Red Hot Poker Cocktail
In the post-holiday crash back to reality, poor old January doesn’t get a lot of love.
Red Hot Poker Cocktail Ingredients
This fall, gather your friends and family around a roaring fire pit, stick this cool new Campfire Beer Caramelizer Tool into the flames or coals until the tip glows bright red, and stick it into an ice cold glass of beer for a few seconds to instantly add a smoky sweet flavor and rich, frothy texture. They can be served hot or cold. The very first Flips, which emerged as early as the late 1600s, consisted of a tankard of ale to which a mixture made from sugar, eggs and spices was added before being heated with a red-hot iron poker from the fire. Back in colonial times, taverns served weary travelers and plotting revolutionaries a mixture of beer, rum, molasses and eggs or cream, which bartenders would heat with a red-hot poker causing it.
The January Blues are real, nevertheless, the gin renaissance keeps drumming on and we are all for it.
Luckily for Londoners, Sipsmith and London’s Ham Yard Hotel are back in 2020 for a fifth consecutive year with their Hot Gin Roof pop-up. This year’s rendition has a bit of fire behind the hot gin cocktails on offer.
Journey to Ham Yard’s fourth floor terrace in Soho for a winter warmer with a view plus a bit of historical gin re-enactment.
Hot gin was once heated by red hot pokers, as discovered by Firmdale Hotel’s Group Mixologist, Eoin Kenny, and Sipsmith Master Distiller, Jared Brown.
You can check out this gintastic historical recreation at Sipsmith’s London rooftop bar Masterclass sessions on Thursday evenings throughout the event.
Inspired by times of yore before central heating, cocktails will be ‘poked’ piping hot by blacksmith crafted pokers. Once heated, the pokers are dunked into cocktails. Any sugar in the drink is then instantly caramelised as a heavenly smell emanates from the glass.
Firmdale Hotel’s Group Mixologist, Eoin Kenny and Sipsmith Master Distiller, Jared Brown, are responsible for the pop-up’s unique historical roots.
Choose from winter warmers including hot G&Ts; Singapore slings garnished with a barbequed pineapple slice and Hangman’s Blood, a porter based cocktail recipe hailing from 1929.
Red Hot Poker Cocktails
From there guests can overlook the London skyline, wrapped up in a woollen blanket and smugly wonder why Dry January is a thing (kidding!).
Red Hot Poker Cocktail Recipe
The Hot Gin Roof event in London will run from 24 January to 29 February. Tickets are £20 for a 90 minute session including a complimentary hot G&T and cocktail of choice.
Follow us on Facebook, on Twitter @theginkin, or on Instagram at @theginkin. If you have a story suggestion email editor@theginkin.comCharles Dickens’s drinking knowledge was as epic as his tales, many of which include passing descriptions of the Victorian era’s drinking rituals. The Smoking Bishop happens to fall into a family of punch-style drinks named for the clerical hierarchy. The Pope involved mixing with Burgundy while Archbishop employed claret and the Cardinal, Champagne. In a final scene from A Christmas Carol, Scrooge turns to Bob Cratchit, his belittled employee, with new eyes and invites him to be merry over a bowl of Smoking Bishop—the word “bishop” was 19th-century code for port—which referred to a roasted clove and orange-infused port punch, warmed and mulled with baking spices and further fortified with red wine.