The Ward Eight is, famously, the one traditional cocktail to return out of Boston and by some means make it into the twenty first century. Many say that the drink (sometimes made with whiskey, lemon and orange juices, grenadine and, initially, soda water) was born on the metropolis’s previous Locke-Ober restaurant, however its origins are disputed; in any case, fantastic eating was not, on the time, a tradition from which new cocktails usually sprung. Others hyperlink the Ward Eight to the Hari-Kari—an Eighties Whiskey Bitter topped with soda and garnished with fruit—but it surely lacks the grenadine.
Although by no means actually celebrated by the cocktail revivalists of the aughts, the Ward Eight did land spots in each the PDT and Loss of life & Co. books. The latter is the place Logan Rodriguez, of New York’s Smithereens, first encountered it some years in the past, whereas he was doing a “masochistic deep dive” into classics that decision for orange juice (well known as a tough cocktail ingredient).
On the East Village restaurant, Rodriguez determined to deal with the Ward Eight due to the restaurant’s New England theme. (The cocktail menu additionally features a variation on the Cape Codder and a PSL Espresso Martini named after Ben Affleck.) However the Olde New England vibe is countered by a really trendy cocktail program and Rodriguez’s personal anti-traditionalist ethos. The ensuing Ward Eight is one that will be unrecognizable to Bostonians of 100 years in the past.
One factor that Rodriguez didn’t change is the rye base. At Smithereens, he carries a really restricted variety of spirits and there may be however one rye in home: Rye & Sons, which he prizes for its notes of orange and spice that go particularly nicely within the Ward Eight.
Rodriguez determined to nix the lemon and acidify the orange juice to lime-level acidity, which supplies the cocktail “the roundness of the orange” whereas nonetheless providing a nice “lingering tartness.” Amping up the orange flavors within the drink is the Smoked Orange distillate from Acid Spirits, a microdistillery in Queens that produces a small line of surprising spirits utilizing upcycled waste from high-end meals companies. The discarded oranges, which come from Beepublic Espresso, are smoked over oak chips earlier than being fermented and distilled. Rodriguez says the ensuing spirit is packed filled with citrus oils, lending physique and texture to his Ward Eight.
Rodriguez has all the time been puzzled by grenadine’s seeming ubiquity in sure durations of cocktail historical past. “It’s not a nasty ingredient, but it surely’s like yesteryear’s ketchup,” he says. He knew he had so as to add dimension to the ingredient, and he regarded to the Smithereens kitchen for inspiration. After a lot experimentation, he landed on a model that mixes a standard grenadine with a shrub that makes use of the brine from the restaurant’s beet salad. The acidic shrub—with hints of shallot, bay leaf and garlic—marries with the unctuous pomegranate molasses–laced grenadine to offer the Ward Eight a barely savory taste.
To go along with the beets and savory flavors within the drink, Rodriguez couldn’t resist including Acid Spirits’ Horseradish distillate. He thought it solely applicable given the restaurant’s location on First Avenue, close to the Ukrainian restaurant Veselka and the Japanese European delicacies that lives on within the neighborhood. “I all the time wish to throw one curveball into the combination,” he says, “and the horseradish was calling.”
For his remaining flourish, Rodriguez determined the drink wanted one thing bitter to floor it. He reached for Cappelletti, a wine-based aperitivo from the Italian Alps that contributes brilliant orange peel notes and a touch of vanilla.
Rodriguez says that his variation on the Ward Eight has been well-received by visitors at Smithereens. Maybe that’s as a result of not many individuals on the market know what a standard Ward Eight is even presupposed to style like, so the various departures in his model aren’t so difficult. Nonetheless, it won’t be for everybody. “If you happen to’re the form of person who loves a chilly glass of Sunny Delight together with your borscht,” says Rodriguez, “that is the cocktail for you.”
