The Noble Experiment in Collingwood is one of our favourite discoveries of 2015. The food at this bar/eatery is very good and the drinks are excellent. Spirits and cocktails are the main focus here, with an extensive range of both on offer. What’s really interesting when it comes to the cocktails is the barrel aged cocktails that are on offer. Linus Schaxmann, head cocktail maker at The Noble Experiment explained to us the philosophy behind barrel ageing cocktails.
There is nothing quite like barrel aging cocktails. It softens the harshness of the alcohol and lets all the different flavours of the spirits mingle together, so you don’t know where one flavour starts and the other ends. The result is a complex, smooth drink, with a greater depth of flavour than you find in most cocktails.
A lot of the top bars have recognised this and may have a barrel aged cocktail on their list. However none of them have embraced it to the extent as we have. We now have 23 cocktails in our barrel aged program , have our barrels custom made and are about to move to larger 50 litre barrels, to keep up with demand.
We’ve tried a few barrel aged cocktails on the occasions that we’ve visited the Noble Experiment and can confirm that the harshness of the alcohol is indeed softened. The flavour profiles are really quite complex and different that one would expect.
To showcase their cocktail making skills, we decided to team up with The Noble Experiment to design a collaboration cocktail. We provided a list of flavours that we were looking for, and on overarching theme for the cocktail. Linus took this and created an amazing spiced pear rum old fashioned – the perfect drink for this winter! It might not be barrel aged, but it’s damn tasty. If you want to try making it at home, here’s the recipe.
Ingredients
The Pear Syrup
- 1 pear, peeled and quartered
- 1 cup (250ml) water
- ½ cup white sugar
- 1tbsp (20ml) lemon juice
- 1 cinnamon stick
- ½ vanilla pod, sliced lengthways
The Old Fashioned
- 60ml Appleton Estate 12 year old rum
- 15ml spiced pear syrup
- 2 dashes Angostura bitters
Method
The Pear Syrup
- Ass the sugar, lemon juice, cinnamon and vanilla to the water.
- Simmer in a sacuepan for 10 minutes, then add the pear.
- Gently simmer for another 10 minutes.
- Cool the mixture then strain it through a fine sieve, using a large wooden spoon to press the pear and extract all of the flavour.
- Sealed and refrigerated, the syrup will keep for up to 1 month.
The Old Fashioned
- Pour all of the ingredients into a mixing glass or a large glass.
- Stir over ice and pour into a large “rocks” glass full of ice.
- Garnish with an orange twist.
Notes
You can use any type of dark rum to make this, however we think that the Appleton Estate 12 year old has the best flavour profile to match the other components.