Shrubbery

This drink is pictured in the

Double Spiral Etched Whiskey

Sour Glass, available on the

Contemporary Complements website.

Not every drink is for every person. Sometimes, one should accept that you’re beyond the bounds of what you like, and learn to smile, nod and say, “I think I would prefer something else.” (I can only imagine what that phrase would do to wine sales if people employed that phrase more confidently.)

Fortunately, this story does not end at something I don’t like, but it does lead us to a drink that’s not going to tickle everyone’s palate. This story begins at The Ravens Club, where Tammy Coxen (of Tammy’s Tastings) is doing a guest bartending gig. She’s made up a custom menu for the night, and two of the drinks feature shrub.

I do what any self-respecting person would do – order something else while waiting for the Google search for shrub to complete on my iPhone. Eventually, I get to a page that spells out exactly what we’ve been confronted with, which is a traditional blend of macerated fruit (cherries, here) and balsamic vinegar as a mixer (details below).

This is not a mixer for the timid, and it’s a ten-day process to make up a batch. So, of course, I snag a quart of cherries from farmer’s market, drag them home and start a-macerating (that is to say, cover ‘em in sugar and wait). At the end of the process, I have a bottle of shrub, and...well, not much to do with it. Recipes are a bit thin on the ground, owing to the fact that you’re putting, y'know, vinegar into your drink, cherries notwithstanding.

What recipes there are, often imagine it as a replacement for sour mix in things like a whiskey sour, if you handwave the fact you’re adding a mixer that threatens to beat up the other alcohols from across the room. But, the vinegar caused me to remember another alcohol in the bar that gets limited love due to its high alcohol and its unique herbal footprint – Chartreuse (green, to be precise).

So, a few attempts later, I have something that’s...well, pretty darn drinkable. None of our liquids here are shrinking violets (well, let’s give a pass to the club soda, there to let the flavors blend and linger a bit more softly on the palate). My wife gamely tried it, handed it back to me, and said, “I’d prefer to drink something else.”

The Kentucky Monk

2 oz. Maker’s Mark

.5 oz. balsamic black cherry shrub

.5 oz. Chartreuse

1 oz. soda water

Combine; pour over ice.

Balsamic Black Cherry Shrub

I could spell out the recipe, but credit where credit is due; here’s where I found the recipe I used. As Ann Arbor residents have the luxury of Zingerman’s Deli on our doorstep, there’s no such thing as cheap balsamic vinegar to use for this, just different levels of better.