Communal cocktails pack some real punchCommunal cocktails pack some real punch

Bret Thorn

As the holidays approach, special-occasion menu items are in order, and on drink menus, that often means a big batch of celebratory punch.

Operators are crafting their own blends of juices, fruits, teas, spices and spirits to create the familiar flavors and festive atmosphere associated with the party staple.

At Teardrop Cocktail Lounge, a bar in Portland, Ore., an $8 serving of punch from the “Flowing Bowl” is always an option on its cocktail list.

“It’s a hot punch at the front of the bar, so it has kind of communal aspect,” says owner Daniel Shoemaker. The punch flavor changes each week, and Shoemaker is now planning his cold-weather varieties.

“This winter I want to stick to some real traditional classics,” he says. That includes a ponche de la duc de Bourgogne, which is made by gently heating red wine with ruby port, cherry liqueur, orange juice, lemon juice, sugar and water.

He’s also planning a wassail bowl, for which he peels and cores apples and coats them inside and out with mace, nutmeg, clove, cinnamon, ginger and sugar. He roasts them and serves them in a bowl of Madeira with half a dozen tempered eggs folded into it.

“You can use sherry, too, but I like a nice five-year Malmsey Madeira,” he says.

Cocktail historian Dave Wondrich says punch was probably invented by English sailors in the 1600s.

At the time England was a country of beer- and wine-drinkers, he says, but those beverages did not keep well during long voyages on the high seas.

Either the sailors themselves or possibly English merchants mixed together alcohol and local ingredients to make something that was agreeable to the English palate, Wondrich says.

The resulting mixture of spirits, citrus juice, sugar, water and some kind of spice was likely the first type of cocktail, and also hard liquor’s entrée into polite English society.

“At the time, gentlemen drank spirits medicinally, not recreationally,” Wondrich says. But once punch was introduced, “the upper classes got just as drunk as the lower classes.”

But Wondrich, who currently is writing a book on the history of punch, says the original shared cocktails were probably about as strong as fortified wine.

For awhile, punch was an everyday drink, “but as society changed it became less acceptable to gather around a bowl of strong drink and see it off in the afternoon,” Wondrich says, and punch became a special occasion drink.

And so it got fancier. Champagne was often added, and the bowls got nicer.

“It became more of a focus for entertaining, and that’s kind of where it stands right now,” Wondrich says.

Jim Kearns, who with business partner Lynette Marrero developed the drink menu at Rye House, a new bar in New York City, equates punch with “panch,” the Hindi word for “five.” He says he thinks of punch as having five elements, all starting with the letter S: sweet, sour, spice, savory and strong.

Kearns and Marrero developed the Rye House punch, which has chai-infused rye whiskey, Batavia arrack—a spirit flavored with red rice that Kearns says has “a grassy, aggressively vanilla flavor,”—bitters, sugar, soda, lemon and grapefruit juice.

They’re adding another drink for brunch service, called Oregon Trail Punch. It’s made from the juices of lime, orange and grapefruit mixed with sugar, chai, aquavit, gin and bitters.

“I love the flavor of chai,” Kearns says. “I think tea is great in punch to begin with,” he adds, noting that he has used jasmine green tea in punches in the past.

Carrie Nahabedian, chef-owner of Naha in Chicago, offers a nonalcoholic version of a favorite family recipe: fresh fruit punch made with sour cherry syrup, ginger ale “and our version of rainbow sorbet—passion fruit, raspberry and lemon—served in a tall glass. This is the punch we all grew up on,” she says.

Ideya Latin Bistro in New York is serving a Mexican punch for the holidays. For the drink, sliced apples and crabapples and guavas that have been cut in half are steeped in water with sugarcane pieces, split in the middle, and cinnamon sticks.

The mixture simmers until the fruit softens to a pulp. It’s cooled and served, along with two ounces of tequila, in tall glasses with cinnamon sugar rims.

Serpas in Atlanta serves a mulled Christmas cider at this time of year. For the punch, chef Scott Serpas puts four types of apples—Fiji, Granny Smith, Pink lady and either Golden or Red Delicious apples—along with an orange, cranberries, cinnamon sticks, cloves, ginger, all-spice, granulated sugar, brown sugar, honey, apple cider and apple jack in a slow cooker.

He simmers it until the sugar is dissolved and then sets the heat to medium and cooks it for between three hours and five hours. He strains it into glasses and serves it in teacups.

At McGillin’s Olde Ale House, which opened in 1860 in Philadelphia, the holiday drink is Poinsettia bunch, made by mixing together Champagne, cranberry juice, orange juice and triple sec, and garnishing it with orange slices.

In San Diego, at The Grant Gill, the restaurant is mixing up Pearly Holiday Punch for parties this season. They use gin infused with Douglas fir and a simple syrup infused with Douglas fir, orange flower and juniper berries. They mix that with lime juice, white cranberry juice and champagne, and garnish it with cranberries, the juniper berries leftover from infusing the simple syrup, and Douglas fir leaves.

Steve McDonough and Dan Smith, owners of Hearty in Chicago, have an “apple picker’s punch” in their cookbook, “Talking with your Mouth Full.” For the punch, they steep herbal apple tea bags and whole cloves in hot water. Then they dissolve sugar into that, cool it, strain it and pour it into a bowl with cranberry juice, apple juice, spiced rum and apple jack, garnishing it with apple rings.— [email protected]