Stuntin' 101: Impress Your Friends with 5 Summer Cocktails They've Never Heard Of

Even in the early days of summer, the typical drinks can begin to feel dull. How many more mojitos or margaritas can you really imbibe? We know you're looking for recipes to stand out, so we talked with expert mixologist Toby Maloney about five summer cocktails your friends have never heard of.

Maloney is the owner of Chicago's The Violet Hour (1520 N Damen Ave.), a nationally renowned cocktail haven. The following five recipes are for drinks Maloney will be serving this summer in the Chi. But now you can put them together on your own.

Here's Maloney on what makes these drinks, which all contain potable bitters, perfect for summer:

"Potable bitters are, for all intents and purposes, liquids that are meant to be drank in quantity that have a very herbaceous quality. The granddaddy, the one the vast majority of people know, is campari. Campari contains fruit but still has an herbaceous quality. It’s often sweet but it also has a very distinct bitter note.

"Potable bitters dry drinks out, making them refreshing. Bitter and dry are the exact opposite of rich and creamy. Think about what you want to drink when it’s hot out. You walk off the street and it's 102 out with 59% humidity, and you walk into a bar, and maybe that really rich framboise doesn’t look good. Something that’s clean, crisp, and light is where you want to go. You don’t want to drink a quart of heavy cream. You want the opposite of that.

"Bitters has those flavors and helps bolster other dry ingredients. Like lemon juice. Lemonade is the quintessential summer drink. And a lot of the drinks we’ll look at today are basically plays on adult lemonades. But using a wider palette of flavor."

1.5 oz. Amaro Cio Ciaro

.25 oz. Campari

.5 oz. Tanqueray

.25 oz. St. Germain

.75 oz. Fresh Lemon Juice

.5 oz. Simple Syrup



Glass: Rocks

Ice: Chunk

Garnish: Grapefruit peel, expressed and inserted



Shake. Strain.

This is based in a potable Italian bitter called Amaro Cio Ciaro. Amaro just means bitter in Italian. The cio ciaro has a great orange note. And we have the campari, which is a bitter orange note. So we’re adding lemon to these orange flavors and then we’re sweetening it with Saint Germaine, which is an elderflower liqueur. It’s so unbelievably summer like. It’s got great notes of lychee and grapefruit, but it’s also very floral, like sitting in a garden, surrounded by beautiful flowers. So we’re using that as an aromatic and flavor component to put you in a summer place. But it’s also very dry, so it keeps you wanting one more sip.

1 oz. El Dorado 5 Year
1 oz. Sailor Jerry

.25 oz. Aperol

.75 oz. Fresh Lime Juice

1 oz. Pineapple Juice

.75 oz Simple Syrup

13 drops, Angostura Bitters



Glass: Coupe

Ice: None

Garnish: Floating Lime Wheel



Shake. Strain.

"This drink features two different kinds of rum, and the second kind, the Sailor Jerry, has these great vanilla notes and some Christmas spices, which is slightly counter-intuitive to what you want in a summer drink. But cinnamon, clove, vanilla, and pineapple are just a match made in heaven. I would say it plays around with the idea of tiki without being actually tiki.

"On paper, pineapple and spiced rum, that sounds like it’ll be sweet. But then what we add the aperol, which is a rhubarb potable bitter, and it dries out the drink while adding one more complex note, the rhubarb. The drink goes from whimsical to dry and intriguing."

2 oz. Death’s Door Gin

.75 oz. Fresh Lemon Juice

.5 oz. Simple Syrup



Lace: .25 oz. Briottet Crème de Cassis

Lace: .25 oz. Campari

Glass: Collins

Ice: Crushed

Garnish: Knotted Lemon Pigtail Twist & a Blackberry

Short shake. Strain.

"So the Ramble On is a riff on a drink called the Bramble. It's a gin lemonade with a little bit of red currant and campari on crushed ice. Drinks on crushed ice are so unbelievably satisfying because they’re so cold.

"The Ramble On is an adult lemonade, with great complexity provided by the Death’s Door gin, which has juniper but also great floral notes, a lovely lavender tone that is very summery. And then it’s got lemon and the Cassis to give it some whimsy. The campari really dries it out and gives it some deep orange notes. The drink is lip-smackingly dry."

1 oz. Tito’s Vodka

1 oz. Cocchi Americano

.125 oz. Apry

.75 oz. Grapefruit Juice

.75 oz. Fresh Lemon Juice

.5 oz. Simple Syrup



Glass: Coupe
Ice: None

Garnish: Lemon Wheel with small amount of essential oil

The main player in this one is the Cocchi Americano, which is a light, lemon-flavored fortified wine with one very bitter note that’s balanced by against the citrus and sweetness of the fortified wine. This plays beautifully with fresh squeezed grapefruit juice. We added just a whisper of Apry (apricot liqueur) and then we have the vodka in there to make everything taste more. Vodka for all intents and purposes is a flavor enhancer. It has no flavor in and of itself.

1.5 oz. Pimm’s #1

.5 oz. Tanqueray

.75 oz. Fresh Lemon Juice

.5 oz. House Made Raspberry Shrubb

.125 oz. Simple Syrup

15 drops, Angostura Bitters



Glass: Coupe

Ice: None

Garnish: Lemon Peel, Expressed & Discarded



Shake. Strain.

"A shrubb is a very old invention. Basically it’s a way of keeping berries fresh for months upon months. It’s fresh berries that are cooked down and then combined with sugar and vinegar. Just a suspicion of vinegar to keep the acid level up so that it keeps for a long time. It’s got this great, bright acidity. Especially raspberry, which is already on the tart side for a berry.

"So we’re taking the raspberry shrub and adding it to Pimm’s, which is an herbal gin liqueur from England. It’s incredibly complex while still being incredibly light at the same time. Then we add a little angostura bitters to dry this particular drink out.

"Angostura is the bestselling alcoholic ingredient in the world. It’s a bitters now made in Trinidad and Tobago. It’s been made for approximately the last 200 years. It was originally made by an army surgeon to help the turbulent stomachs of soldiers who were being brought from Europe into the tropics. It was originally a tonic that one could catch while in the tropics. Now it’s used in cocktails as the salt and pepper."