42BELOW Vodka: Creative Mixer to the Extreme

Tasted neat, delicate sweetness initially shines through with barely any aroma in the nose. There is slight silkiness in the texture, but not slippery oiliness that some vodka leans towards. I notice a faint residual edge to it in the finish just at the back of my tongue. 42BELOW Vodka is thin while retaining a fair amount of body making this a high quality mixing vodka. If it makes sense to imagine, 42BELOW lies somewhere between velvet in texture with a slight abrasiveness in the nap so to speak to let you know there is something significant in its nature not to be ignored or considered one of the crowd.

I am a sucker for lemon about now as the winter weather is getting the best of me and wishful thinking will hopefully hurry spring up a little. The Lemon Sorbet Cocktail seemed just the ticket. This is a nice little pucker me up sipper, but I “dashed” a little too much on the sugar syrup. Which begs the question; how much is a dash exactly?

Dash or Splash

Universal terms for miniature amounts. There are roughly 36 dashes in one ounce. When a recipe calls for a flexible amount of dashes, for example 2 – 4 dashes bitters, this denotes you are seasoning to taste. A splash is faintly larger than a dash, but considered to be less and 1/2 ounce.

Lemon Sorbet Cocktail

1-1/2 measure 42BELOW Vodka

1/3 measure Limoncello

1 dash Fresh Lemon Juice

1 dash Simple Syrup

Lemon Zest Garnish

Combine liquid ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake to blend and chill. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Grate lemon zest on the surface of the cocktail or as 42BELOW suggests “a white orchid if feeling ostentatious.” – Notation: If you prefer tart over sweet, lean a little heavier on your lemon juice dashes and weaker on your sugar syrup dashes.

As a Straight Up Martini with hint of vermouth and lemon twist the 42BELOW fills out with a little more body. The vermouth fine tunes the edges to a much better degree than consuming the vodka neat. 42BELOW Vodka is worthy used in a straight up martini, but preferable as a mixer. The reason is the little after taste in the finish that lingers at the back of the throat. It is not off-putting, but with so many choices on the market tailor made for different purposes, why not use vodka geared more toward what it is best suited for? Use 42BELOW to get creative. Heck, get wild and crazy if you must. The guys at 42BELOW certainly do. One need only look at their Cocktail World Cup competition to see that. They have required participants to parachute out of an airplane and shake their first cocktail upon landing for pity sake. Now that is extreme!

The next Cocktail World Cup will take place early 2010. Keep checking in for details. (And hey 42BELOW…Can I go? Just to photograph, write about it you know and taste the Feijoa and Passion flavors since you play keep away from the USA.) Find more 42BELOW recipes (Summer Breeze, Fresca, Flame of Love to name a few) on their website.

42BELOW Vodka sample for review courtesy representatives of 42BELOW Vodka representatives.

Cheri Loughlin is a leading cocktail and photography resource for beverage companies, event planners, businesses and individuals. High resolution cocktail and beverage stock photography images are available in downloadable digital format in the newly redesigned Stock Photography Gallery at www.cheriloughlin.com.

Twitter, Facebook, StumbleUpon – str8upcocktails @ gmail.com – ©2012 Cheri Loughlin-The Intoxicologist, All Rights Reserved. All opinions, reviews and spirits’ coverage are the personal opinion and decision of Cheri Loughlin.

42BELOW Vodka: Creative Mixer to the Extreme

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