Spoiler: We both didn’t like it, though for unrelated reasons. We were certain that tiki and byrrh were going to go together. They didn’t. At last not here.
Tasting Notes
Ryan: Initially, way too much Batavia arrack. The drink has a weird briny feel that doesn’t work with the other ingredients. Maybe it needs more …not Batavia. Since I’ve seen this recipe crop up a bunch, this drink feels like a classic, and I don’t want to mess with the ideas in it… so, I guess it’s just one I don’t like all that much. Maybe it’s Rory’s influence tasting notes in general but I agree that the Batavia arrack is very “prickly” and “rough”. I’m writing this and waiting for a bit more dilution and melding of flavors to try another sip, but I don’t want to wait too long because then the Batavia will show through more and I don’t want it to here! The Smith & Cross does not show through much to me, it’s like all Batavia…
Waiting a few sips and now I just get a lot of watered down Smith & Cross, oops. At least it’s not just Batavia.
Rory: Initial taste: tastes like all the other canonical tiki drinks, which I think means “tastes too much like smith & cross and lime”… though there’s no lime here; it’s lemon. so I guess it tastes too much like Smith & Cross (which I liked from first sip … so we went through an entire bottle in two weeks, and now it reads as uninteresting, I guess? oops!)
the byrrh is coming through after a few sips, and the lemon, but I don’t know if it’s enough to combat the rum, falernum, and angostura. I think I’ve enjoyed more both the other byrrh drink (eyes on the table) and the other arrack drinks (aztec warrior and spice road especially, though they’re not nearly as batavia-arrack-focused; the atalanta was okay).
i don’t feel like it’s a particularly interesting drink; it feels pretty by-the-book tiki. the cinchona from the byrrh is coming through, but none of the other notes are very original. it’s kinda like when people put sriracha or chili crisp in things and it just tastes like sriracha or chili crisp.
Ryan was concerned that I hadn’t really mentioned the batavia, and I said I didn’t really taste it, so I’ve gone to pour myself a half-oz to try to remind myself what it tastes like on its own. Smell: rubbing alcohol and olive green. Taste: The texture of rubber (not flavor! just… biting through something thick) and prickly prickly heat. Olive green. There’s some burn.
Going back to the privateer: I get the thick chewy latex of the Batavia arrack, but …. I think I’m still mostly getting the Smith & Cross and lemon. I agree with Ryan that this isn’t a great drink for us, though. It’s a little disappointing; I’d really enjoyed the tiki/adjacent drinks we’ve had before from Last Rites (lots of tiki flavors, but also amari and fortified wines) and I was hoping this was going to be a gateway recipe to that.
I was going to say that I didn’t feel the lemon and mint garnish brought much to it, and apparently the original garnish was nutmeg! I think that might’ve worked better, though I don’t know it would’ve redeemed the drink. The original quinquina component was Dubonnet, which I haven’t had, and instead of lemon it originally contained lime, which at once feels like a major and completely inconsequential change.
Recipe
- 1 1⁄2 oz Batavia Arrack van Oosten
- 1 oz John D. Taylor’s Velvet Falernum
- 3⁄4 oz Smith & Cross Traditional Jamaica Rum
- 1⁄2 oz Byrrh Grand Quinquina
- 3⁄4 oz lemon juice
- 3 dashes Angostura Bitters
Shake with ice, and strain into a double rocks glass filled with crushed ice.
Garnish with fruit and a mint sprig.
Source: Mattias Hagglund via Haus Alpenz