Saturday, May 9, 2009

Luxardo Maraschino

Finally. After two years of searching through several states, my local liquor store has special ordered a case of luxardo maraschino for me to try out. Unfortunately, i had already ordered a bottle of it online, but oh well. I was a bit surprised, because on a previous occasion (at Details) i had tried the Luxardo Maraschino and been surprised to find almost no cherry-flavor - just the overwheleming burn of alcohol. However, after trying a bottle that i have bought myself, i do taste the cherry after all - it's just not a pronounced cherry flavor that you find at the front - it's more in the back. Surprisingly, as i noted before, the cherry flavor does come through quite well in mixed drinks.

What i did, specifically, was to try a drink made with the luxardo and without the luxardo. I made, basically, a daquiri (sweetened a bit for modern times, with simple syrup) and a version of the florida daquiri (sweetened half with simple syrup and half with luxardo). Could i tell the difference? Yes. The cherry flavor comes in pretty well - although you only taste it after the sourness of the lime juice. I can definitely see why luxardo would be a nice liqeueur to mix with, and why it was so popular way back when. Will definitely be trying it out in a number of different drinks - especially the "old" version of the Aviation - which is made with creme de violette - which will be coming in the mail at some time in the near future.

If you're any kind of serious mixologist, you should definitely have a bottle of luxardo maraschino laying around for making "real" drinks. Taking a look at the website www.cocktaildb.com, it is featured in 211 classic drinks - compare to Cointreau - an obviously popular liqueur - which is featured in 226 drinks. I'm just happy that after a few years i was able to get a bottle or two of the alcohol to play around with. Just wish stupid Ohio would revise its idiotic liquor laws.

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