Bourbon GingerMint Cocktail - and home made ginger simple syrup

My latest book from my Cook My Book group is Smoke and Pickles by Edward Lee. While I was browsing for something more complicated to make, I paused for a moment in the cocktail section.

Okay, it was a long pause.

I've been dabbling with cocktail-making lately, and the ginger simple syrup Lee used in one of his recipes caught my eye. I thought it would be a pretty thing to have in my arsenal.

And, fortunately, I had a good amount of ginger in my freezer. I had gotten a big hand of it from Frieda's Specialty Produce a while back, and I used some right away then froze the rest.

The recipe is so simple, it's barely a recipe:

Ginger Simple Syrup

1 cup of water
1 cup of sugar
3 ounces of chopped ginger

Combine the ingredients in a saucepan. Bring to a boil, make sure the sugar is melted, then let it steep. The book suggested 20 minutes, but longer is fine. You can let it steep until it's cool, if you like. Then strain out and discard the ginger and refrigerate the simple syrup.

I'm trying to think of a use for the ginger - it still had quite a bit of "bite" to it - but so far I haven't thought of anything stunning. If you use a lot of ginger, you might have some ideas.

So, once I had the ginger syrup, I started brainstorming some ideas. First, I made a simple ginger soda with the ginger syrup and some freshly made soda water.

Then I moved on to an actual cocktail.

Bourbon GingerMint

1 ounce Bulleit bourbon
1 ounce ginger simple syrup
1/4 ounce peppermint schnapps

Combine all in ingredients in a short glass with ice. Stir. Garnish as desired - I used a cherry. Serve.

Note: I receive a lot of samples from Diageo brands. The Bulleit bourbon was one. I'm not required to post, but I'm sure they appreciate it. The ginger came from Frieda's Specialty Produce.

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