Instead of a long story about how my recipe reminds me of a warm fire on an autumn afternoon. This means you can easily decide if you’re up to it or if you’d rather toss a pizza in the oven.

For ingredients, 1 means you may already have all of them at home and 5 means you may need to special order an ingredient.
For equipment, 1 means the most very basic of tools need and 5 means needing to buy a special piece of equipment you may not use often.
For method, 1 means as easy as prepping and tossing in the oven and 5 means you’ll feel like you’re juggling flaming knives.

Ingredients: 2/5
Equipment: 1/5
Method: 2/5

Ingredients:

  • 1 cup brown sugar
  • 1 cup water
  • Vanilla extract
  • 1 orange
  • Angostura Bitters
  • 60 ml rum (I use Mount Gay Extra Old or a similar cask rum)
  • Ice

Equipment:

  • 1 small saucepan
  • Slotted spoon
  • Cocktail peeler or regular peeler if you don’t have one
  • Small cocktail spoon

Method:

Making the Simple Syrup

  1. Cut the orange in half and peel
  2. Chop the peeled half into small pieces
  3. Add the sugar, water, orange pieces and a dash of vanilla extract to the saucepan and bring to a boil.
  4. Remove from heat and set aside until cooled. Remove the orange pieces using a slotted spoon
  5. Once cooled, you can store the simple syrup in a glass or plastic container in the fridge for up to a month

Making the cocktail

  1. Add a tbsp of simple syrup and two dashes of bitters to a rocks/lowball glass
  2. Add 3-4 large ice cubes to the glass
  3. Pour the rum over the ice and stir very briefly
  4. Garnish with an orange twist. This video is great for learning how