Last Call

Last year we visited American Bar currently #2 and formerly the #1 bar in the world, according to the World’s Top 50 Bars. The bar is beautiful and it is filled with well dressed men and women out for a night on the town. However, because we did not make advanced reservations, we sat in the main lounge… which is far from the beautiful bar and feels a bit like an airport lounge full of rich people.

Most of the cocktails were excellent (and very pricy), so we were curious about the recipes. When we recently came across the “Last Call” cocktail in the Whisky Advocate magazine, we went to work gathering ingredients (earl grey tea bags and a bottle of ruby port) to create it. The drink blends Bunnahabhain, a lightly (by Islay standards) peaty whisky, Campari, Earl Grey syrup, and Ruby Port to make a wonderfully smoky drink.

It’s hard to make a peaty scotch taste good in a cocktail. But the flavors in here work beautifully. It’s a genius cocktail, with a lot of unexpected flavors working harmoniously together: earl grey, campari, port, and peaty scotch. A really beautiful cocktail.

Ingredients

• 1.5 oz Bunnahabhain
• .75 oz Campari
• .5 oz Ruby Port
• .25 oz Earl Grey Syrup

Glass

Cocktail Glass

Instructions

• Add all ingredients to a mixing tin.
• Stir and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

The drink was the brainchild of Angelo Sparvoli from the American Bar.