Latitude 42 Vodka · Recipe 17
The Pastoral
A vodka drink for people who say they don't drink vodka.
Ingredients
- 60 ml Latitude 42 Vodka
- 25 ml verjuice
- 15 ml chamomile syrup
- 2 dashes celery bitters
- 1 dash white wine vinegar
Method
Stir. Serve in a Nick & Nora glass. Garnish with Celery leaf + lemon peel.
Verjuice: available at specialty food stores. Chamomile syrup: steep 2 chamomile tea bags in hot 1:1 syrup, 10 min, strain.
The story
The finest vodka drinks don't announce themselves. They present their flavours — of the accompaniments, the dilution, the water used in the spirit — without editorial commentary from the base spirit itself. This is vodka's gift and its eternal PR problem. Alex Kratena, who built Artesian bar into one of the most conceptual cocktail experiences in the world, argued that neutrality is not emptiness — it's space. The Pastoral occupies that space with chamomile, verjuice (the unfermented juice of unripe grapes — tart, complex, and far more interesting than the same volume of citrus), and a whisper of celery bitters. It tastes like a long walk through a field just before the rain comes.
Tasting note
Hazy yellow-gold, bone dry with a chamomile sweetness that arrives late and lingers. The verjuice adds a complexity that plain citrus cannot match.