Photography by: Saturnine Studios
There’s so much to be said about my first competition of 2026, everything from the theme, setting, and people was surreal. The competition was put on by the great Eddie Cruz (Regional Agave Master) of Ilegal mezcal, and the special task was to design a cocktail based on a love song which would then be the name and theme of the drink. When I think love songs, what comes to mind isn’t so much pop summer love type tunes but more crooning and melancholic love ballads, I suppose. My father, I believe, was some kind of romantic and raised me on music like Santana, Tears for Fears, Counting Crows, AC/DC, Iron Maiden, Metallica, and Guns N Roses.
Since the base spirit was going to be an Ilegal product, I knew that mezcal was gonna be a little smokey so I started to get this vision of love as a burning house and remembered that old classic “November Rain”, but the product would turn out to be more powerful than I could imagine just then.
I’ll admit it that the idea for the ingredients came by relatively last minute (as oft seems they do), but I am grateful for it in this case. When I finally decided I would use a rose infusion, it would not be just any roses…
Last year my girlfriend Miriam had bought for me a beautiful bouquet of roses, which after they had dried out I had separated the stems and stored them safely inside of a deli cup. Dear friends, the last year of 2025 was an ambitious yet stormy year, themed by an extreme variance in circumstances. I had to move several times, pressure at work was building up, and my own personal creative endeavors required more and more of my commitment. It was stressful as Miriam had her own struggles as well. Again, extreme variance in work situations, living situations, and even a “not minor” health complication that would put her under extreme dietary restrictions. Through all of that, however, we found a way to hold onto those roses. I made sure every time I moved to find a special place for them, as I do with most items of emotional value, large or small.
Enter this competition, deliberating and pondering on the idea of love and what it means and has meant to me throughout the recent time, my thoughts drifted to the now very delicate and one year aged dried rose buds in the deli cup.
ENDURANCE. PRESERVATION. RESILIENCE.
I got this image of a mighty and fragrant forest being consumed in a great fire, followed by a healing rain. I smelled burning wood and moss, charred mushrooms and the sweetness of petrichor. While, this may not be too appealing in itself for a cocktail, I quickly adapted the idea to something perhaps more palatable. I still decided it should be an old fashioned build, though. I believe those kinds of cocktails make you think and stop for a bit to appreciate the ingredients. For this one in particular I needed that to be the case, and I find amusement in the extreme variance paralleled in the ingredients. A whole glass of a base spirit, just a few drops of sugar…
This was my way of doing something romantic for the woman I love, to take something she had given to me as an expression of adoration and transform it into something that was enjoyed and celebrated by many others that night. A way to give something back as evidence of a return in such a high risk investment…in me…and it ended up winning 1st place. I’m taking this to show that the belief in any idea you care about is worth nurturing and taking care of, and if that idea be love…even moreso.
Leave a comment