Bill's Grille Depression Era Cocktail

As we're all (almost all, that is) cutting back on our spending, it behooves us to reduce our spending on alcohol. I'm a single malt scotch drinker, which, of course, is the most expensive of whiskeys.

Eric Felten, the drink writer for the Wall Street Journal, had an article about the best in cheap, blended scotch. One of his top picks was Ballantines.

So I decided to try Ballantines - not great but drinkable. Cheap whiskey needs something to take the edge off it.

I was reading an excellent book by the English author, William Boyd, called Restless, which I highly recommend. There's a point in the book where two characters are in a bar drinking Whiskey Macs. I never heard of a Whiskey Mac, but the internet told me it was Ginger Wine and blended Scotch. Intrigued, I found and bought a bottle of Stones Ginger Wine. Stones is a bottler based in London, so consistent with the author, the wine, and the scotch this is definitely a British cocktail.

The recipes on the internet suggest equal parts ginger wine and scotch. I tried that with my cheap Ballatine and found it too sweet - I just want to take the edge off, not make a girly drink.

After some experimentation, I found that for me, the proper proportion is four parts scotch and one part ginger wine. So now we have:

Bill's Grille Depression Era Cocktail

Combine in a cocktail glass filled with ice:

4 parts blended scotch

1 part Stones Ginger Wine

Stir and enjoy.