This past Friday night, J and I hosted our semi-regular cocktail party. It’s a great way to end a busy workweek, just hanging out with friends over drinks and snacks. My favorite part of the preparation is creating a drink menu: four cocktails, with different flavors and degrees of booziness, something for every palate. I drew inspiration from our recent trip to Italy, the many varieties of amaro that we tasted, and the several bottles that we brought back. My ever-expanding collection was exceeding the capacity of the liquor cabinet, so amaro-based cocktails were the perfect opportunity to share the wealth and reduce the population to a more manageable number.

Virtually every café in Rome offers Aperol Spritz as a pre-dinner aperitivo, so that was an obvious choice for the menu. Light and refreshing, the bite of bitter orange is tempered by the effervescence of prosecco. The Negroni is another classic Italian cocktail as well as a personal favorite, and definitely belongs on the list. But the standard recipe calls for Campari, which is similar to Aperol, and I wanted something different. After some experimentation, I opted for a White Negroni, with Suze as its replacement. This bitter gentian liqueur brings a brilliant yellow hue and astringent citrus flavor, somewhat akin to grapefruit peel. For the third drink, my thoughts turned to bourbon, undoubtedly influenced by the cool autumn weather and my Southern roots. Paired with Averna in lieu of vermouth, the Black Manhattan is a dark, soulful riff on the traditional cocktail.

Amaro plays a supporting role in those three drinks, so it should be the star of the show in the fourth. I recalled that J had a fantastic amaro-focused cocktail at Barnum Café in Rome, created by Matheus Dela Rune, bartender extraordinaire (and fellow cocktail blogger of Urban Mixologist). As this drink was the last round of an extended evening, my memory of its components was a bit hazy. Definitely Strega, canary-yellow from saffron, with a sweet licorice flavor. Possibly Zucca, or one of the rhubarb-based amari. Some citrus, simple syrup, and a splash of soda? I’d have to wing it. The final version that I concocted, dubbed the Melting Witch, is pleasantly bitter and incredibly complex – not a replicate of the original, but rather an homage to its spirit (and spirits). Salute!

h.

Melting Witch

(bonus points for figuring out the drink name)

• ½ oz. Strega
• ½ oz. Sfumato
• ½ oz. Gran Classico
• ½ oz. lime juice
• seltzer
• lime wheel, to garnish
• cocktail shaker, bar spoon, ice, Collins glass

Steps

• add first four ingredients to ice-filled shaker
• stir until well chilled; strain into ice-filled Collins glass
• top with ~2 oz. seltzer (to desired dilution); stir briefly
• garnish with lime wheel