Mandarine Napoléon Cocktail Challenge
The Mandarine Napoléon Cocktail Challenge is back for a second year, with fantastic cash prizes on offer for the winners!
We are once again looking for the best new cocktails that harness the vibrant flavours of Mandarine Napoléon Liqueur, a rich blend of Mediterranean mandarines, infused with cognac and given extra complexity by a blend of botanicals including clove, nutmeg cinnamon, angelica, green and black tea.
As an incentive to drive your creativity, our friends at Mandarine Napoléon are offering a cash prize for the best original cocktail recipe created by a professional bartender and a cash prize for the best new recipe by a home cocktail enthusiast. As long as you are over legal drinking age in your country, you are invited to enter this competition, wherever you are in the world.
Your challenge is to create a delicious Mandarine Napoléon cocktail that others will want to make and enjoy in homes and bars worldwide; hence your cocktail should also be easy to replicate, made using easily available commonplace ingredients without the need to pre-combine ingredients. Your cocktail must include at least 15ml (½oz) Mandarine Napoléon liqueur.
Cocktails based on less than seven ingredients are preferred, including fruit juices, syrups, drops or dashes. Solid garnishes are not counted as ingredients; neither is an additional spray of citrus fruit zest over the drink if specified as a garnish.
Entries will only be considered where a photograph of the finished cocktail has been uploaded to accompany the recipe. These photographs may be taken with your phone, and you may want also to include a bottle of Mandarine Napoléon liqueur behind your cocktail (although not a requirement of entry).
When naming your cocktail, please don't use rude, lurid or sexual words or names that may offend.
For some cocktail inspiration take a look at these recipes with mandarine liqueur.
Enter
Please complete the short form on our ENTER page. If you are already a Difford's Guide member and you are logged in, then we already have your name and email. If you are new to Difford's Guide, then you'll be asked for this additional information to become a member and upload your cocktail recipe.
Key Dates
Competition opens – Thursday 17th April 2025
Competition closes for entries – Sunday 18th May 2025 at midnight Greenwich Mean Time
Winners announced - Friday 23rd May 2025
Prizes
- Best bartender cocktail wins €1,000 Euros
- Best home cocktail enthusiast's cocktail wins €1,000 Euros
Judges & judging criteria
The most delicious yet easy-to-replicate recipes will receive the highest scores. As a cocktail's name greatly influences its popularity, the name of each cocktail will also greatly impact the score. Points will be awarded as follows:
Taste = 40%
Name = 20%
Ease to replicate = 20%
Photograph = 20%
The competition will be judged by Max de Smit (Mandarine Napoléon Global Brand Ambassador), Arno van Eijmeren (founder of Barrelproof Company), and Leontien Oonk (Global Mandarine Napoléon Brand Manager).
View all 2024 entries
