We had plenty of mint left over after making Planter’s Punch. D experimented with putting it in some of our food dishes but it’s a notorious difficult flavor to pair with. I had the bright idea of making Mint Juleps with the remaining, I mean it is Spring and all. The first step was getting a handle on what exactly goes into a Mint Julep, and like a lot of things that have been around for a while, there are quite a few varieties of the cocktail. Some call for white sugar, some call for brown sugar. Some insist that you use only powdered sugar, some mention soda water others leave it out. I decided to go with the most basic recipe I could find with the assumption that it’d be the closest to the original. Just bourbon, brown sugar, fresh mint, and a lot of ice.
Mint Julep
- 2 oz. bourbon
- 1 tsp. brown sugar
- 10 mint leaves
- 4 cups of ice
Crush the ice. In a cocktail shaker muddle 8 mint leaves and brown sugar. Add bourbon and stir. Pack a cocktail cup with crushed ice until overflowing. Strain bourbon into cup. Stir until sides of cup frost over. Top with more ice and garnish with remaining mint leaves.
Not really much to look at is it? It wasn’t really much to drink either… I suppose if I was at the Kentucky Derby under a hot sun, sipping on a Mint Julep might not be a bad idea. Or if I had a porch to sit on during a long warm, summer evening than a Mint Julep might make sense. There just isn’t much to talk about here. Sightly sweetened bourbon with a hint of mint that gets more and more watered down as you drink it. If I tried this again I think I’d crush the ice a little finer and see if club soda adds anything to the drink. In all likelihood though, the next time I have mint lying around I’ll make a Mojito.
