The Boracay Breeze
Meet my new craft Islander cocktail creation - i’d say East meets West but it’s more fair to say Imported from the East, Concocted in the West.
Lambanog (Lum-buh-nog) aka tropical moonshine, also referred to as Philippine’s vodka (40% alcohol proof), originated from Luzon island in the northern part of the Philippines. FYI - i’m from there! Farmers used to gather coconut sap, ferment it then distill it and there’s your lambanog! When i was growing up, comments I used to hear from adults were something like “it’s a very strong drink and it can knock you down easily if you’ve had too much!”.
Outside of the Philippines, it’s not as well known as its Asian counterparts (Korean soju, Japanese vodka. etc) however, it’s slowly gaining popularity due to the rise of Filipino restaurants/pop-ups/bars owned by younger innovative chefs serving their craft cocktail drinks using Lambanog. Over the holidays, I went to a local Filipino store to buy some Filipino produce and saw it, so i immediately added to my cart as i know i have to make something out of it. Also it turns out Bevmo carries it as well. It seems like t’s slowly gaining traction and appealing to a larger audience! Yay!
About the star fruit - you might be thinking, what the heck is that fruit (see pic below)? It indeed looks exotic to most but this is a tropical fruit called star fruit. I wanted to incorporate it to my drink since it also reminds me of my childhood. We had a big star fruit tree growing up and my siblings and my friends used to climb it all the time! My aunt even made star fruit jam at times as it had abundant of fruits. Here in the US, it’s actually being sold at American stores - my husband got it from Ralphs (local Grocery store) and it seems to be in season as i see it at the store all the time!
Another fruit that’s nostalgic to me is the soursop/guyabano. It’s another fruit I enjoyed growing up so i thought why not add it as a key fruit ingredient as well. I’m not sure if they even sell the fresh fruits at the nearby Asian stores but i found the soursop nectar available online.
I’m sure i’ll be experimenting with other fruits or liqueur with Lambanog but for now - i was happy with how it turned out! Mabuhay & Cheers!
Ingredients
2 oz lambanog
1 1/2 oz soursop juice
1/3 oz lychee liqueur
5 sprigs of mint
2 slices of star fruit (leave 1 for garnish)
Put 2 ice cubes, 1 slice of star fruit and mint leaves in your cocktail shaker. Muddle it all together gently. Add lambanog, lychee liqueur and soursop.
Shake until chilled. Pour into your cocktail glass of choice!
Cheers!
