01BUILD TEQUILA + CASSIS + LIME OVER ICE IN A HIGHBALL
02TOP WITH GINGER BEER
03GARNISH WITH A LIME WHEEL
1 oz taken as 30 ml in the metric column.
STRENGTH // WORKED
Pre-batch
2.5 oz mixed with ice, 0.68 oz of it pure alcohol
Melt
Built in the glass: +5 % of the pre-batch, +0.12 oz of water
Topped
Poured after the melt, kept whole: ginger beer 4 oz, no alcohol
Served
2.5 + 0.12 + 4 = 6.62 oz in the glass, 0.68 oz of it alcohol
Strength
0.68 ÷ 6.62 = 10.3 % ABV as served
Ethanol
0.68 oz × 29.57 ml × 0.789 g/ml = 16 g · about 111 kcal from the alcohol alone
IN THE GLASS
METHYL ANTHRANILATE
FROM TEQUILA AGAVE · the grape candy note
Formula
C₈H₉NO₂
Mass
151.16 g/mol
IUPAC
methyl 2-aminobenzoate
The grape-candy / Welch's-grape-juice aroma. Concord grapes carry it in concentrations no European wine grape (Vitis vinifera) approaches; American Vitis labrusca grapes, native to the northeastern US, hold methyl anthranilate as a signature. The "foxy" note in North American grape juice and artificial grape candy both come from the same molecule. Also used as the standard bird repellent on commercial fruit crops; birds find it intolerable.
The acid that puts the bite in green apples, unripe stone fruit, and rhubarb. Wine carries it from the grape, but most reds lose it during malolactic fermentation, where bacteria convert the sharp malic into the rounder lactic, swapping "tart" for "creamy." Whites that skip MLF (most Sauvignon Blanc, most Riesling) keep the malic edge as part of their crisp identity.
Fresh ginger's heat, a phenolic ketone that activates TRPV1 (the same capsaicin receptor) at a fraction of chili-pepper intensity. Dried ginger converts gingerol into shogaol via heat-driven dehydration, which is why dried ginger reads as warmer and sharper than fresh root. Ginger beer, the Moscow Mule, and the Dark 'n' Stormy all lean on it.
Tequila, crème de cassis, lime and ginger beer. The blackcurrant-and-tequila pairing is unusual. Cassis's beta-damascenone bridges the tequila's ethyl acetate and the ginger's gingerol. ABV is about 11%.
PROVENANCE
Victor Bergeron printed the drink as the 'Mexican El Diablo' in his 1946 Trader Vic's Book of Food and Drink, one of the few tequila cocktails in his Polynesian-themed repertoire. The original was lengthened with ginger ale; by his 1968 Pacific Island Cookbook it was plain 'El Diablo', and modern bars use ginger beer. The crème de cassis is the unusual element: most period tequila drinks used grenadine or grapefruit for sweetness/color, not a French blackcurrant liqueur.
