Airmail (cocktail)
Airmail or Air Mail (also Airmail Cocktail ; from English airmail / air mail ' Luftpost ') is a classic cocktail made from rum , lime or lemon juice , honey and sparkling wine . It was probably created during or shortly after the prohibition period in the United States or Cuba , i.e. in the 1920s or 1930s.
history
As with the somewhat older Aviation Cocktail, whose recipe is incidentally not similar, the name is reminiscent of aviation , which was developing rapidly at the time. In those years when international telephone connections were still a rarity, airmail was the fastest means of communication across national borders. Because of the alcohol prohibition it was only possible for US-Americans to legally drink alcohol abroad until 1933 - Cuba , among others , benefited from this , where a distinctive bar and cocktail culture developed in the 1920s. There was an air service from Key West to Havana since 1925 , and regular airmail services began on the island in 1930. A little later, the Airmail Cocktail appeared for the first time in an advertising brochure from the rum manufacturer Bacardi, which was still based in Cuba at the time.
In 1941 the recipe was published in a mix book. In his recipe collections Just Cocktails (1939) and Here's How (1941), the author W. C. Whitfield had compiled numerous drinks from the years of Prohibition and provided some laconic comments. To the Airmail Cocktail he wrote: "It ought to make you fly high" (for example: it should make you fly high or induce you to soar ). Its inclusion in the 1949 Handbook for Hosts of the men's magazine Esquire helped the cocktail to become more popular a few years later.
In the following decades, however, the cocktail was rarely published. It only experienced a certain renaissance with the return to classic recipes since the 2000s, to which, among other things, the distribution of the PDT Cocktail Book published in 2011 (German: The Secret Cocktail Book , 2012) and Bacardi's marketing activities contributed.
Ingredients and preparation
The basis of the Airmail cocktail is a sour mixture of rum, lime juice and honey or honey syrup , which is always shaken with ice cubes in the cocktail shaker and then strained into a pre-chilled cocktail glass . Then top up with chilled sparkling wine and stir briefly. In terms of ingredients, the Airmail is similar to the rum drink Canchánchara ( aged rum, lime juice, honey), which, however, works without sparkling wine. Esquire sees Airmail as a “cross between French 75 and Honey Bee ”. The French 75 is a champagne drink with a classic sour mix of gin , lemon juice and sugar syrup ; the Honey Bee combines white rum with honey and lemon juice, making it a daiquiri variant with honey. A modern cocktail with the common ingredients (matured) rum, lime juice and champagne is the Old Cuban , created in 2002 .
Most recipes provide for a mixing ratio of 3 cl rum, 1.5 cl lime juice and 1.5 cl honey syrup for the Airmail , which is then poured with around 3 cl champagne and garnished either - as with most sparkling wine cocktails - not at all or only with a lime slice on the edge of the glass; Imbibe magazine recommends a drop of Angostura bitter and a leaf of mint , while rum maker Bacardi recommends a postage stamp.
The cocktail can be prepared with both matured (brown) rum and unripened (white) rum, whereby in the first case a comparatively aromatic honey, in the second a rather mild honey such as acacia blossom honey is recommended. Cuban rum is often recommended. Instead of lime juice, lemon juice is also possible. Honey syrup is a mixture of honey and water, for example in a ratio of 2: 1, which is easier to dose and mix compared to pure honey. Usually the cocktail is poured with dry champagne , crémant or sparkling wine , more rarely with prosecco .
It is served “straight up”, i.e. without ice, in a pre-chilled champagne glass or a cocktail bowl , although there are also recipes with significantly larger amounts of liquid and proportionally more sparkling wine that are served in a Collins glass.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b In The Mix. In: augustine-bar.de. Retrieved August 22, 2015 .
- ^ Air Transportation: The Pioneering Years: Commercial Aviation 1920-1930. In: centennialofflight.net. Retrieved September 21, 2015 .
- ↑ a b A return to Havana: the Airmail Cocktail. In: cold-glass.com. August 11, 2015, accessed September 21, 2015 .
- ^ William Campbell Whitfield (author), Ted Shell (illustrator): Here's How. Mixed drinks. 1st Edition, Three Mountaineers Inc., Asheville (North Carolina), 1941, p. 36.
- ↑ a b c d Jim Meehan, Chris Gall: The secret cocktail book . Gestalten Verlag, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-89955-436-6 ; Airmail: p. 48; Honey syrup: p. 30. Original English version: The PDT Cocktail Book . Sterling Epicur, New York 2011, ISBN 978-1-4027-7923-7 ; same page numbers.
- ^ Esquire's Handbook for Hosts. Grosset & Dunlap Publishers, New York 1949.
- ↑ a b c d e f Marco Beier: Air Mail. Fasten seat belts. In: mixology.eu. June 9, 2015, accessed August 22, 2015 .
- ↑ a b c Air Mail. In: esquire.com. November 5, 2007, accessed August 22, 2015 .
- ↑ Honey Bee. In: esquire.com. November 5, 2007, accessed August 22, 2015 .
- ↑ a b c Airmail Cocktail. In: imbibemagazine.com. June 12, 2009, accessed August 22, 2015 .
- ↑ Air Mail Cocktail. In: bacardi.com. Retrieved September 21, 2015 .