If you’re like me, you are gleefully welcoming the arrival of grapefruit season — one of the few perks of winter fruit-and-veg shopping. Last week I shared a delicate gin cocktail made with grapefruit and elderflower. This week I’m mixing up a more classic grapefruit cocktail: the Brown Derby.*
The Brown Derby (adapted from Saveur)
1 ounce bourbon
1 ounce fresh grapefruit juice
1 T honey syrup**
Pour liquid ingredients into ice-filled cocktail shaker. Shake gently until cold and strain into a cocktail glass.
I have to admit that I was initially a bit skeptical of these ingredients. I was worried that the bourbon and honey wouldn’t play nice with one another and that the cocktail would be excessively sweet. But the Brown Derby is actually a delightful little drink and ridiculously easy to boot. If you love bourbon and/or grapefruit, definitely give this one a try!
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* Interestingly, internet searching revealed that there are two very different versions of the Brown Derby. One is made with bourbon and grapefruit juice; the other is made with dark rum, lime juice, and maple syrup. The rum Brown Derby sounded intriguing, but since I didn’t have rum in my Canadian bar, bourbon it was.
** Honey syrup is a 1:1 mix of honey and water, warmed gently until homogenous and then cooled. You can’t just use straight honey because it will glob and stick when it hits the ice in your cocktail shaker. Making a syrup is a bit more work than Saveur’s approach, but I prefer making the syrup to simply mixing warm-ish water and honey — the latter approach didn’t entirely prevent the honey from globbing up in the cocktail shaker.
Incidentally, making honey syrup is a fabulous way to salvage crystallized honey into something useable. Not that I’m speaking from experience or anything.
PC, get out of my pantry. I KNOW you saw that jar of crystalized honey. I’ve been meaning to do something about it, I swear.
And now I will – I will get tipsy on it!
Also, I’m ammending the name of this cocktail to just “The Derby.” :)
interesting…especially since i just bought a bottle of Evan Williams Black Label on your earlier blog recommendation! (Then again, I don’t have a shaker, so that could be a problem.)
Guess what I found in the back of the fruit bin… a grapefruit! WHAT A HAPPY COINCIDENCE.
I don’t have any Evan Williams on hand but one of our other bourbons will have to do. :D
@Kerry — What can I say, going through other peoples’ pantries is my secret hobby ;-) If you’re a fan of gin, here’s another use for honey syrup: http://notwithoutsalt.com/2011/06/26/bees-knees/
@thefrogprincess — I bet you could improvise a cocktail shaker — do you have a coffee mug with a lid? A large-ish jar with a lid? Otherwise, mixing everything in a glass usually works too!
@lyn — I enjoy feeling virtuous about my fruit intake while making these cocktails. I do like raw grapefruit, but let’s face it, they’re just more delicious when combined with gin or bourbon.