A martini that tastes like a cheeseburger isn’t precisely customary bar fare, however at Sepia, it’s rapidly turn into some of the talked-about cocktails within the metropolis.
Head Bartender Keith Meicher’s “World Well-known” Cheeseburger Martini leans totally into the sudden, mixing approach, creativity, and simply the correct quantity of shock.
The drink begins with cornichon-infused gin, fat-washed with roasted beef tallow sourced immediately from the restaurant’s kitchen. From there, it’s constructed out with tomato water, dry vermouth, and a splash of pickled ramp vinegar, including brightness to stability the wealthy, umami-driven base. Stirred and served in a relaxing coupe, it’s completed with drops of dill oil and a “charcutini” skewer of cornichon and cheddar—an deliberately playful garnish.
The thought got here collectively organically, sparked by two unlikely components: leftover cornichon gin from a spirits dinner and a surplus of beef fats from the kitchen. Mixed, they set off a sequence response that resulted in one of many metropolis’s most creative cocktails—one which manages to be each technically exact and genuinely enjoyable to drink.
As savory cocktails proceed to achieve traction, drinks like this are pushing the class into new territory, proving that umami-driven builds may be simply as compelling (and craveable) as their citrus-forward counterparts. To know how a cocktail like this involves life (and why it really works so effectively), we caught up with Meicher to speak inspiration, approach, and the rising enchantment of savory drinks.
What was the “aha” second that led you to create a cheeseburger-inspired martini? Did the leftover beef fats instantly spark the thought, or was it an extended experiment within the kitchen?
First, it got here from having some Citadelle Cornichon Gin leftover from our Maison Ferrand spirits dinner. I had a couple of bottles in our liquor cage that I didn’t know what to do with. After which, unrelatedly, chef requested me if I had any use for some extra beef fats that that they had out there. At any time when chef asks me if I can use something he’s attempting to do away with, I ALWAYS say sure. After which, as soon as I assumed to mix the pickle gin with the meat fats, then we had been off to the races…
Fats-washing gin with roasted beef tallow isn’t one thing you see day-after-day. How did you determine that will work with Citadelle’s cornichon-infused gin, and what flavors had been you hoping to focus on?
The truth that it isn’t one thing you see day-after-day was half the explanation I wished to do it. Fairly often once I’m writing a menu at Sepia, I’ll ask myself “What have I merely by no means seen earlier than?”, and attempt to go along with that. As for flavors I’m attempting to focus on, my intent is to make a stirred drink that tastes as very like a smashburger as I can.
The dill oil and charcutini skewer are visually superb. How do these closing touches elevate the ingesting expertise (past taste)?
Effectively after all there’s that outdated saying: you style first along with your eyes. When somebody first sees this drink, and it involves them with what appears to be like like a bloody mary garnish on it, and 4 drops of sensible inexperienced dill oil, they most likely don’t know what they’re in for. I’m actually within the ‘shock’ of all of it.
Savory cocktails are positively having a second – how do you see this cheeseburger martini becoming into the bigger motion of umami-forward drinks?
I *love* savory cocktails. For years, I’d put only a single savory drink on a Sepia menu for the season. However, after a visit to Mexico the place I noticed cocktail menus that had been dominated by savory type drinks, I used to be impressed to actually lean into that intuition. Now, on this present menu, there are drinks that function roasted scallions, beets, carrots, and this cheeseburger martini. I hope that everybody will get as a lot of a thrill out of this type as I do.
This looks as if the right drink for summer season cookouts. How would you counsel pairing it with grilled meals, or is it daring sufficient to face by itself?
I had a bar visitor a couple of weeks in the past that was in from out of city, principally to take a look at Chicago’s meals scene. She was telling her good friend that the cheeseburger martini was the perfect burger she had on her go to! I assumed that was exceptionally cool of her to say, and appreciated that the drink can maintain its personal all by itself.
What’s the subsequent adventurous cocktail you’d like to experiment with? Any wild concepts brewing for summer season?
I’ve been playing around with making a carrot orgeat for a shaken sake cocktail, however you’ll have to come back in to Sepia to see the way it seems!
The put up Inside Chicago’s Most Sudden Cocktail: The Cheeseburger Martini at Sepia appeared first on Chilled Journal.
