For your new year’s resolution, you vowed to eat healthier, work out more, drink less, etc. But if you’re anything like me, 10 days after all of this well-meaning resolve, you’re back to your old habits. Cielo bar and restaurant manager Cory Cuff recognized this conundrum and decided to create a series of “detox/antioxidant cocktails” for the new year, so people could feel a little less guilty about what they were drinking.
Rather than creating lo-cal sippers that skimp on flavor or ones loaded with gross sugar substitutes, Cuff relies on tea. Not only are both of these cocktails well balanced and delicious, they make you feel healthier just by drinking them. Dangerous – and genius.
Cielo bartender Ryan Gore created the Earl Grey Chaos, which consists of Broker’s gin infused with black pepper and Earl Grey tea, limoncello, lemon juice and some simple syrup. The drink is shaken and served with cubes of frozen Earl Grey. It has pepper on the front, but is quickly balanced by the floral tea, finishing with the taste of lemon. In the words of Cuff: “This isn’t your grandmother’s Arnold Palmer, let me tell you that!” This is the perfect cocktail if you’re fighting a cold but don’t want to stay home on the couch. If you want your drink to taste more like tea than a cocktail, just let your ice cubes melt – if you have the patience or willpower.
The Commodore Gambi Elixir, created by Cielo bartender Blair Schrautemeier, features Meyer’s dark rum shaken with cinnamon-plum tea, rosemary, thyme, Amaro Nonino, Luxardo maraschino, lemon juice and simple syrup. Herbal, aromatic and not too sweet thanks to the Nonino, this is a cocktail that even the non-rum drinker will enjoy.
This article appears in January 2014.