Frozen cocktails have long since jumped from the hands of Tommy Bahama-wearing Margaritaville enthusiasts and oversized Applebeeās menus to high end cocktail bars. But they are, for the most part, still dependent on whirringĀ blenders and hypnotically spinning slushy machines. Not that there is anything wrong with a little mechanical help, thereĀ is a way to make a summery frozen drink that eliminates the trouble of hauling a heavy blender out of the cupboard or becoming that person on your block who actually owns a slushy machine.Ā
For his 2023 bookĀ Cook It Wild, Chris Nuttall-Smith created a frozenĀ negroni that utilizes another, cheaper tool you might consider for making a frozen cocktail: time. Nuttall-Smithās drink, designed for camping and paddling, but just as good for a day at the beach or in the park, gets slushy thanks to 48 hours in the freezer and a little tweaking to the classic. And because it arrives at your campsite pre-made, it leaves plenty of time for some of Nuttall-Smithās fussier (but also delicious) campfire snacks like cheesy honey tomato toasts or fire-warmed olives.Ā
The spirits in the recipe make a departure from theĀ one-to-one-to-one ratio of gin, vermouth, and Campari that you may be familiar with. Itās closer to a three-to-two-to-one (gin, vermouth, Campari). This, says Nuttall-Smith, is all about flavor profile for himāhe actually keeps an undiluted batch of this in his freezer frequently just to enjoy at home. āTo my palate, one-to-one-to-one is too sweet and a little bit cloying. And even with Campari as a bit player in this drink it still comes through and gives that mouthwatering quality you get from Italian bitters.āĀ Ā
The trick to pulling off a lo-fi frozen drink like this one is in the dilution. Alcohol, as you may know, has a much lower freezing point than water. āPure ethyl alcohol (the type of alcohol we drink) freezes at about -174 degrees Fahrenheit,ā saysĀ Anthony Caporale, director of spirits education at theĀ Institute of Culinary Education.Ā An 80-90 proof alcohol (40%-45% alcohol), like a typical gin or vodka, will freeze somewhere around -17 degrees Fahrenheit. According to the FDA, theĀ typical home freezer should be set to 0 degrees Fahrenheit and probably canāt get much lower than -4 degrees Fahrenheit or -5 degrees Fahrenheit no matter how much you crank it.Ā
So a drink with no non-alcoholic ingredients, like a negroni, will have no chance of getting slushy without a little help. Caporale says you can achieve a granita-like level of frozen if you cut the alcohol content to about 15% with non-alcoholic mixers (he also adds that, because wine is typically close to 15% ABV already, it can make a nice slushy right out of the bottle).Ā
Nuttall-Smithās negroni doesnāt go quite that far (theĀ Epicurious ABV calculator puts it at 24.5% alcohol), but heās also not aiming for a granita-like quality. Itās more Slurpee, less Sno-cone. TheĀ Cook It WildĀ frozen negroni is 27% water, though Nuttall-Smith offers a fairly wide range of dilution that he says will work when freezing cocktails (anywhere from 20% to 40% water). How much water to use exactly, he says, is more about a drinkās potency than its consistency, because anywhere in that range should still create a slushy texture. āI like a drink thatās softer, and so to me it often comes down to how much headroom I have left. Can I add 40% water and still fit it into the container Iām using?āĀ
That container can be almost anything. As long as it isnāt glass (if you are taking the drink out of the house thereās no reason to risk any shattering incidents), any sort of resealable bottle will work. However, Nuttall-Smith recommends a vacuum-sealed bottle, which he likes for its versatility. āThat vacuum bottle you can stick in a backpack, you can stick it in a dry bag and it will stay frozen-ish for at least 24 hours.ā If you do have a good cooler, the drink can stay frozen for days. The one caveat he mentions is that, if youāre trying to freeze anything in a vacuum-sealed bottle, make sure to leave the top off. That allows all the cold from the freezer to get in. Time in the freezer is really important here. The recipe says āseveral days,ā which might sound like overkill, but when I checked my drink after 24 hours, there wasnāt enough ice to get the slushy effect weāre going for.Ā Ā
When it comes time to serve, the final important step in Nuttall-Smithās negroni is the shake. āWhat happens when you freeze a drink with water and booze is that the water often separates out and freezes before everything else,ā he says, so the shake breaks up the slush and gives it a uniform texture. And you may need to shake quite hardāas if you were shaking together a cocktail. Otherwise, you may end up with ice chunks too big to pour and very potent, undiluted alcohol in your glass because itās the last thing to freeze.Ā
Nuttall-Smith wants everything inĀ Cook It WildĀ to change how we think about what constitutes eating well on a camping trip. The idea that undergirds it all, which came to him talking to chef friends who had to work ahead every day in their jobs, is that if you do some reasonable prep at home you can easily get something delicious way out in the wilderness with āno chopping, no measuring, no drudgery.ā This cocktail is one of the easiest examples. With nothing but a bottle, a freezer, and two days of forethought you can have a beautiful afternoon of sipping negronis on a mountaintop (or, you know, a lawn chairāwhatever your ambition level may be).Ā
