Paul Steele 
As the days are shorter and colder and the nights long and dark it’s nice to kick back at the weekend and perhaps enjoy a drink or two.
My usual go-to drink is Prosecco or wine but I thought ‘how about creating something that reminds me of a favourite autumnal cake, ginger cake?’
So I got to researching cocktails and ways to make them.
I am rather chuffed at the way it turned out as it does actually taste like ginger cake. The brown sugar on the rim helps give it a bit of sweetness to counterbalance the bitterness from the lemon.
To create it you will need to make a syrup beforehand and also give it time to cool so you can add it to your mix.
The best rum to use would be the spiced variety as this will add flavour to the drink but if you haven’t got any, dark rum is fine.
Ingredients
For The Syrup
100ml water
50g Dark muscovado sugar
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
For The Rest
1 x shot Gin
1 x shot dark rum
American ginger ale
1 x dash of the sugar syrup
1 x squeeze of lemon
1 x twist of lemon
Ice cubes
Method
To make the syrup, That is brown sugar syrup with Ginger and Vanilla
This makes enough for about 8 cocktails as you only use a teaspoon in each one.
Pour the water into a pan and bring it to the boil. Add the sugar, the ginger and vanilla extract and gently stir until it is all blended.
Continue on a rolling boil for 5 minutes to reduce it into a syrupy state.
Remove from the heat and let it cool for about 30 minutes before you are going to use it.
To prepare your glass
Use a bit of golden syrup or glucose and wipe it round the rim of the glass to make it sticky. Usually water would work but as it is brown sugar the granules are bigger therefore they need something to stick to!
In a saucer, put some brown sugar in and roll the rim of the glass into it, so the sugar sticks to the rim.
Measure out and pour the gin and rum into your cocktail shaker. Add the teaspoon of sugar syrup then give the lemon a squeeze into it. Add two ice cubes.
Give this a vigorous shake to blend the ingredients together.
Strain into the glass and then top it up with some ginger ale.
Peel a bit of lemon and give it a twist round. This releases the oils from the skin.
Pop it into the cocktail and enjoy! It makes a nicely balanced drink with a hint of ginger.
