I happened across this recipe while pondering what to do with a largely useless bottle of matcha liqueur that had been struggling to justify the space it consumed in my liquor cabinet. Tried swapping in said problematic liqueur for the chartreuse. I thought the result was nice: the matcha added bit of earthiness. Perhaps Sir Winston would approve of as well: that swap got the French and the Vatican out of his cocktail while slipping some tea in…
I hear from the cooking blogs that rhubarb goes well with lavender. So I tried this cocktail two ways: first as directed, and then with lavender bitters. Liked the latter much better!
Has anyone ever tried this with Old Tom gin? I just did — and found that it added some nice complexity.
The amaro matters. I didn’t have any Lucano, so I subbed in Averna. That didn’t work, too syrupy. Then I went out and got myself a bottle of Baulio (Simon mentions that the original Treadway recipe actually called for Braulio, not Lucano). This made a huge difference— not too sweet, plenty of piney “alpine” notes. Definitely a keeper!