Salty Sweet – Hoos Sal Miakki

Liquorice is a love or hate thing. I love this salty flavoured sweet and at least for me, it cannot be salty enough. Therefore, I was keen on trying the new liquor from Heiko Hoos. The liquorice and salmiac flavoured liqueur opens up a lot of new possibilities for mixing cocktails. On top of that, it gave me the idea of mixing an equal-parts cocktail for this month’s Home Bar Awards Challenge.

For those of you who do not know Heiko Hoos, he distils his own gin in Karlsruhe, Germany. I already featured his gins here on the blog. However, this time we take a closer look at a rather unconventional product. With  the Sal Miakki Heiko uses natural liquorice flavour, sal ammoniac or salmiac and glucose syrup. In fact, he uses a lot of salmiac which means that the liqueur has to be labelled as “extra strong”. In the end, the liqueur is bottled at 30 % ABV.

Salty liquorice

First, let me tell you, that I love liquorice, the saltier the better! So, it might not come as a surprise that I love the Sal Miakki, too. The liqueur clearly tastes of liquorice with all the associated flavours of anise, fennel and liquorice root. Apart from that, you can also taste a clear saline notes. On top of that, I noticed some citrus and caramel, too. In the end, the sweetness is noticeable, but not overwhelming.

A simple equal-parts drink

For a drink, I decided to keep things simple and just combine the salmiac liqueur with gin and vermouth. I do not know if this means the drink is a Negroni or a Dry Martini variation. However, I chose Heiko’s Lapsang Souchong flavoured gin as a base spirit. On top of that, to stay true to the Home Bar Awards theme of April “equal-parts”, I kept all ingredients at one ounce. If you are not bound by that rule, I would suggest you add a couple of dashes of Liquorice Bitters from The Seventh Sense.

The “Salty Sweet” starts off with a  note reminiscent of a Martini cocktail. However, you quickly taste the liquorice note, too. Through the salinity of the Sal Miakki the drink also evokes the memory of a Dirty Martini. In conclusion, the drink’s taste is rather weird, but also intriguing and delicious. – That is, if you like liquorice and salmiac of course.

*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 liqueur was provided by Heiko Hoos.