Drinking Melbourne is the weekly newsletter from drinks writer Fred Siggins, unpacking what’s happening in Melbourne’s bars (and what you can learn from them), sent every Tuesday to your inbox. Get on the list here.
In this newsletter:
- How Leonardo’s Pizza Palace is making its soft serve machine work for its cocktails
- Kaiko Tulloch’s recipe for their Key Lime Splice Cocktail
- How to support Victorian drinks producers affected by the fires
- A food and drink filled ‘metro safari’
We’ve had a brutal few days of 40 degree-plus weather in Melbourne over the last week. Thankfully, this week is shaping up to be much milder, but for when the mercury spikes, or your blood sugar dips, the bar at Leonardo’s Pizza Palace has you covered. This week, one of Melbourne’s best pizza-joint cocktail programs is launching a limited-run summertime cocktail series making use of one of my personal favourite cocktail ingredients; ice cream.
Leonardo’s Ice Cream Cocktail Series has been dreamed up and crafted by bartender/flavour wizard Kaiko Tulloch, with a new flavour unveiled each fortnight and available only at Leonardo’s during its two-week run. Each flavour will also feature collaborations with local booze brands including Marionette Liqueurs, The Gospel Rye, Red Mill Rum and Melbourne Gin Company.
Leonardo’s GM Johnny Linstead says they just wanted to have a bit of fun in the sun this year, and considering they already had a soft serve machine, it felt like summertime serendipity.
“Kaiko wanted to create something a little bit silly and nostalgic that would work for summer,” Johnny says. “People love queueing up for gelato in Melbourne, especially in our neighbourhood, so we wanted to cater to those folks in a way that was a little different from the norm and would also fit into our drinks program.”
At Leonardo’s, that means bold, cheeky, and flavour-driven drinks that are creative without being pretentious and nostalgic but made with serious craft technique.
I popped in this week to try the cocktail that’s shaping up to be an absolute smash-hit of the summer: the Key Lime Splice (recipe below). The combination of limoncello, prosecco, elderflower, tequila, lime-leaf oleo and soft serve ice cream is just as delicious as it sounds. Slurping it through a wide-gauge straw, the tubby little kid in me is over the moon, while the cocktail nerd is sufficiently impressed. And for anyone who’s ever enjoyed a slice of sour-sweet, creamy, key lime pie, cold from the fridge at an old-school American diner, this drink packs more nostalgia than an episode of Stranger Things.
As Johnny says: “this series is built for sunshine, sweaty fun, loud colours, melty textures and big summer energy.” I’ll slurp to that.
Leonardo’s Key Lime Splice Cocktail
Ingredients
- 15ml Unico-Cello Limoncello
- 10ml Marionette Elderflower liqueur
- 25ml Olmeca Altos Plata tequila
- 20ml lemon and lime leaf oleo
- 15ml lime juice
- 30ml prosecco
- 30ml soda water
- 75g soft serve ice cream
Method
- Add all ingredients to a highball (minus the soft serve ice cream.)
- Add five regular sized ice cubes (this will prop up your soft serve.)
- Top with soft serve ice cream, microplane lime zest over the top and add a chunky straw.
For the lemon and lime leaf oleo (yields 900g)
- 250g lemon peel
- 15g lime leaf
- 1g citric acid
- 750g caster sugar
- Place the all ingredients into a sealable vac bag.
- Gently rub the sugar into the peels through the bag to help release the oils. Seal it up and let it rest for 72 hours at room temperature. Occasionally give the bag a lil’ slap and rub for good luck to help combine the flavours.
- Empty the contents of your vac-sealed bag into a large jug, add 375ml boiling water, stir well until all sugars are fully dissolved and double strain out your solids and discard (and of course date and label your liquid). Your oleo will be good in the fridge for three weeks.
Around the bars
East West. Mr West, in collaboration with Bar Thyme, The Lincoln and Good Measure, has teamed up to celebrate the opening of the Metro Tunnel and the fact that Footscray and Carlton are now only a few stops apart. Northwest Connect is a self-guided “metro safari” inviting guests to travel between each venue via the Metro Tunnel. Each venue is running food and drink specials with help from Never Never and Hop Nation Brewing. With free public transport on weekends until the end of January, it’s a great time to explore the bars of another suburb.
Support Victorian drinks makers affected by fire. Unfortunately, it’s been a pretty devastating week for Victorian drinks producers, with several wineries, Harcourt cidery and our beloved Maidenii vermouthery destroyed in the worst start to bushfire season since Black Summer. I’m not sure what to say about it except to express my deep sadness and sympathy for the good folks who have lost decades worth of work, and of course to everyone else in Victoria who have lost homes and businesses this week. But I am thankful for the cool change that came through on Friday night which saved many others, and to the firefighters and volunteers across the state who put themselves in harm’s way to limit the damage.
So if you have it in your budget this week, order some extra Madenii (thankfully their bottled stock survived), and also some extra Marionette liqueur, as one of that business’s founders is also one of the founders of Maidenii. And of course hospo knows how to rally ‘round the family, so restaurants including Horn Please in Fitzroy North and Bibi Ji in Carlton are already raising funds for those affected by bushfires. Other fundraising efforts include the Victorian Bushfire Appeal, Victorian Farmers’ Federation Disaster Relief Fund, and Blaze Aid, so dig deep if you can.
