There is an ingredient listed on the cocktail menu at Union which receives more quizzical looks, more gasps of surprise when sampled and generates more chatter than anything else we do in the bar. The complexities of it's aroma and flavors are hard to pin down, though everyone tries. This witches brew of cocktail goodness is popping up in scratch cocktail bars all over the nation, and in the well-stocked homes of cocktail aficionados all over the globe.

I'm talking about falernum, the nectar of the tiki gods.

What falernum used to be and what it has become are totally different. Since the beginning of the tiki boom in the 1930's, falernum has been used as a sweetener used primarily in tropical and Caribbean cocktails. Produced commercially rather sporadically in Bermuda, Barbados and the U.S., it had been, until recently, hard to get consistently. Keeping in line with the notion that you crave the most what you can't get, frustrated bartenders and cocktail historians began tinkering with recipes to produce their own.



Here is where the difference between what falernum used to be and what it is now comes into play.

The more tinkering from home enthusiasts, the more it evolved. What had been a translucent, almond and clove syrup has now become a juice and spice driven nectar, adding a parade of flavors. As with most concoctions of this nature, everybody seems to have their own spin on how to make falernum. I use Paul Clarke's outstanding recipe from his site The Cocktail Chronicles as a launching point, of which I will quote verbatim:

6 ounces Wray & Nephew Overproof White Rum
zest of 9 medium limes, removed with a microplane grater or sharp vegetable peeler, with no traces of white pith
40 whole cloves (buy fresh ones - not the cloves that have been in your spice rack since last Christmas)
1 1/2 ounce, by weight, peeled, julienned fresh ginger
Combine these ingredients in a jar and seal, letting the mixture soak for 24 hours. Then, strain through moistened cheesecloth, squeezing the solids to extract the last, flavorful bits of liquid.

Add:

1/4 teaspoon almond extract*
14 ounces cold process 2:1 simple syrup (two parts sugar to one part water, shaken in a jar or bottle WITHOUT HEAT until all the sugar is dissolved)
4 1/2 ounces fresh, strained lime juice
Shake it all together and serve.

My variation adds 20 allspice berries to the soak (which I increase to about 3-4 days) and also add a couple drops of vanilla extract for good measure. For another variation, Craig Hermann (who also snapped the above picture) over at Tiki Drinks & Indigo Firmaments publishes his experiments in four parts.

And should you know of or come up with a variation yourself, I'd love to hear about it.

Ah, and you'll need a drink after all this thirsty work. Here's the best one I know of, The Royal Bermuda Yacht Club Cocktail, an early tiki drink by Trader Vic.

2 ounces of dark or gold rum
3/4 ounces of fresh lime juice
1/4 ounce Cointreau
1/4 ounce of your freshly made falernum

Shake, strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a lime zest.

Here are five more recipes you can use with your new falernum:

The White Lion
Port Antonio Cocktail
Test Pilot
Clermont Smash
Chartreuse Swizzle