Now that we're comfortably in our post cocktail revolution crafty bubble
it's pretty easy to forget but it was not so long ago that we were drinking sticky
luminous libations by the gallon and I am speaking personally here.
One such wonder was the Appletini. It's basically a grown-up Jolly Rancher
so you can understand why it became a phenomenon.
In this episode I'm going to show you how
to recreate the original so that you two can relive your misspent youth
but also, do stay tuned, because I'm going to show you how to make an appley twist on a
classic martini for something a little more classy.
Before all of that though, let's cast our minds back to when the Verve had just released
Bitter Sweet Symphony,
Aqua's Barbie Girl was fighting it out with Hanson's Mmm Bop,
and Chumbawamba were Tubthumping.
Unlike a lot of the cocktails that I've researched
all of the main players in this story are still around,
so it's actually pretty straightforward. The year is 1997, the place is LA and the bar is Lola's.
There's a bottle of De Kuyper Apple Sour Pucker gathering dust on the shelf
and so the owner asked the bartender to do something with it for
St. Patrick's Day. Vodka is not yet a dirty word,
so he combines it with the schnapps and some Ketel One, floats a lemon soaked apple slice on top,
and the Appletini is born. Except his name was Adam, so he actually named it
the Adam's Apple, but that didn't stick. The large portion sizes at Lola's
and probably the fact that it tastes more like a sweetie than an alcoholic beverage
led to an element of notoriety. They even took them off the menu for a while
because of the number of people over indulging, but it had taken hold and
spread like wildfire. It even became JD's drink of choice in Scrubs,
although that was probably more of a dig at his immaturity than anything.
Then came the craft cocktail revolution and a move back towards fresh ingredients,
and flavors, and the Appletini did become a little bit passé.
So now days, if you ask for an Appletini
most bartenders will balance it with some citrus and apple juice,
and good quality apple liqueur, so I am gonna do a bonus how to for those of you that don't want
to go full cheesy but also don't want to go too far down the classic
martini path, so do stay tuned for that at the end.
As always, we're gonna get our garnish ready first. Probably because this was a
nightclub cocktail and so it was easy to pump out heaps of them they didn't
really tend to go with the apple fan, it was just an apple slice but it is good
to give it a little rub with a lemon or stick it in some lemon juice so that it
doesn't go brown. So we're just gonna cut the lemon in half.
And for the apple it's really up to yourself, I kind of like to do it so that you still can see the
little star core in the middle.
Now you obviously want to try and get it nice and thin
'cause you are going to float it on top so you don't want to just the
sink to the bottom.
Give it a little rub with your lemon half.
You can pop that to the side.
I know that I do always tell you that if the drink's all booze
it should be stirred but this Appletini really doesn't play by any of the rules.
So in a small half of your shaker tin you're gonna put 45 mils of Ketel One
45 mils of De Kuyper Sour pupple-
45 mils of De Kuyper Sour Pucker Apple schnapps
It's a bit of a mouthful.
De Kuyper Sour Pucker Apple schnapps.
I've got this nailed now.
I did open this today and said that it just smelt like me being 17
all over again. I mean 18.
The actual measurements are a little bit
arbitrary here it's just half-and-half vodka and apple schnapps so you can make
it as big or as small as you like.
You're just going to pop as much ice as you can fit
into your smaller shaker tin here. Make sure they're nicely lined up
and shake as hard as you can.
Once your tins are nice and frosted just pop them open
Give it a little taste.
Tastes like regret.
I'm going to grab your martini
glass out of the fridge or freezer. You're going to use your Hawthorne
strainer to hold the ice back and then strain through the fine strainer to
catch all of the little ice chips into your ostentatiously at large martini glass.
Now you're just gonna gently float your apple slice on top.
A cheesy Appletini. So now you know.
Before I give this a taste don't forget to subscribe
and if this did take you back to the late 90s or early 2000s then give us a
thumbs up or let us know where you first discovered this bad boy.
It's honestly not as bad as that I remember. I think the sour apple schnapps
might be of a higher quality than what I was drinking when I was in my teens
but it's just pretty clean, a little bit sweet, a little bit sour and appley.
So what's not to like?
If you prefer your drinks not to come in luminous green
the fun apple flavor can easily be merged with a classic vodka martini, or kangaroo
for all of the parents out there, for a classy apple martini.
And if martinis get you going you should definitely check out my other video on them.
Now as with all martinis if you can have everything nice and cold when
you're making this so try and keep your mixing glass in the fridge or the
freezer you can even pop your vodka in the freezer and of course your vermouth
should be chilled in the fridge if it's open anyway. For your garnish we're gonna
make an apple fan. So the easiest way to do this is just to take a full cheek off
the Apple, so you're just cutting down parallel to the core. Then pop it on the
cut side and slice lengthwise along it trying to keep it as thin as possible
now obviously you can make this as ostentatious as you like.
If you are in a bar then your bar manager probably won't want you to use a full Apple for this
keep the cost down but if you're at home you can make yourself as much of a snack
as you like then you just want to fan it out, give it a little dip in some lemon juice,
so that just can sit to the side well you're doing the rest of your drink
The lemon juice is just gonna stop it going brown kind of while you're making
the drink and while you're drinking it. Before you start building the drink as
well you also want to get your absinthe rinse in your glass, because apple and
aniseed are a match made in heaven, so this adds a lovely other dimension to
the drink. You don't want to be faffing about with that at the end once your
drinks all diluted. So grab your glass out of the fridge or the freezer then
all you have to do is put a couple of drops of absinthe in your glass and just
tilt the glass on the side and try and get it as close to the edge as possible
without spilling it everywhere. Shake out any excess and you've rinsed your glass
Now into your mixing glass we'll add 45 mils of Belvedere
this vodka is rye base so the spice works really well with the apple flavor,
but really any good quality vodka would work
15 mils of dry vermouth, I'm using
Dolin because it's really crisp and herbaceous but and Noilly Prat would be
a good alternative really just anything that's nice and clean tasting.
15 mils of Massenez is Pomme verte liqueur. You want to look for a good quality apple liqueur,
which actually tastes like fresh apples and isn't too sweet, I've gone for
Massenez but according to the hive mind of the Melbourne Bartender Exchange the
Giffard brand is a good option as well. Now fill your mixing glass with as much ice
as you can fit in it, now you're just going to stir this by placing the back
of the spoon against the inside of the glass and pushing the ice around.
Use your julep strainer to hold the ice back.
Balance your little apple fan on the side of your glass,
because we had to keep in a nod to this drinks 90's roots. A sophisticated take on the Appletini.
Before I give this a taste don't forget to subscribe and let us know what your
favorite martini variation, is classy or not?
The absinthe just really kind of brings it all together, because obviously
without that it's pretty just kind of clean and fresh like a little bit
appley, but yeah that kind of mix makes a real drink out of it.
I think this would be a good one if you're maybe wanting to make a transition from sort
of fruitier cocktails to two more martinis and things because it's got all
of the really lovely cleanness from a martini with still just a little bit of a
appley zing to it to make it a bit more approachable.
I do things that the Appletini is a great example of why we should not dismiss disco drinks
they are really popular for a reason, so I'm obviously all for using good products
and fresh ingredients but the basic flavor combination of apple and vodka is
an absolute banger, it's crisp and fruity and refreshing and sort of spawned a
thousand variations. I know some bartenders who had a spike of citrus
some who use apple brandy or apple juice or puree rather than schnapps
basically there's an Appletini out there for everyone and we shouldn't be ashamed of it.
Now as I mentioned I'm gonna show you what I would make if you ask for
an Appletini at Bomba where I work, because believe it or not I don't actually
usually have a bottle of Sour Pucker to hand.
So we've got a little bonus make which is Bombas Easy on the Tini.
So as always we're gonna get our garnish ready
I am a bit of a sucker for cheesy garnishes so I do like to go for an
apple fan for this one as well, and we're gonna need some fresh lemon juice for
this one so we'll give half a lemon a squeeze.
Now I like to keep this one really nice it's easy so just equal parts of all of
your ingredients so we start with 20 mils of vodka, I'm sticking with
Belvedere for that nice rye spice but Zubrowka is obviously another really
popular one that's the bison grass vodka which has a lot of kind of herbal notes
that work really well with the apple as well.
Then 20 mils of a good quality
apple liqueur, I'm going for Massenez Pomme verte, but Giffard or Cartron
are other pretty big names that also make good quality ones.
20 mils of cloudy apple juice
so you don't want to go for concentrate, definitely something as kind
of as close to fresh as you can get
and 20 mils of fresh lemon juice
Now we're gonna fill the small half of the shaker tin with as much ice as you can fit in there
pop your tins together and shake as hard as you can.
Now you can adjust this with a little bit of sugar syrup if you like it is quite tart but I like it
like that and it's obviously not super boozy this one unlike the other two that
we've looked at so a little bit more delicate.
You're just going to use your
Hawthorne strainer to hold the ice back and then just flow it through the fine strainer
Garnish with the required apple fan and there we have it
Bombas Easy on the Tini.
Now before I give this one a taste please don't
forget to subscribe like comment or share or all of the above if you're
feeling super generous also if you didn't know we do have a new website
which is up and running and you'll find all of the cocktails we've ever made
there plus heaps of extra viewing for you we've even got some downloadable
recipes for use in your kitchen at home and if you try making any or all of
these why not let us know which one is your favorite you can tag as using with
Kara Devine on reddit Facebook insta and Pinterest it'd be really good to see
which ones you like. So now you know.
I love this one it's just really
quite tart and fresh and zingy obviously a little bit less booze in
there than either of the other ones so a bit more of a kind of an afternoon
tipple, so fresh and fun it really is easy on the tini!