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Clarified Churro Cocktail
by Elyse Glickman
Although there’s always an occasion for favorite Mexican comfort foods and a trusty Margarita, your customers’ tastes and sense of adventure have evolved. It can be a challenge to keep up with the latest artisanal agave spirits, and factoring culinary trends and flavor profiles into the mix can make pairing even more daunting.
Here, three chefs share their recipes for creating food and cocktail pairing that will delight customers.
Cristhian Rodriguez, beverage director at elNico in Brooklyn, New York, sets his sites on pairings that he calls “an extension of an experience.” When creating cocktails, he uses ingredients that complement the story of the dish. Examples include a pungent aged cheese paired with the briny and salty notes of Inaequidens Mezcal from Michoacan and simple bowl of strawberries and cream enhanced with lactic notes of a Cupreata Mezcal from Guerrero.
“In our Clarified Churro Cocktail [see recipe below], we use cinnamon, vanilla and cardamom just as our chef does in our house churros. This helps us tell a similar story,” Rodriguez says. “To add extra layers, we add roasted cacao nibs, maple verjus and añejo tequila for bitterness, depth, and charred notes. We serve it with a shell of salted caramel chocolate on the glass and a final touch of cardamom salt to accentuate the flavors.”
For Rob Arrellano, owner of Descanso restaurants in Costa Mesa and Los Angeles, pairing what’s prepared behind the bar with what comes from the kitchen is a matter of rhythm.
“Our food and cocktails are like dance partners...always in sync,” Arrellano says. “We match bold dishes with strong cocktails and lighter meals with more delicate drinks. We play with seasonal ingredients, so in summer, expect fresh, herby cocktails, while winter calls for cozy bourbon mixes. We love using similar ingredients in both food and drink, like citrus-heavy dishes with gin and tonic.”
His advice: “Don’t be afraid to mix sweet and savory. A honey cocktail, for example, can balance out salty flavors in a dish.”
For Chef Carlos Gaytán, who in 2013 became the first Mexican-born chef to win a Michelin Star, two adages come into play when creating food and beverage pairings: “what grows together goes together” and “opposites attract.”
“Complementary and contrasting flavors work like a color wheel. Flavors that are similar work together, but so do flavors that are polar opposites,” says Gaytán, the man behind the menus of Tzuco in Chicago’s Gold Coast, the Patina Restaurant Group’s Paseo, Céntrico and Tiendita in Anaheim, California’s Downtown Disney District, and HA’ in the Hotel Xcaret Mexico in Riviera Maya (a restaurant that recently garnered a Michelin Star).
“Examples of complementary flavors are vanilla and cream. Opposite flavors that work together are grapefruit and cinnamon,” says Gaytán, who adds that he often pairs ingredients of similar ages across food and drink. “For a tasting dinner, we used a seven-year aged rice in a blended mushroom risotto,” he says. “I took the scraps from the chef's mushroom blend and infused them into a seven-year aged bourbon to make an Old Fashioned to pair alongside the risotto.”
Clarified Churro Cocktail
Recipe from elNico, Brooklyn
Makes 1 cocktail
.25 oz. Amburana Cachaca
.5 oz. Maple Verjus
.5 Amontillado Sherry
.75 Blanc Vermouth
.75 cacao nib infused Mijenta Reposadon Tequila
.75 Grey Goose Vodka
.75 cinnamon syrup
2.75 oz. churro spiced milk
In a mixing glass, combine all ingredients. Strain liquid through a couple layers of cheesecloth over an emty glass. When the liquid starts running clear you should have a layer of milk curds in the cheesecloth. Make sure you don’t break the layer, as it’s the clarification layer of the punch. Pour liquid back into cheesecloth to allow liquid to drip through and clarify. Serve over a 2-inch ice cube in a double rocks glass.
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