Not long ago, I found myself on the courtyard of Washington’s Four Seasons hotel, enjoying the charming company of my wife, whose birthday we were celebrating. To be honest, it isn’t the sort of place we seek out. Why? For starters, sitting outdoors in Washington during the late summer is normally a recipe for broiling. But this August evening was downright cool.
Other things that would normally have us seeking out another watering hole: There are the people populating the patio, a few too many with the blank expressions of that affliction, Botox Face, and even a few with scalpel-sculpted figures striving for the distinctive Kardashian shape. What else? Oh yes, they serve a cheese plate tainted with Roquefort or Stilton or another one of those examples of milk gone bad. And then, it being a Four Seasons, one could expect prices to be high even by the inflated standard of the cocktail renaissance. (I often think that when people started using the term “renaissance” to describe the classic cocktail revival, they got the wrongheaded notion that good drinks had to be priced as if commissioned by the Medici.)
But these are just my prejudices showing. I was perfectly happy to be drinking in the courtyard because it is the province of Bourbon Steak, the excellent restaurant that operates in the shadow of its even better bar.
The drinks menu provided a choice between the bartenders’ own concoctions and a slate of “Classics for a Reason.” I was pleased to see on page two drinks that can properly be called classics even though they are of recent vintage — the gold rush and penicillin. Both originated back in the relatively recent day at the famed Milk & Honey bar in New York.
I have long wondered why the cocktail resurgence of the last 20 years has not added much of any original drinks to the canon. Perhaps it is because of the revivalist mindset, a focus on rediscovering things that have already been done. It is a challenge (whether in music, art, literature, or cocktails) to create something new that is in the mode of something old.
I was drinking — and delighting — in a gold rush, a cocktail that succeeds in joining new and old without a hint of pastiche (and absolutely no pastis, which I hate even more than blue cheese). I just wish that the gold rush was better known. But happily, as with many of the best and most enduring drinks, the gold rush is simple. It has but three ingredients — bourbon, lemon juice, and honey — and one will note that not a single one of the drink’s constituent parts is obscure or difficult to source. Commit this simple recipe to memory and you can spell it out to any bartender who may be unfamiliar with it.
The only trick involved involves the honey, which doesn’t like to mix with others. In order to have honey that joins harmoniously, it must first be made into a syrup. But happily, that is as easy as the drink itself. Put two parts honey and one part water in a saucepan; stir over a low flame until the honey dissolves in the water. Let it cool.
Now that we have our honey syrup, we can make a gold rush. Into a shaker goes ice, 1/2 ounce freshly squeezed lemon juice, 1/2 ounce of our honey syrup, and 2 ounces of bourbon. Shake for at least a minute and then strain into an Old Fashioned glass with ice. Garnish with lemon peel.
But what of the gold rush’s sibling, the penicillin cocktail? The gold rush is a brilliant summertime drink, even on an unseasonably cool evening. But the penicillin was out of place. Made with smokey Laphroaig single malt Scotch, it should have been saved for the autumn drinks menu, or, even better, the winter slate.
I will plan to return to that drink when the leaves turn and start to fall.
Eric Felten is the James Beard Award-winning author of How’s Your Drink?
