Excels at Nothing: A drink in need of a name

Excels at Nothing: A drink in need of a name

A new cocktail from Excells At Nothing. It sounds quite interesting and refreshing. Can you help name it?

Update! I tried it when I got home from work. She did an excellent job. It's not too sweet and quite refreshing. I had to use angostura bitters in place of the fresh herbs but it worked great. I'll try with some other bitters in my collection. I even made a variant with cointreau/curacao which made it very smooth.

2 shots black rum
1 shot Cointreau/Curacao
4 dashes Angustura bitters
4 dashes lime juice
1 sugar cube
splash of water
top with tonic

Mix in a shaker and top with tonic. Stir. An excellent summer drink.

(Cocktail recipe) The Chinese

1 1/2 oz Jamaica rum
1 tsp triple sec
1 tsp maraschino liqueur
1 tbsp grenadine syrup
1 dash bitters

Pour all ingredients into a cocktail shaker half-filled with ice cubes. Shake well, strain into a cocktail glass, and serve.

Lately I've been giving Chris various reprints of old bar books (and by reprints, I mean someone dismantled the old books and scanned, then printed them) for birthdays and Christmas.  Occasionally I'll dig through them to find something interesting.  My most recent discovery was the Chinese, so named for its color - it looks like traditional red Chinese lacquer.  It's not overly sweet, but is very balanced, and it's all booze...so drink carefully!



(Chris's Note) The Jamaica Rum that this recipe calls for is a style of rum, not necessarily rum from Jamaica.  Unfortunately, like many old liquors and liqueurs that are no longer produced we're not really sure what it tasted like.  The best approximation we can deduce is a dark Navy rum (Cruzan Black Strap, Goslings Black Seal, Kracken) mixed with a gold rum.  In order to achieve this easily I would increase the Rum to 1/1 oz pour.  You may need to adjust the triple sec, bitters, and Maraschino accordingly by teaspoon to balance the rum you chose to use.  The finished product should taste completely smooth and balanced when it hits the tongue like a fine Chinese Lacquer finish.