I really enjoy making cocktails. It’s a little reminiscent of the free for all science experiments or pretend cooking show concoctions I made as a kid. Except you get to drink a tasty cocktail at the end. One of the perks of being an adult 🙂 We often go to our local liquor store and just wander the store picking up things that seem interesting. Then we get to play around making whatever recipes we find that use them.
I chose this recipe because I had some Amaro Nonino I bought that I needed to use. It is supposed to be made with tequila but in this case I used vodka because we were out of tequila, and I had this giant bottle of ketel one. I know that is probably a horrible crime to bartenders, but I do it often. It is nice to try a new drink made correctly, but sometimes you just have to make it work.
I really enjoyed this one. It had a nice flavor and wasn’t overly sweet. I wasn’t sure honestly about the aperol, amaro, and vermouth combo, but it works! I think good vermouth makes a huge difference in the drinkability of a cocktail, so it is worth splurging on a good one if you can. We like Carpano Antica Formula Vermouth which you can get at Total Wine and probably other places.
For 2 drinks:
- 3 ounces tequila (or in my case vodka)
- 1 ounce aperol
- 1/2 ounce amaro nonino
- 1 ounce sweet vermouth
- 2 dashes of bitters (I used citrus bitters)
Combine in a cocktail shaker with ice, strain into a chilled cocktail glass. You can garnish with a grapefruit twist if you like. I’m usually not motivated enough to do garnishes unless it is the cherries in a Manhattan.