Recipe

• 30ml Campari

• 30ml red vermouth

• 30ml soda water

Fill an old-fashioned glass with ice, pour everything in and add a thick half-slice of orange. Stir a little to mix it together.

Possibly my favourite cocktail so far. I've now had a Negroni a couple of times (see my previous post) and loved it. This is the same thing but with soda water instead of gin, an excellent change that makes it much much more drinkable without losing the dry, bitter edge that makes it so refreshing. I finished mine and ended up stealing some of Claire's as well. I'm going to drink a lot of these.

Recipe

• Orange juice

• Grenadine

Pour orange juice into a wine glass, and add a splash of grenadine. Give it a tiny little stir if it sinks too much – we're aiming for a pleasing gradient.

Obviously this is nice with tequila (a tequila sunrise), but this virgin adaptation is quite good with breakfast. It gets sweeter as you drink it, and the variety of berry flavours from the grenadine are surprisingly complex and interesting.

Recipe

• 30ml Gin

• 15ml lemon juice

• 30ml sugar syrup

• 60ml Champagne (or similar)

Shake the first three ingredients with ice, and pour into a Champagne flute.  Add the Champagne, carefully.

Delicious!  It's very drinkable, with a taste like fizzy sweets, but it's somehow quite adult at the same time.  It's always nice to drink from a flute, and with Steve's wedding coming up, it feels like time for a celebration.

I actually used Prosecco, so I guess this was more of an Italian 75.  But I'm pretty sure no one would've been able to tell.

Recipe

• 15ml vodka

• 15ml gin

• 15ml white rum

• 15ml tequila

• 15ml triple sec

• 25ml lemon juice

• 30ml sugar syrup

• 15ml cola

Shake everything together with ice, except the cola. Fill a tall glass with ice, strain it all in, and add the cola. Add a twist of lemon zest and an umbrella. Stir slightly (perhaps with a straw).

Dangerous! You can taste the tequila, but it's pretty sweet, and you'd never think there were 3 units of alcohol in there. Surprisingly refreshing and nice for something with 5 different kinds of booze!

I make my own sugar syrup. There are a few different kinds that different recipes call for, but I just use half and half: 100g water to 100g sugar.

Recipe

• 1 part vodka

• 1 part Jägermeister

• 1 part orange juice

• 1 part cranberry juice

• 1 part cola

Stir the first four ingredients thoroughly with ice, and pour into a Collins glass. Add the cola, and garnish with an autumn tree leaf. Add more cola and orange if required to get an opaque brown colour.

In tribute to an excellent weekend on a narrowboat with some excellent people, I invented this disgusting-looking long cocktail. The recipe is based on a Sex on the Beach, substituting Jägermeister for peach schnapps, and adding cola for that lovely dirty brown colour.

The taste is actually great (if I say so myself), with the herbal liqueur adding a subtle earthy, weedy taste to a nice sweet drink. I'm guessing it tastes better than the real thing anyway.

Recipe

• 4 parts Scotch whisky

• 3 parts Drambuie

Pour into a whisky glass with one ice cube.

A nice way of enjoying a whisky along with a bit of sweetness. Especially good when you're TOTALLY WASTED ON YOUR BROTHER'S STAG DOOOOOO! The proportions were determined by how much Drambuie the pub had left in the bottle. A 2:1 ratio might've been better.

Recipe

• 5 parts gin

• 3 parts lemon juice

• 1 part sugar syrup

• 8 parts soda water

Shake the first three ingredients with ice, and pour into an old-fashioned glass. Add the soda water. Peel some zest off a lemon (I used a potato peeler) and add.

Simple and boring. The lemon juice totally overpowers the gin, and with so little syrup there's not enough sweetness to counteract the sourness and bitterness of the lemon and soda water. I'd prefer tonic any time!

Recipe

• 5 parts bourbon whiskey

• 2 parts red vermouth

• Angostura bitters

Stir with ice, and strain into a martini glass. Add a cherry.

First of all, there's no way real Manhattans are as red as in all the photos on the internet. It's like photos of lunar eclipses: they look nothing like that in real life.

The taste isn't bad, sort of like a dry version of an old-fashioned. But I found it a little boring, since bourbon really dominated the taste, and isn't my favourite thing. Next time I might try it with rye whiskey or Scotch whisky instead. That said, the bitters added some interest, and the cherry's sweetness improved things towards the end. Would drink again!

Recipe

• 4 parts lemon juice

• 3 parts Messerschmitt (or Jägermeister)

• 2 parts grenadine

• 1 part lime juice

Shake with ice, and pour into a martini glass. Add a slice of lime and a cherry.

Remarkable and unexpected! Very sharp but also very sweet, the grenadine and citrus are the main things you taste, with the Messerschmitt only just noticeable. The tartness is uncompromising, and it's great, although after 100ml or so it gets a bit much!

Perhaps it'd be worth trying this with ice and soda water, and maybe with just one more part Messerschmitt. At under 7% alcohol, this makes a good low-alcohol choice. My whole drink was less than one unit, and the strong taste meant that I was quite satisfied.

Recipe

• 6 parts vodka

• 3 parts bourbon whiskey

• 2 parts maple syrup

Shake thoroughly with ice, and pour into a martini glass over a thick slice of orange. Skewer a few raisins on a cocktail stick, and add.

After my first attempt, I felt that this was worth revisiting, and Bonfire Night seemed the appropriate time. I was running out of maple syrup, so I went vodka-heavy, resulting in a lighter taste than last time – there was sweetness, but no strong burnt maple syrup flavour. I thought orange would be worth a try, and it stole the show, lending a nice rich zest that really stood out. Raisins made for a lovely snack after soaking in the drink.

Next time more maple syrup, and definitely green apple.