The Cocktail Lab

May 6, 2013
Conigliaro has thought long and hard about the “little moments of time” we spend sipping cocktails: the flavors, textures and aromas involved, and the art and science of mixology. As part of a U.K. collective of bartenders and artists known as the Drink Factory (they create and experiment in a building that was once Pink Floyd’s recording studio), he has invented an entire science fair’s worth of potables and puts them on display in this exciting collection. First Conigliaro blows up some classics. There’s a daiquiri made with dry ice that maintains its constant 21-degree temperature from start to finish, and an aged Manhattan that stays bottled for 6 months up to 6 years, growing ever more complex in flavor. Then there’s a drink called the flintlock made with a gunpowder tincture and ideally served with a flaming ball of flash cotton accompanying the glass. Next, he builds some cocktails around fresh fruit, cleverly employing the juice of a grilled lemon to complement the smoky tequila of a margarita. A chapter entitled “Inspired by Perfume” offers treats for the nose, like the blush, with rose vodka, rhubarb cordial, and a twist of grapefruit. And for serious scientists, Conigliaro breaks out the liquid nitrogen to turn a cosmopolitan into frozen bits of “popcorn.” Other useful and frightening lab tools are laid out and explained in a chapter on equipment and techniques and include such obscurities as the rotavapor and the Soxhlet still, both of which can extract flavor from objects hard and soft, from star anise to rose petals.