Only recently has crème de violette become available in the American market. Though not locally procurable to us, we convinced a friend to snag a bottle during his recent visit to New York. From the distributor’s website: “Rothman & Winter Crème de Violette is produced from a careful maceration of Queen Charlotte and March Violets in “Weinbrand” (this distilled from grapes), with cane sugar added for sweetness. Over its three generations, Destillerie Purkhart has produced this liqueur by special request of its regional gastronomy customers. In these local markets, the buyer is most often the “Konditorei” who will use the Violette in special cakes and chocolates.”

Chocolate and special cakes are swell but what crème de violette does to enhance the depth of an aviation is nothing short of amazing. What was a balanced drink of herbs, citrus and the cherry, bitter almond flavors of maraschino is elevated by a floral intensity. After some tinkering we determined that the amount of lemon juice should be slightly reduced to allow the equal proportion of liqueurs more time to shine. As with any good classic cocktail the proportions can be adjusted slightly to your tastes and frankly, we may just be using a touch more crème de violette for a while. We all agreed that the following recipe was the most balanced:

1-1/2 oz. gin
1/2 oz. lemon juice
1/3 oz. maraschino liqueur
1/3 oz. crème de violette
– Shake with cracked ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

Like so many other pre-Prohibition cocktails, we once believed that the aviation was named after some obscure event or person forever lost to the passage of time. But after making this truer version that turns out the semi-transparent color of a bruised winter sky the naming becomes quite clear. Which god do we thank for making one of our favorite cocktails even better?

Beer and wine, of course, fit that mold. Low alcohol, lighter, drier beers or whites in fish-friendly regions. Big wines in regions with spice. Family-brewed beers that fit farming lifestyles or pubs for high-density cities. But I hadn’t really thought much about spirits in that context until this weekend when I brought some Fish House Punch to my co-blogger’s house for a Saturday evening party.

Ted Haigh, aka Dr. Cocktail, writes about the punch:

In 1732, fully 104 years before Texas declared itself a Republic, Schuylkill (pronounced “SKOO-kull”), home of Fish House Punch, was its own colony, and later its own sovereign state. It must’ve been quite a place, too. It had a Navy (well, two boats). It had an army (OK, a cannon). At its core it was a club: The Schuylkill Fishing Company… A recipe as old as Fish House Punch, fervently slurped by the Father of Our Country, has inevitably gone through many fanciful formulations. Jerry Thomas related a simple (and probably accurate) recipe using lemon juice, sugar, water, peach brandy, Cognac and rum in 1862. Another was contributed by Mrs. Goodfellow’s Cooking School in 1907 that added oranges, strawberries or pineapple but called the addition of green tea “an abomination.”

The variations are interesting, and I can’t help but think these variations were spurred on by available ingredients. And more to the point, why rum and brandy? The answer, I suspect, is because of the importance of rum to the early colonies and which would have easily made its way into the areas near Philadelphia, a wealthy city in those days. Not surprisingly, the colonies and territories that would go on to form middle America seemed to acquire a fondness for bourbon, and while they had their own punches and juleps, Fish House Punch was created in a time and place that almost required its invention. Rum was available, and over time, those with access to strawberries or different types of teas or brandies would have altered the recipe to suit their needs, of course. Family recipes would have emerged all around three common ingredients: rum, brandy, and a need to make them easily quaffable.

The recipe I used was based on Haigh’s, with a substitution of some pretty piss poor apricot brandy for his suggested top-shelf peach brandy — in and of itself a choice made because Detroit doesn’t see a big selection of peach brandies.

Fish House Punch

• 2 quarts Jamaica rum (I used Mount Gay silver)
• 1 quart brandy (I used Hennessey and some from another bottle)
• 1/2 pint peach brandy
• 1/2 pint Maraschino liqueur
• 1 quart fresh-brewed green tea
• 1 pint fresh lemon juice
• 1 pound sugar

I’d like to try to make this in the future with some variations: black tea for green tea, slightly more lemon juice, replacing some or all of the sugar with some sort of homemade spicy sugar syrup, et cetera. Regardless, this is a great party punch that represents the fine human tradition of creating something amazing out of whatever ingredients are available. Enjoy it as a powerful social lubricant at your next gathering.