El Presidente
This version of El Presidente comes courtesy of Craft Rum Club. It is a twist on a recipe from Two Drifters Signature English Rum using our No.3 S.E. Dry instead of the traditional bianco giving a drier finish.
Husband & wife team, Russ & Gemma, make their rum from scratch in Devon named after the lines 'Two Drifters off to see the world’ from the song Moon River which Gemma walked down the aisle to at their wedding. This dry, cask aged, Exeter Rum has notes of tropical fruit & toffee, which marry well with local flavours of gooseberry apple & honey from our S.E. Dry London vermouth.
Ingredients:
30 ml London Vermouth Company No.3 S.E. Dry Vermouth
10 ml Giffard Orange Curacao Liqueur
3 x Dashes Angostora Chocolate Bitters
Method
Add all ingredients to a cocktail shaker or mixing glass.
Half fill with ice and stir for thirty seconds
Strain carefully into a chilled coupette glass.
To garnish, add a strip of orange zest.
Origin Story
El Presidente & the story of its origin change over time like the recipe. This is my reading of the story: According to 1924 Cuban “Manual Del Cantinero”, it was invented in 1913 for Cuban President Mario Garcia Menocal. It was later tweaked & popularised by American barman, Eddie Woekle at the Jockey Club, before President Gerardo Machado, jealous of his predecessor asked for his own version in the 1920s, which was tweaked with dashes of orange curacoa. Finally, in the 1930’s, Constante Ribalaigua Vert, inventor of the Daquiri combined the two presidential recipes at the famous El Floridita in Havana, still using curaçao but dyeing it red to look like grenadine.