Showing posts with label Roka. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Roka. Show all posts

Monday, 7 March 2011

La Maison Fontaine® Takes Gold at the London Absinthe Masters 2011


La Maison Fontaine® Takes Gold at the London Absinthe Masters 2011

Last month the great and good of the Absinthe world gathered for the prestigious Absinthe Masters 2011. This competition recognises and celebrates masters in their fields, giving credit and recognition to the brands that are the true pioneers of their worlds. La Maison Fontaine® took Gold in the Design Category and a Silver in the non-coloured spirit category.


These latest accolades mean since launching a little over six months ago, La Maison Fontaine® has already won 3 Golds; Best in Class & Gold at the International Wine and Spirits Competition (IWSC), Golden Spoon at world renowned 2010 Absinthiades, and now Gold (and a Silver) at the Absinthe Masters.

La Maison Fontaine® is gathering recognition and respect with key industry influencers since launching last August. Brian Robinson Editor of the Wormwood Society, ranked La Maison Fontaine® as the 2nd favourite Blanche Absinthe of all time. Giving it 4.7/5 out of a possible 5 Stars (with a maximum 5 Stars in 5 of the 7 categories) out of 7 categories. Our White Fairy can now be found in some of London’s leading bars including Bar Boulud and The Mandarin Bar at Mandarin Oriental, 22 Below, The Bathhouse, Nightjar, Roka, Paramount, Purl, and McQueen.

Mark Stringer Founding Director “We’ve been amazed and exceptionally grateful for the level of support that we’ve been getting since we launched last August. To have won 3 Gold Medals, A Best in Class and a Silver so quickly is fantastic. We always thought that we had something special so it’s nice that such leading luminaries agree”

• Spirit Business Judges included Patience Gould, editor of Spirits Business, Keith Lyon, Independent Spirits consultant (Ex Spirits Buyer for Waitrose) and Nick Quatroville from "W" hotel.

• La Maison Fontaine® 56% ABV, is an ultra premium artisan Absinthe handcrafted amongst the beautiful Jura Mountains in Pontarlier France, a place renowned for its Absinthe history.

• Distilled in the oldest Absinthe stills in the world, La Maison Fontaine® has been masterfully refined using 15 natural herbs. Some we’re keeping secret, others we’re happy to shout about – notably, our world-renowned Pontarlier-grown Grande Absinthe, which, together with green anise and fennel, is the “holy trinity” of any real absinthe.

• As well as delivering a traditional Absinthe we’ve created La Maison Fontaine® as a wonderfully versatile spirit that can be mixed into an array of sublime cocktails. We call this The Art of Imagination and we’ve put a few of our favourites on our website:

www.fontaineabsinthe.com

• We’ve been working with one of London’s leading “tastemakers” and cocktail writer, Allan Gage, to help develop a number of signature drinks that are perfect for the global premium bar scene.



Wednesday, 27 October 2010

Giles @ Shochu makes a last couple of drinks...

I'm always sorry to hear of a favourite bartender leaving a favourite bar but that's progress for you! On Friday 29th October 2010 Giles Cowen will be leaving the Shochu bar at Roka for good. Needless to say I hot tailed it down there last night to catch up with Giles and share some La Maison Fontaine Absinthe with him before he left. It's always interesting to have a conversation with bartenders about Absinthe, so many myths to explode! Absinthe should never be set on fire, it doesn't make you mad, it's not hallucinogenic and there's a scientific reason for the high alcohol strength....etc....etc.

Although Giles is not a massive fan of anise he was very pleasantly surprised by the smoothness and complexity of La Maison Fontaine, inspired he made a drink:



Purple Rain

25cl La Maison Fontaine
25cl Gin
15cl Cherry Brandy
10cl fresh lemon juice
5-10cl sugar syrup

Shake all ingredients over ice and strain into a chilled martini glass. Lemon zest as garnish.

This was really very easy to drink and now Giles was warmed up he ventured onto something very different indeed.

Snow Fairy

25cl La Maison Fontaine
25cl fresh cream
15cl Cartron white chocolate liqueur
5-10cl almond syrup
5cl sugar syrup
Fresh mint leaves

Bruise the fresh mint with the sugar then add all the other ingredients and shake the hell out of it. Fine strain into a chilled martini glass and add a mint garnish.

I'm not a massive fan of creamy cocktails but this was very well balanced and reminiscent of mint chocolate ice cream. A Snow Fairy is the sort of drink where you look at the ingredients and think maybe it shouldn't work - but it does!

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Friday, 9 April 2010

Pandor Cocktails by Marcin @ Roka


This was a while back but still worth sharing.... Shochu is the downstairs bar at Roka and one of my all time favourites. Last year I popped in with some Pandor Absinthe, both the 40% and 69%. Marcin kindly obliged and made some fantastic drinks!
Pandor's Box
Shake Pandor 40%, Lemon, Sugar Syrup and juice of Fresh Ginger over ice. Pour into Martini glass and top with Orange Foam and garnish with Orange Zest - Delicious!
Pandor Sours
Marcin also made a Rhubarb Sour, Cherry Sour - in the photo - an Elderflower Sour and an Apple Sour - all of which were great and really brought home how versatile and mixable Pandor is.