Nova Scotia, and delicious cocktail or not, I’m not wasting it. I grabbed a bottle Knob Creek today, so…let the tuning & tweaking commence!