I’ve always taken a perverse delight in watching bartenders make cocktails. There’s something decadent about sitting back and having someone else make a concoction for you, especially when as much alchemy is involved as it is with the Bedtime Blazer.

I had this cocktail at the Victoria Room and was impressed with the ritual of poaching grapes within a brandy (or balloon) glass as well as with the finished result, which is so potent that a sniff too soon can pretty much burn half your nasal passages. Compared to this, wasabi is for wimps.

But enough with the hype: here’s the recipe that the Victoria Room gave us:

• ½ barspoon of vanilla sugar
• 2 muscatel grapes (deseeded)
• 5ml Amaro Montenegro
• 5ml grappa
• 40ml Remy Martin VSOP cognac
• 1 drop lemon bitters
• 1 drop orange bitters
• orange and lemon discs (to be discarded)

Add all ingredients to balloon glass. Fill a rocks glass full of boiling water and place the balloon glass on top of it. Let it sit for a while to poach the grapes and then pick up the balloon glass, swirl the contents, light a flame and hold the flame just inside the glass, which you need to keep turning until ignition. Flame the citrus discs and discard. Provided your eyebrows are still intact, extinguish flame with napkin and serve with a warning.

Voila!

 

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