Damien mixes: Spring Fever with Raspberry Flavor

© Damien Guichard

Spring is here, making way for a range of fresh herbs and fruits to play around with. For this community cocktail, you had a choice on Instagram between tomatoes and raspberries – and with 66%, raspberries got the vast majority of the votes. Damien Guichard immediately got to work and created a spring-fresh cocktail.  

When I come up with a new drink or process a new ingredient, I like to break down my approach into three categories:

• Challenge: how challenging is this ingredient? Is it something guests are known to enjoy already or will it be challenging to them?
• Flavour: How tasty is this ingredient but more importantly, how do I extract the flavour to its full potential?
• Creativity: How do I utilise this ingredient in a way that is interesting - to the guest, but to me also?

Let’s start with the challenge:

Raspberry is a pretty obvious and easily accessible ingredient - because everyone loves raspberries. Our last community cocktail was with Slangbos, which is a herb native to the Cape Town region in South Africa. I had never tried it nor seen it before. Raspberries, however, can be bought just about anywhere. So, it's a pretty easy entry – so far, so good.

And now the flavor:

Fun fact about the raspberry, it is part of the Rosaceae family, the same family as – surprise – a rose. Now to extract the well-known floral, grassy and sweet aroma, I could easily just muddle the fruit, make a Cosmopolitan or a Clover Club and call it a day. But what I’m mostly interested about is the acidity level of the raspberry: with a ph of 2.5 - 3,5, raspberry juice happens to be almost as acidic as lemon juice (ph 2-3). At a time when bartenders are on the constant search for sour replacements in their cocktails, this will be the direction I will be taking. 

Now let’s get our hands dirty!

For this ingredient I will be using clarification. At our bar “Wax On”, we are obsessed with clarification – not only because a clear drink looks good but because we try and stream line our mixing and service process in a way that the drinks come out consistent and fast: batching, slick mise-en-place and carbonated drinks are some of our most common weapons to implement that.

In this case I will be using a simple technique using a product called Pectinex SP-l—ULTRA.

Pectin is a natural starch found in a lot of fruits - like the raspberry - and is responsible for the wobbly texture of jams and jelly. Pectinex SP-l ULTRA is an enzyme that allows us to break down that strcture and separate the liquid from the solid parts leading to clarification.

In order to be activated, it needs to be heated to 37C.

You will need:

• Scales
• Thermomix (or blender, a vacuum bag (or zip lock bag) and a thermometer)
• Sieve
• Coffee Filter
• Pectinex SP-l Ultra

In this case, I am going to be using a thermomix as it blends and heat, it is precise and fast. If you don’t have a thermomix, you can simply blend the raspberries and heat them up sous vide or in a zip lock bag with a sous vide stick or using a thermometer.

© Damien Guichard

Instruction

1. Weigh your raspberries before washing them so that the weight of the water doesn’t affect your overall weight.

2. Wash your raspberries.

3. Add 2g of Pectinex Sp-l Ultra for 1000g of fruit. That’s 0.2%. In my case: 660g of raspberries for 1,32g of the enzyme.

4. Add everything into the thermomix. Set the temperature to 37C and blend for 10 min.

                                                           or

Blend your raspberries with the enzyme and heat them up sous vide for 20min once the bath temperature has been reached.

5. Strain everything into a coffee filter and let time do its wonders.

Creativity must also not be missing

I am now in possession of the most delicious, clearest, purest and tartest raspberry juice and my choice is simple. One of my absolute favourite cocktails is the Artist’s Special: Scotch - Sherry - Lemon Juice - Red Currant ( cordial or cassis).

I always find fruity scotch drinks the most interesting as they are usually combined with darker, nuttier ingredients such as the Don Lockwood, Bobby Burns or Rapscallion. Raspberry has such a high acidity level, that I can use it as a replacement for lemon juice and because it is completely clear, I will stir this drink down.

After a few messed up attempts where the drink was too raspberry forward, too acidic or too thin, here is what I end up with: 

© Damien Guichard

Artist’s Special #2

• 30ml Dewars 12
• 15ml Amontillado Sherry
• 15ml Raspberry Juice
• 10ml Laphroaig
• 5ml PX Sherry
• 5ml Simple Syrup (1:1)
• 1 drop Pastis
• 1 drop Saline

Stir down and pour into a chilled coupe.

Voilà! Enjoy and don’t hesitate to write me directly if you have any questions.

Yours Damien

© Damien Guichard