The Abbey Cocktail

For this one, I turned to the first entry in Dale DeGroff's The Craft of the Cocktail: Everything You Need to Know to Be a Master Bartender, with 500 Recipes: The Abbey Cocktail.

Note that the Abbey Cocktail can be found in a lot of different places online. It is the first in the Savoy Cocktail book, too, so it is the first that the Underhill Lounge features here. You can find it on the Cocktail database, the Webtender (where they recommend a cherry garnish), or the Cocktails wiki (which also recommends a cherry), or from my fellow Texan, who happens to be a bit inebriated, I guess, and who likens it to a fancy gin and juice, a description that I appreciate. He, also, got it from Dale DeGroff. Or you can go to an academic take from my hometown here.

Anyway, here's how you make it, according to DeGroff. Shake together with ice:
and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Then garnish with a flamed orange peel.

Tipsy Texan's Great Website!
The Abbey Cocktail is interesting. Again, it's not quite as sweet as I thought it would be, but the addition of the Lillet makes it unique. I keep learning new things about this stuff, and its use here is new to me. In the Vesper, it is used to lighten gin and vodka. Here, it is used almost as a sweetener, like a liqueur would be. Imagine replacing the Lillet with Cointreau, and you have another drink. With the Abbey Cocktail, it adds hints of otherness that complement the gin nicely. The orange really comes through thanks to the bitters and flamed orange peel. At first, I was thrown by it because I wanted it to be sweeter, but by the end, I had come to terms with it and wanted to try another one. Which is what I'm going to do now.