18) Georgia

1.5 oz. Square One Vodka
.5 oz. St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur
.75 oz. Peach puree
1 Tbsp. lemon juice

Shake all ingredients over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

This one was done pretty much on the fly by Ed for a regular who was looking for something refreshing, and wanted to be surprised. The peach puree had just recently come into the bar, and the St. Germain was because that is what we seem to use for everything these days. I know I said we'd stop it, but it's not my fault! Blame Ed. Take that Ed!

As you might have noticed by now, I'm not a big fan of Vodka. While I don't think it's entirely useless I do think it's the least useful of the basic spirits due to it's lack of flavor. One of the things I do think it's good for however, is allowing certain ingredients to shine without having to use them in quantities that would be overwhelming. After giving this cocktail a taste, I thought it was a perfect example of that. I can't believe we hadn't thought of pairing peach and St. Germain before - The floral qualities of the St. Germain and the smooth, voluptuous flavor of peach is a match made in heaven.

Using Vodka allowed for that flavor to come out unencumbered by other flavors that would have come into play had we used something like Gin (though I'm sure Ed and I will be experimenting with a Gin variation on this quite soon). The small amount of lemon juice added just a hint of citrus bite and helped had a bright note that opened up the drink.

Comments always welcome, or if you prefer the e-mail fire away at drinkaweek [at] gmail [dot] com.