Campfire Old Tom Gin cocktail demo

To celebrate both the launch of our Campfire Old Tom Gin and World Cocktail Day on 13 May we held a cocktail demo in the distillery. Ben presented three cocktails – two classic Old Tom cocktails and one of our own creation which was inspired by our cycle trip round Kerala back in 2013.

When doing a final practice run at home the night before the event we suddenly realised we’d chosen three quite complex cocktails to demonstrate. However to our own amazement (!) both time slots ran very smoothly, even though we cheated slightly on the Ramos Gin Fizz by using a NutriBullet instead of shaking for 12 minutes! Well, sometimes you just gotta find a shortcut when making 20 samples all in one go for your eager audience! We didn’t even need the Campfire Gin branded ponchos for the front row, a clothing item we thought we might need in case the NutriBullet wasn’t secured properly.

So if you fancy having a go at making these cocktails here are the recipes.

Thekkady Cyclist

In a town called Thekkady in Kerala we watched a chef prepare payasam – a sweet dish made from milk, nuts, raisins, vermicelli, cinnamon and cardamom. During our trip a couple of hours cycling would be rewarded with a lime soda from a street food stall. Campfire Old Tom Gin uses cinnamon and cardamom as two of the eight botanicals. This recipe (if you don’t serve the chocolate raisins) is vegan friendly and free from nuts but you could substitute the oat milk for nut milk or single cream.

For the syrup
45gms light brown muscovado sugar
15 cardamom pods
90ml water
Grated zest of 1 lime

Add sugar, water and cardamom pods to a saucepanand heat until just before boiling point when thesurface starts to crack. Pour into a sterilised bottle.Once cool add the lime zest. Refrigerate for 24 hoursand strain to remove the cardamom and lime zest.

To make (serves 2)
70ml Campfire Old Tom Gin
70ml cardamom and lime syrup
140ml oat milk
Ground cinnamon for garnish

Add syrup, gin and oat milk to a shaker filled with ice. Stir and strain into glass. Sprinkle with cinnamon. Sip through a bamboo straw and enjoy withchocolate coated raisins. 

Ramos Gin Fizz

To make (serves 1)
60ml Campfire Old Tom Gin
15ml double cream
15ml fresh lemon juice
15ml fresh lime juice
22ml simple syrup
3 dashes orange flower water
1 fresh egg white
Soda water

Add all ingredients except the soda water to a cocktailshaker and dry-shake (without ice) vigorously (ideally around 12 mins!). Then add some ice and shake again. Strain into a Collins glass and top with the soda water.

Martinez

To make (serves 1)
60ml Campfire Old Tom Gin
7.5ml Dolin Dry Vermouth
22.5ml Carpano Antica Formula Rosso Vermouth
7.5ml Luxardo Maraschino Originale Liqueur
1 dash Angostura Bitters

Add ingredients to a cocktail mixing glass half filledwith ice and stir. Fine strain into chilled martini glass. Garnish with a maraschino cherry.