Winter Warmer (Bourbon Old-Fashioned)

Note: This recipe is using INW Shisha Punch in a 10% PG dilution. The notated 1.5% reflects the total amount of the DILUTED FLAVORING to add!

"Winter is coming....."

Nothing warms you better than a Bourbon cocktail. My favorite is the Old-Fashioned. It's a time-tested recipe that is sure to please in any of it's myriad variations. Not coincidentally, it translates PERFECTLY to vapor. This profile lives for olfactory application. It's beauty is in it's ingredient simplicity yielding complex flavor results. Ever since it came together, I cant stop vaping it. It gets better every day.

This iteration is a spicier one, as it is modeled after a recipe using brown sugar and Angostura bitters. The cornerstone is the duality of TFA Kentucky Bourbon, and a touch of FA Vanilla Bourbon. I've found the FA adds a subtle high note to an otherwise perfect TFA offering. This bourbon combo leaves room for the real beauty of an Old-Fashioned: What lies "beneath"......those subtle aromatics, earthy spices, herbal undertones, citrus, and ripe fruit notes peeking from below.

Nothing overpowering, just fragrant hints vying for your attention. Their friendly interplay is essential to make the recipe equate to more than the sum of it's parts.

This recipe is using an aftermarket dilution of 10% INW Shisha Punch in PG solution. (To make dilution: Simply add 1mL flavoring to 9mL of plain PG.)

Our aromatics are chiefly INW Shisha Punch (see note ^). A grossly under-appreciated flavoring that is pretty tasty on it's own around 0.5%. With notes of cinnamon, clove, cardamom, nutmeg, star-anise, and then some. Shisha Punch stands in for the quintessential aromatic bitters. The only lacking component from the flavoring is, perhaps, vanilla. Thus, a boost of TFA Vanilla Swirl is used to fill that missing space in the Angostura puzzle. It adds straight vanilla, and rounds out some edges with it's light creaminess. This is no place for an egg-laden bakery vanilla.

We're left with our simple muddled ingredients: TFA DX Brown Sugar, FW Blood Orange, Sucralose, Ethyl Maltol, and FA Lime Tahiti DISTILLED (NOT Cold-Pressed!).

(The DX Brown Sugar can be subbed with regular Brown Sugar Extra. However, the DX version can hold up to higher temperatures without imparting nasty burnt notes.)

Naturally, DX Brown Sugar and Blood Orange stand in for the orange-peel and brown sugar, with the Distilled lime an added feature to liven the citrus tone. FW Blood Orange, and FA Distilled Lime Tahity are hard to sub, as they possess so much of that oily, spicy quality of an actual citrus rind. The Sucralose/EM combo represents the simple syrup component. With that, we're off to the races.

Now you're ready to vape like a fancy man. Grease up that handlebar 'stache! Hope to see other variations on this simple concept. Cheers, my fellow mixers!