Cocktail Hour: Orange Moscow Mule

Since moving into our own place a few months ago, Rene and I have really been enjoying building our home bar. “Home is where the liquor is” - isn’t that how the saying goes? Crabbie’s ginger beer is one of our new favorite cocktail ingredients. I first got to sample Crabbie’s at Edible Manhattan’s Good Beer event this summer and it was love at first taste. The beer is sweet, spicy, tangy and not overly carbonated. It’s basically the best cocktail mixer for any liquor of your choosing.

A traditional Moscow Mule, popularized in the 1940′s and 50′s, calls for vodka, ginger beer and lemon juice. For my Moscow Mule cocktail, I decided to take the orange route, using orange vodka, Spiced Orange Crabbie’s, fresh orange juice and a fancy burnt orange garnish. The burnt orange - a classic topper for Negronis and Cosmopolitans - is made my setting the orange’s essential oils aflame (instructions below). I used matches as a prop in these photos but a lighter is a better and safer option for the task.

(Yield: 1 cocktail)

• 1 shot (1.5 oz) premium orange-flavored vodka (I used Stolichnaya)
• 1/4 c (2 oz) freshly squeezed orange juice
• About 1/3 c Crabbie’s Spiced Orange ginger beer
• Ice
• 1 2″-slice fresh orange peel

Procedure: Pour vodka and orange juice into a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake for a few seconds and pour over ice into an 8 oz glass. Top with Crabbie’s Spiced Orange ginger beer. To make the burnt orange garnish (this video demonstrates the technique perfectly), hold the slice of orange peel between your thumb and pointer finger, with the orange side facing outward. Hold the orange peel over the flame of a lighter, warm it up for a few seconds, then press your fingers closer together - the oils in the peel should burst into a quick flame - and drop the peel into the cocktail.

Crabbie’s ginger beer was sent to me for the purpose of recipe development. I was not otherwise compensated for this post; all opinions are my own.