London Cocktail Week 2012

It’s autumn, the days are getting shorter, it’s getting colder and our thoughts turn to cocktails.  Yes cocktails, but not just the tall cocktails filled with fruit, umbrellas & tons of ice, making us think of summer.  Cocktails work when we haven’t got sun & sand too.  Selina has a round up of London Cocktail Week which runs form 8th - 14th October 2012 and also shares two delicious recipes for autumnal cocktails. 

London Cocktail Week is a unique celebration of our capital’s unrivalled cocktail culture. Through a host of seminars, pop-up bars, tastings, parties and master-classes, aimed at both novices and the discerning experienced professionals. This year, the festival’s events will be held in a concentrated area of London - the historic and beautiful Seven Dials, Covent Garden.

The “pop up” Cocktail week Kettle One Hub based at 15 Short Gardens, Seven Dials is the central hub for where cocktail drinkers meet to collect their wristbands, which allows them access to a wide scope of brilliant bars taking part in the capital. These can be purchased there and then for £10 but at £4 purchased online, it’s a better deal.

From here you can head out armed with your guide to a mix of high end luxury hotels, underground bars, retail spaces and exclusive members clubs, which will be buzzing with tastings, master classes, pop up shops and cocktail parties. All venues will be offering £4 cocktails throughout the week, which is music to my ears since reasons why I don’t drink them that often are because of the £12 dent to your wallet or going for the “happy hour” cocktails which can result in watered down, over sugary death traps.

A Cocktail Week is not complete without fun-filled tours, with downloadable maps of areas in London and with free rides on a vintage routemaster buses to make it easier to cross the city. There’s an extensive list of events to take part in from making your own gin at The Ginstitute, sampling Smatt’s Rum & Ice Cream shack cocktails, to learning about Zubrowka bison grass vodka from mixologist  experts and  tasting Talisker whiskey paired with oysters, there’s something for everyone, the list and creativity is endless.

So in honour of this momentous event happening in one of the most exciting cities in the world, I decided to rustle up a cocktail of two of my own in the kitchen, celebrating also some Fall/Autumnal inspiration  this cold weather has given me. Think cosy fire, warm house, spiced piquant flavours, reminiscent of the season and comfort in a glass.

Using Chivas Regal blended Scotch whisky, apple juice (cloudy is better if you have), orange peel & Cinnamon Stick this is a perfect Autumn inspired drink.

 2 oz Chivas Regal blended Scotch whisky

 2 oz cloudy apple juice

 1 Orange peel rind

1 Cinnamon Stick

Preparation:

In a whiskey glass, combine all the ingredients, pop in an ice cube or two and the orange peel, use the cinnamon stick to give it a stir, you can leave it in there for a little while to get some of the spiced flavour.

Hot Buttered Rum

Not to be shunned away, until you’ve tried it, it’s a pre-Prohibition American cocktail which is surprisingly successful considering it contains butter.

1 tsp unsalted butter, softened

1 tsp brown muscavado sugar

Sprinkle of  ground allspice

50ml/2fl oz dark rum (mine was infused with a vanilla pod)

Hot water

Freshly grated nutmeg, to garnish

In a glass mix sugar, add in the allspice then top it up with 50ml hot water, give it a good stir.

Then all your rum, stir again, place your softened butter on the top sprinkle with nutmeg and watch that butter melt into the rum. Drink while hot to warm you up on those cold days!

You can buy your wristbands for London Cocktail Week here 

What’s your favourite autumnal or winter cocktail?