The Blood and Sand is an equal parts cocktail originated in The Savoy Cocktail Book by Harry Craddock way back in 1930. I’m guessing oranges were more acidic back then because by today’s standard the cocktail is insanely out of balance and much too sweet with no acidity whatsoever. The drink was named after a 1922 movie about bullfighting. The blood bit represented by the Cherry Brandy and the sand by the OJ. Today, however most places use blood orange juice to up the blood part and Cherry Heering, a liqueur hailing from Copenhagen and coming in at 48 proof or 24% alcohol but bartenders typically use their favorite.

First off, orange juice, any orange juice in a cocktail is going to be a bit of a waste unless you’re specifically using it to dilute the drink a bit like in a strong tiki beverage. Orange juice is very neutral, has little to no acidity, and is quite flabby in terms of flavor when in a drink because it has a hard time standing up to everything else. Also, oranges from our source here in L.A. vacillate wildly in their sweetness levels. Sometimes delicious and sometimes not tasting like much at all. The plus side is that orange, as a flavor, goes with literally everything. The other plus side is that if you place blood orange on a drink menu, the punters will blindly go stark raving mad for it. Yes, you can acid adjust your OJ if you wish. In a busier bar, I might do this if I were juicing the orange fresh every single day. OJ gets crappy fast. The better thing to do, in my opinion, is to just make orange sherbet which utilizes more of the product anyway and imparts those tasty orange oils which is sort of the best and most flavorful part of the orange anyway.

Scotch cocktails are few and far between for a reason. Scotch can be overpowering due to the peatiness. Out of all spirits, I would say scotch is probably the least popular which is kinda funny considering how popular Japanese whisky is at the moment. Whatever.

The other big problem is and will always be cherry flavor. Back in the day, products like NyQuil utilizing that awful fake cherry flavor had yet to arrive via megavats brewed in some horrendous laboratory in New Jersey. If you use cherry now, you have to be very aware of this or people will tell you your drink tasted like NyQuil which is the worst possible underhanded diss. The get around for this nowadays is typically a nice maraschino liqueur which imparts some sweetness and a dry hint of cherry without beating you over the head.

Let’s go over the original specs:

Blood and Sand Cocktail

1/4 Orange Juice

1/4 Scotch Whiskey

1/4 Cherry Brandy

1/4 Italian Vermouth

Yeah, not sure what the 1/4 measure here is. Probably whatever giant measuring vessel they used back then because in those days people got real shitty. Raging 20s, The Great Depression, yada, yada. You’d drink your sorrows away too. Anyway, to be a little less delicate…The Blood and Sand sucks. Not one of Harry’s best. But again, I’m guessing the cherry brandy mentioned wasn’t as cloyingly sweet and gross as Cherry Heering is. Probably pretty strong and who knows where the hell he got something like that.

So, let’s make an attempt to repair this drink while still staying somewhat true to the original. We have some scotch, orange, cherry, and Italian vermouth. A bit of a switcheroo of some of the ingredients.

Calling it Blood and Sand, however, would be no fun. So let’s go with a not so obscure reference-Groundskeeper Willie, the angry Scotsman from the Simpsons. If you don’t know, you don’t know but he’s rife with one liner gems.

I actually once worked with a true to life Groundskeeper Willie, Jon Blaha. He was the dumpling roller at Five Spice Cafe in Burlington, VT. On Sundays he worked the line for our famous dim sum brunch. His drink of choice was Maker’s Mark bourbon on the rocks over at The Other Place on North Winooski Avenue, a non ironic dive bar with a garage door that could open for the summer months. Yes, before it was a bar, it was an automotive shop. Anyway, to say Blaha was grumpy would be the world’s greatest understatement. On Fridays and Saturdays, The Other Place would typically flood with college kids looking to get loaded but they would end up being elbow to elbow with Blaha, a red headed, red bearded pre-incarnation of an American version of The Simpsons character Groundskeeper Willie. He rolled his own smokes, often rocked a bandanna, and the combo of whiskey and cigarettes aided in a gravelly voice reminiscent of Tom Waits. After more than several drinks, if he felt too crowded, he would begin to swing his arms and shout “Give me some goddam room!” Much to the delight of the young crowd looking to see some of the more colorful, older locals perform which is part of the reason why people enjoy dive bars. Of course, this would lead to further hijinks down the road with them buying him multiple whiskeys but only to see him freak out more when surrounded by a bunch of early twenty somethings looking to binge drink. And so on and so forth. I think of Blaha from time to time and wonder if he’s still alive. I last saw him when I left Burlington in 2005 and by then the Five Spice had burned down and he had become a janitor somewhere. Hope he’s doing ok. He and I always got along well.

Let’s get to the cocktail already.

Wee Nip O’ Courage

1 oz. Blended Scotch

1 oz. Fresh Lemon Juice

.5 oz. Housemade Cherry Pit Creme de Noyaux

.5 oz. St. Agrestis Paradiso

.5 oz. Blood Orange Sherbet

2 Dashes Grapefruit Bitters

Shake, strain over rocks glass with BFR. Optional garnish with cherry as an ode to the Blood and Sand.

The Cherry Pit Creme de Noyaux is from last year’s cherry bounty. The kitchen and bar saved all the pits, I roasted them at 350 degrees for twenty minutes to kill all the cyanide then placed them in a jar with 192 proof grain spirit for a couple of months. When needed I strain the super hot noyaux off and add equal parts simple syrup making it a cooler 96 proof. It needs to sit like this another month to cool down some more and be drinkable.

I switched Sweet Vermouth for something a bit more bitter, American, and less sweet and more in between Aperol and Campari from the Brooklyn boys, St. Agrestis.

Your AI generated image for this post, #417, January 17, 2025