Congratulations to you on taking your first steps towards DIY cocktails! You’ve memorized the recipes, you mumble them in your sleep. You‘ve become a mixologist, the bringer of fun at parties, yet something’s missing. Every drink you make ends up being topped by the same old garnish that the ones before you mention. You want to experiment, but don’t want the last step to bungle up all the hard work that went into creating your masterpiece. Worry not, here’s the last garnish handbook you’ll ever need.
How To Garnish A Cocktail
Your garnish can serve one of many functions. It can either just be a purely aesthetic addition, like an umbrella on a Piña Colada. It can add to the flavor of your drink, like the Tajin rim on a Margarita. In some cases, the garnish can be cool enough to possess both form and function, as seen with the many citrus garnishes that you see on various cocktails.
How about dissecting these garnishes a little and getting a bit familiar so the next time you get mixing, you guess less, and pour more?
Also read: Which Bollywood Character Are You Based on Your Favorite Drinks?
Citrus Garnishes For Cocktails
Did you know that lemons do not exist naturally? Lemons came to be as a result of crossbreeding bitter oranges with citrons. Before you ask, citrons are the predecessors of all citrus fruits (think Daddy Lemon). What we’re trying to say is, life didn’t give us lemons, we did!
Thank the mixologists for giving these lemons some glorious purpose though. Here are some ways you can use, not just lemons, but other citrus fruits to zhuzh up your cocktails:
- Wheels or Slices: Slices of citrus fruits can be added to your cocktails to not only infuse them with citrus flavors but also adding a visual element to an otherwise plain drink. It’s like your drink is an empty pool on a summer day and these slices are some really good looking peeps in that pool! Like people in a pool, the slices can be thick (with 3 C’s) or thin as a blade. Just like in real life, the thicker the slice, the more pulp you get, the juicier the situation.
You can also use dehydrated slices if you want to reduce the sweetness and dilution to imbue your drinks with a more pronounced flavor.
- Wedges: Citrus wedges serve a similar purpose in your cocktails to slices, as they add flavor as well as visual appeal to your mixes. The difference between wedges and slices is how they are cut. Wedges are prepared by cutting from the stem end to the bottom of the fruit. For slices you channel your inner Babua from Wasseypur, because the cut for slices is perpendicular to the cut of wedges.
Now, wedges don’t add as much flavor to your drink as slices do, but they could end up tilting your focus to do some shots, maybe? So that’s pretty neat.
- Twists: Citrus fruits really went hard on the “no waste movement” when even their peel joined the garnish game! Introducing citrus peels to your cocktails can add the unique taste that the fruit possesses when you really tone down their sour and/or sweet notes. These flavors are carried in the form of oils in the skin that can be expressed, or brought out by light muddling or squeezing (not too much though, that can lead to bitter results). Lemons and limes have a spiced, vegetal note to them, while oranges can bring a tart, acidic note to your drink.
You can extract the peel off your citrus fruit using various knives and peelers. It all depends on which one you’re more comfortable with.
- Spirals: This garnish is also created using the peel of a citrus fruit, but don’t get it twisted! (That’s for the previous garnish.) Spirals require a little more finesse and add more visual flair to your drink than flavor.
The best way to imbue your drinks with the flavors from citrus peels is to run them on the rim of your glass after lightly bruising them. You can also lightly squeeze the peels to spray some of the oil from them onto the top of your drink.
Remember that pool metaphor we used earlier? It works well in the case of using citrus peels too. Just as most people don’t get all the way down to their birthday suits before getting into a pool (we said most, exceptions can be, and are made), you don’t want to strip the fruit all the way. Use a light hand and avoid the white pith that is between the upper layer of the peel and the pulp of the fruit. The pith has the type of bitter taste that makes your teeth feel all weird and your drink will be worse for it.
Also read: Best Cocktail Smoker Kits In India For The Home Mixologist
Fruit Garnishes For Cocktails
Moving on from the sourpusses over on citrus-land, we cast a wider net over the fruit domain to meet the next type of garnish that you can use to turn your mixture of spirits and mixers into a full-fledged cocktail.
Fruits can add flavor to your cocktails and a change of pace from just sipping. What makes adding fruit to your drink even better is that you get to say a scrumptious goodbye to your beverage in the form of a booze soaked, flavorful slice of fruit.
Fruit garnishes can take many forms. We channel our best Bubba from Forrest Gump as we tell you that you can slice ‘em, wedge ‘em, skewer ‘em and let them float on your drank or perch ‘em on the rim of the glass. You can add them fresh, or dried. They can be big like fruit fans, or teeny tiny little cubes. You can use them big ol’ melons or them fancy little cherries.
Truly, the world is not just your oyster, it’s your fruit salad too! You’re only limited by your creativity and the flavors you want to add to your cocktails.
Also read: 7 Best Fruit Wine Brands To Buy In India
Herb Garnishes For Cocktails
Whenever most people hear of herbs as an edible addition, people think of spices added to sauces and meals. Their first thought doesn’t go to cocktails. Well, a lot of herbs not only go into making the spirits that create your cocktails, they also work great as toppings to the cocktails containing these spirits.
Some of the most commonly used herbs are mint, cilantro, basil, and dill, but the list is not exclusive. To ensure that these leaves are able to leave an impact on your drink, it is advised to mildly muddle, bruise, crush, or damage them in some way. This allows the leaves to ooze their flavory goodness into your cocktails.
Damn! All this talk and leaves and crushing has us thinking of some other ways to get unsobered.
Also read: Here Is The World’s First Jackfruit-Flavoured Vodka
Herbs are typically used in cocktails that use spirits with mild or no additional flavor notes, like vodka. However, it is strongly recommended that you experiment with combinations. Go full “mad scientist” with beakers, flasks, and an entire chemistry set. That is how you will find your style and really understand the flavor combinations that work and the ones that don’t.
Rim Garnishes For Cocktails
Before we get into this style of garnishing your cocktail, we must warn you – messing up what you type when looking for “rim” and “glasses” can lead to some dubious search history!
Internet safety tips aside, rim garnishes can be some of the most interesting ways to round off a cocktail. You can go full Professor Utonium as you experiment with sugar, spice and everything nice. This style of garnishing provides an interesting spectrum to play with as you can use the old reliables like salt and sugar, as well as some literally spicy options like Tajin and ground peppers!
Rim garnishes obviously add flavor to your drinks and they also introduce an interesting crunchy texture to your sips. (Just make sure to not get carried away and bite into your glass.)
To add a rim garnish to your cocktail, lightly dampen the edge of the glass you will serve your cocktail in with water or a cut lemon. Next, dip and roll the dampened edge of your glass in a plate that has the rim garnish of your choice. You can get really creative and segment the garnish that you add to your cocktail, turning one glass into a vessel for multiple drinks.
Also read: Best Honey Cocktails That You Can Make At Home!
Summing Up
Although garnishes are something that rest on top of your cocktails, they can help add a whole lot of depth to them. A good garnish can really work magic and set your drink apart by adding new flavors, mouth feel and visuals to it.
Don’t be afraid to experiment with your garnish options and go against the grain. You might just be a few experiments away from finding your Rachmaninoff’s Third!
FAQs
What Garnish Goes With What Cocktail?
Limes, lemons, and other citrus fruits are the most commonly used garnishes for most cocktails. However, herbs, spices, fruits, and even meats have been successfully used to top drinks. So, there’s no one good answer, except “Experiment and find out!”
What Are 5 Popular Garnishes?
Based solely on how commonly they are used, the 5 most popular cocktail garnishes are:
- Citrus fruits and peels
- Cherries, berries, and other fruits
- Sugar and salt
- Herbs like mint, cilantro, basil, and more
- Chocolate syrup and chips
What Are The Basic Garnishes For Cocktails?
Some of the more basic ingredients that can be used to garnish your cocktails are:
- Dehydrated fruits
- Cherries
- Lemon twists
- Mint
- Edible flowers
How To Choose A Cocktail Garnish?
You can be really picky and a purist about choosing the garnishes for your cocktail and sticking with what has been proven to work well, or you can get experimental and try combinations that are completely new and might even ruffle some feathers. The key thing to remember is that a good garnish is meant to elevate your cocktail’s flavor as well as its visual appeal. So it might help to use fresh or high quality ingredients and make sure that there are little to no blemishes or visual imperfections in your garnishes.
Does Every Cocktail Need A Garnish?
While you can always stick to the basics and make sure that the ingredients of the cocktail alone are enough. If you are making a drink that sits with its consumer for a while though, adding some garnish can provide the drinker (yourself or another) a better, well-rounded experience.
How To Make A Cocktail Look Fancy?
A cocktail can be made visually appealing in a lot of ways. You can use food coloring, ingredients with natural colors that affect the visuals of the final drink, or garnishes that add visual aspects to the drink beyond the liquids in the glass.
How To Prep Cocktail Garnishes?
While a lot of garnishes come pre-cut and already prepared these days, for a truly DIY experience, it is best to handle the garnish yourself. A little prep goes a long way and can really lead to a tailor made drinking experience. A few things you need to do to prepare your garnish are:
- Use a clean, sharp knife to peel and cut your garnish.
- If using fresh produce, wash the ingredients well before use.
- Practice to get used to and comfortable with your tool for a smoother and injury free prep session.
