Café Madrid, Valencia, 1959.
| 4 oz · 120 ml | SPARKLING WINE | 11 % |
| 1½ oz · 45 ml | ORANGE JUICE | |
| ½ oz · 15 ml | GIN | 40 % |
| ½ oz · 15 ml | VODKA | 40 % |
| ½ barspoons | SIMPLE SYRUP |
1 oz taken as 30 ml in the metric column.
1 oz taken as 30 ml in the metric column.
| Pre-batch | 2.58 oz mixed with ice, 0.4 oz of it pure alcohol |
|---|---|
| Melt | Stirred: +15 % of the pre-batch, +0.39 oz of water |
| Topped | Poured after the melt, kept whole: sparkling wine 4 oz, +0.44 oz of alcohol |
| Served | 2.58 + 0.39 + 4 = 6.97 oz in the glass, 0.84 oz of it alcohol |
| Strength | 0.84 ÷ 6.97 = 12.0 % ABV as served |
| Ethanol | 0.84 oz × 29.57 ml × 0.789 g/ml = 20 g · about 137 kcal from the alcohol alone |
FROM CAVA · the dominant grape acid
The dominant acid in grapes and the reason wine tastes sharp instead of flat. Forms crystals ("wine diamonds") when bottled wine gets cold; harmless, sometimes filtered out, sometimes left in as a mark of authenticity. Without acid, wine is sugar water.
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FROM ORANGE JUICE · citrus peel oil
An orange rind, squeezed, throws a spray that catches the light. That's d-limonene boiling off. It's roughly 95% of orange peel oil by mass, and the molecule that puts the "orange" in orange anything. Used industrially as a green solvent because the chemistry that dissolves citrus oils also dissolves greasy machinery. The expressed-peel garnish on a cocktail is delivering vaporized limonene to the rim of the glass.
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FROM GIN
The pine note in juniper berries, and the reason gin tastes like a forest. Co-distilled with the spirit during production. Found in actual pine trees, rosemary, basil, and a good London Dry. The "Christmas tree" smell of gin and the smell of a forest floor share a single molecule.
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Cava, orange juice, gin, vodka and sugar. Valencia's official cocktail is a Spanish answer to the Mimosa, with gin and vodka added for lift. The notes are Cava's yeast autolysates, d-limonene from fresh orange and the two spirits. The name, 'Valencia water', is deliberately understated.
Constante Gil created the Agua de Valencia at Café Madrid in Valencia in 1959, the story goes, as a joke on Basque regulars who ordered cava as 'agua de Bilbao'. The drink became Valencia's official cocktail; it's served by the liter at any restaurant in the region. The name's irony is part of the joke: a 'water' built on cava, orange and two spirits. Pitchers and shared serving are traditional.
