What A Day – Esprit de Figues
Another idea I had for a cocktail using the Seamaster Rum revolved around a fig liqueur. While this might not be the most common fruit liqueur on the market, it certainly is intriguing. Apart from that, the Esprit de Figues uses natural ingredients and just seems perfect for creating cocktails with it.
A 150-year-old distillery in Burgundy produces the Esprit de Figues liqueur from Violette de Bordeaux figs. The liqueur gets its purple colour from a three-month infusion of the figs in neutral alcohol from Northern France. However, the next steps of production remain a secret. In the end, the liqueur has an ABV of 20 % and is bottled in a beautiful decanter-style bottle. All in all, the creation of the recipe took twelve trials and seven years.
Luscious figs
I guess it is obvious that the Esprit de Figues tastes of figs. You get a lot of fresh fig flavours, but also some green notes. They remind me of a bit of black currant leaves. Additionally, the sweetness is noticeable, with a velvety mouth-feel, but this is perfectly fine for a liqueur. I enjoyed the liqueur very much, especially its natural and pure fig taste.
A fig Old-Fashioned
My initial idea was to replace the orange curaçao in a Mai Tai with the Esprit de Figues. However, after a while I thought that an Old-Fashioned style cocktail would better allow the flavours of the liqueur to shine. Apart from that, I again used the Burke’s Seamaster Rum as a base spirit for my third and final entry to the #bhcc2021. Since cinnamon and figs also work well in desserts, I added cinnamon instead of plain simple syrup. Apart from that, I used black walnut bitters, also because they seemed to go well with the fig liqueur.
1,5 cl Esprit de Figues Liqueur
3 Dashes Fee Brother’s Black Walnut Bitters
0,75 cl Cinnamon Syrup
Garnish: Dried Flowers;
Song: Ben Howard – What A Day;
The “What a Day” clearly reminds me of a Rum Old-Fashioned. However, there are complimenting spice and fruit notes. You can find a lot of cinnamon notes in the taste which go very well with the fig notes from the liqueur. Interestingly enough, the Jamaica rum notes of the Seamaster are a little subdued and the Barbados rum shines through a bit better.
*The fact that I received a product reviewed in this article for free, did not – in any way – influence the rating of said product. The fig liqueur was provided by the Bremer Spirituosen Contor.
