DIY

Issue No. 3 —

Falernum #9

Falernum #9

Making handmade Falernum is a real treat and is easier than one might think. House made Falernum smells and taste wonderful. With a fresh Falernum you can taste all the complexities and it’ll add a deep flavor component to your cocktails. Commercial grade Falernum cannot compare as it is flat and dull. Go the extra mile and your cocktails and taste buds will thank you. You’ll have your guest “Wowing” your creations.

Recipe

from Jeff Berry’s Beachbum Berry Remixed

  • 6oz Wray & Nephew Overproof White Rum
  • Zest of 9 limes with no white pith
  • 40 whole cloves, toasted
  • 1 ½ oz (by weight) peeled and chopped fresh ginger
  • 2 tablespoons blanched, slivered almonds (dry toasted until golden brown)
  • 14 oz cold processed simple syrup.* I use 1:1
  • ¼ teaspoon almond extract
  • 4 ½ oz fresh lime juice, strained

* How to cold process simple syrup: Use warm water just warm enough to melt the sugar. Combine the warm water and sugar in a jar and shake until sugar dissolves. Doing this will give you a crisper simple syrup with a lighter density.

Instructions

Step one

Combine the rum, lime zest, cloves, almonds and ginger in a sealed mason jar, letting mixture soak for 24 hours.

Falernum Ingredients

Step two

Strain through moistened cheesecloth, squeeze out all the liquids.

Step three

Add the almond extract, sugar syrup, and lime juice. Bottle up and shake to incorporate. This should keep in the fridge for one month.

Cocktails

Here are a couple cocktails that incorporate my Falernum. I will be featuring these cocktails at my event at the Wharf Rat Thursday, September 9th 2010.

Don the Beachcomber’s Mai Tai

  • 1 oz gold rum
  • 1 1/2 oz Meyers’s Plantation rum
  • 1 oz grapefruit juice
  • 3/4 oz lime juice
  • 1/2 oz Cointreau
  • 1/4 oz falernum
  • 6 drops Pernod or Herbsaint
  • Dash of Angostura bitters

Bitter End

  • 2 oz white rum
  • 1 oz grapefruit juice
  • 1/2 oz lime juice
  • 1/2 oz falernum
  • 2 dashes Bittercube Jamaican #2 bitters
  • 2 dashes of Angostura for a float

Adapted from Left Coast Libations by Yanni Kehagiaras.

Posted in DIY

16 Notes on Falernum #9

  1. I made a batch of this and it is my new favorite ingredient. It was so quick and easy also! I have been mixing 1 oz falernum, 1/2 oz pimento dram, 1/4 oz lime juice, 2 oz tonic water, and 2–4 dashes bitters and serving over ice. Very popular at our house right now.

  2. Just wondering why on earth this (excellent) recipe only keeps for ‘a month’. With 6 oz of overproof rum in it surely it would last considerably longer?

  3. Michael– This should last a month and a half, two months would be pushing it. Try and use a wine vacuum pump will help store longer and pump the air everyday. After time you will notice the lime juice will get funky.

  4. Touching on Michael’s comment, could you keep the rum/extract/simple syrup and add the lime just prior to serving? I mix at home so I try and limit my perishables to small batches or better, alter so they will keep. I’ve found adding a bit of vodka will keep grenadine longer with minimal change to the profile… Its a trade off but with out the volume, its my best option.

    • I’ve actually started doing this with my falernum. I’ve noticed the lime juice would start changing color after a week and the flavor would drop off. This is a smart idea to stretch the life of falernum. I like to add a shot of vodka to all my syrups. The more vodka you add you will start to turn your syrup into a liqueur. I do not like to waste these tasty hand crafted syrup & liqueurs also. I think the best solution is to just drink more.

      • I did a tasting of 4 cocktails. I squeezed limes for 2 days, on the 3rd day I squeezed one batch in the morning and then again right before the tasting. I was shocked at how much better the juice was when it was fresh, the juice squeezed a few hours prior was not as good but it wasn’t that noticeable, but the juice that was just 24 hours old was very different and not nearly as good and the 48 hour old juice was unacceptable. I was surprised how quickly it oxidized. In the home bar setting, there is no excuse to fresh squeeze everything. In the bar, squeezing before a shift may be the only option. I guess the point of my rambling is that adding citrus before you have to seems like a mistake. I will take you up on your drinking more advice! :) its the only way I can try more recipes… however I may need to open a bar just so I can try new things.

  5. Made my first bottle of Falerum and Last week made the Orgeat syrup looking forward to compare the two Mai Tai Verions

  6. Josh,

    Great recipe, I have adapted from this for our house falernum at work. I beefed up the ginger a little bit and am also adding toasted allspice.

    When you strain out this soaked hi-proof rum do you add more Wray & Nephew if your yield is below 6oz? I have found that I lose some booze during the soaking process and adjust my lime juice and simple accordingly.

    Great recipe and website!

    Cheers,

    Ryan

    • Ryan,
      Have you seen my Aperol Falernum? Lately I have been doing my falernum without lime juice. The lime juice gets a little funky after a week on me. In my Aperol Falernum I have 10 oz of booze. I don’t see why you couldn’t add more Wray & Nephew or a light rum, or a vodka, to thin it out a bit. Let me know what you come up with.

      • Josh,
        I’m definitely going to try making that aperol falernum. I discovered recently how useful an aeropress coffee maker can be for making my falernum. I have found good results with infusing each ingredient one at a time(using the same rum base to infuse each). Each ingredient infuses at a different rate, so I monitor each phase by smell and test until I reach my desired aroma/taste. The order of infusion that makes sense to me is: almond, ginger, spices, zest. this also helps with the final color because because you are infusing the brightest ingredient last. Using the aeropress each time really helps with separating the impurities in the rum. Corn & Oils are my favorite with this. Another fun thing to do is to make cocktails with the rum base before adding in the simple. Dilute it down with some cheap white rum and make daquiris all day! if you are ever in Seattle check out The Whale Wins bar!

  7. Great recipe, and thanks for sharing all the knowledge. A slight change to process made this go quite a bit faster. I put all the aromats and alcohol into a 1 liter whipping siphon, gave it 3 nitro charges and in two hours we had a batch of brilliant stuff. I know not everyone has a siphon, but if you do it’s great tool. We make tons of foams for cocktails with the siphons as well, and interesting things like carbonated negroni’s. The siphon can add a whole new dimension to a well stocked bar set up.

    Thank again for all the great knowledge!

Leave a Reply to PJ Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>