Tiki's Falernum Cocktail Recipe

Everyone's been asking so here it is from our mixologist, Hailey Pasemko...

Tiki Event - bar in the jungle

"The greeting cocktail that was served at the party is called falernum.  It's a traditional syrup that originated in the Caribbean that can be made alcoholic or not.  It is often used as an ingredient in cocktails, but it is quite acceptable to simply drink it over crushed ice with a bit of fresh lime juice.  There are countless variations on the recipe.  I used the one from the kaiserpenguin website (great cocktail site by the way) and just tweaked it a tiny bit here and there.  It yielded about 600ml of syrup."

Ingredients:

50 cloves

1 tablespoon whole allspice

1 whole nutmeg

zest of 8 limes (I used a micro plane to avoid the bitter white pith)

1/2 cup fresh ginger, peeled and sliced

4 oz white rum

4 oz amber rum

2 cups sugar

1 cup water

crushed ice

Directions

Combine the lime zest and ginger in a glass jar.  Toast the cloves, allspice and nutmeg in a dry pan over medium heat for for a few minutes or until they start to smell really good, and then add them to the jar too.  Add the rums and make sure all the goodies are covered by the rum.  The stuff in the jar looks pretty cool at this point.  Then seal the jar and let it sit overnight.  The next day strain the spiced up liquid through cheese cloth or a fine mesh strainer.  Try and squeeze as much goodness out of the solids as you can.

 

Combine the sugar and water in a pot over high heat and stir until dissolved.  Let cool.  Combine the spicy rum with the sugar syrup and you have a basic falernum syrup.  Some recipes call for fresh lime juice to be added to the syrup at this stage but apparently it wont keep as well.  So just add the fresh lime at the time of consumption.  For the party I used a ratio of 3 parts syrup to 2 parts fresh lime juice.  The crushed ice is key as it chills, dilutes and mellows out the sweetness and acidity.