Little Jack Horner

Just Like Tom Plum’s Booze

A good winter cocktail is a tricky feat. As opposed to a toddy or some hot spiced rum, making a drink with ice these months can seem counterintuitive, even in as temperate a town as Santa Barbara.

But our general delight in overindulgence during the holidays also permits some risk with your cocktails you might not take on a hot summer afternoon when nothing beats a simple, exquisite gin and tonic. You can push ingredients, expand the sweet palate.

Yet there’s also a struggle working local ingredients, and something from your own yard, into a winter cocktail. One means for extending the seasons in the kitchen is preserving, and you can use that trick for your cocktails, too. This issue’s drink, Little Jack Horner, lets you pull out a plum… jam. Not only are we blessed with Santa Rosa plum trees in our yard, we’re even more fortunate to have a neighbor who collects them and preserves them, winning blue ribbons for his handiwork at the Santa Barbara County Fair. Then he gives us a bunch back.

Since the drink starts with this luscious deep fruit, I opted to go with even more fruit by adding another local ingredient from Cutler’s Artisan Spirits in the Funk Zone. Ian Cutler is making Grandma Tommie’s Apple Pie Liqueur, which is vodka-based but does have a perfectly balanced apple pie taste—mostly apple, with a touch of organic vanilla and cassia (which works better with savory flavors than cinnamon, so it is spot on here).

Between the plum and the apple, the drink would work perfectly at a Christmas dinner; far better than a can of store-bought cranberry sauce, that’s for sure.

The liquor heart of the drink is rye, and alas we don’t yet have a local maker of that once-again-in-style whiskey. To be called a rye, a whiskey has to have at least 51% rye in its mash (bourbon is at least 51% corn) and, as you’d guess, rye is less sweet than corn. You’ve got enough sweet in the drink, so it’s time to work back the other way.

A higher-proof rye is also helpful. First, it’s winter, so you need more alcohol warmth. Second, you want to cut through that apple and plum. Redemption Rye works particularly well. It’s not too expensive, it’s 92 proof, and what’s more, it really brings the rye, made with a mash at 95% rye. A fine standby like Old Overholt is a mere 80 proof, and they brag about being 61% rye—save it for your Sazeracs.

The last liquor ingredient is another local product, Margerum Amaro. Doug Margerum of Margerum Wine Co. and the Wine Cask decided he wanted to make his own version of the bitter Italian digestif and came up with a doozy, a magnificent mix of fortified Sangiovese, brandy, spices, caramelized sugar and natural flavors (a list that includes everything from bark to roots to lemon verbena). It gets to be your vermouth and bitters all at once, grounding this drink and giving it amazing bass notes.

Finally, your yard helps out in two more ways, with lemons for juicing—preferably Meyer lemons as they are a bit sweeter while still bringing the acid and zip. You’ll also use sage, which has the scent of the winter months and its heartier foods, from turkey stuffing to sage brown butter on ravioli.