Good spirits | The Coast Halifax

Good spirits

Bartender Jeffrey Van Horne’s favourite new cocktails from a year of thoughtful drink menus.

I had The Big Boss at Field Guide, which is a mix of dark and amber rum with fresh lime, mint and cinnamon syrup. It was simple, clean, balanced and highlighted the warm flavours you find in both rums, great cocktail for this time of year.

La Frasca Cibi + Vini leans heavily towards cocktails with Italian aperitifs such as Campari, Aperol and also Prosecco to give a crisp balance to the bittersweet liqueurs. My favourite cocktail there was The Delmonico, which is a classic cocktail similar to The Manhattan, using Courvoisier cognac in the place of rye whiskey. The cognac gives this cocktail a rich warm flavour of dried fruit, raisins and spice.

The other place for great cocktails is EDNA. I love their New York Sour—it's a great classic, essentially it's a whiskey sour with a red wine float. The red wine leans the perfect amount of dryness and body to tang of fresh lemon juice. While the whiskey keeps the drink warm like a nice boozy sangria.