LCBO Food & Drink Autumn 2023

NEXT-GEN COCKTAILS

Precision Infusion Having conquered the hearts and minds of chefs, the sous vide cooker, a “water oven” that makes it possible to cook ingredients at low, precise temperatures, has recently been seen behind the bar—this tool’s next frontier for exploration. Expect to see and taste more sous vide–method cocktails in the future, given that it’s a dead-simple way to deliver potent, fresh flavours from

TIP

Some cocktails, such as the Old Fashioned, can be almost entirely prepared via sous vide, so that all the home bartender has to do when it’s time to serve is cool, strain, pour over ice and add a dash of bitters. HACK A slow cooker can take the place of a sous vide machine— just be sure you have a vacuum-sealer that can handle sous vide–quality plastic bags. This recipe can easily be scaled up to serve groups, too!

fruit and other ingredients into a cocktail glass.

FIGGY FASHIONED P. 178

ASK AN EXPERT Owner, manager and head mixologist at Stratford’s The Relic Lobby Bar, Ulises Sanchez says that bartenders initially started using sous vide as a time-saving move: you can mix up an infusion, seal the heatproof plastic sack, drop it in a sous vide bath and get on with the rest of your prep list. The reason the technique is about to take off at bars, though, has a lot more to do with the thirst for novel flavours in cocktails—from smoke to heat to umami and tropical fruit. Sous vide infusions can help preserve the full, punchy flavour of raw ingredients, since it’s a gentler and more precise cooking method. These days, more is more (flavour, that is). Sous vide has got us covered.

136 FOOD & DRINK AUTUMN 2023