Cocktail for This Week: The Patiala Peg Cocktail – How to Make It
Folklore claims that during 1920, Bhupinder Singh, was adamant that his team would succeed over a visiting English team. To secure an advantage, he hosted a splendid party the night before the match, where he served his guests the famous Patiala pegs. These were notoriously generous four-finger whisky servings, customarily gauged from little finger to index finger. Unsurprisingly, the English players partook excessively, resulting in them being extremely the worse for wear and, consequently, vanquished the following day. And so, the story of the Patiala peg came to be.
This take on a kind-of Old Fashioned cocktail draws inspiration from the Maharaja's concoction. At the restaurant, we present it from a custom-made five-litre bottle, but we've adjusted the recipe to make it more suitable for a household environment.
Patiala Peg
Yields 1 litre, enough for 10-12 portions.
You Will Need
- 725g blended scotch whisky
- 130g sugar syrup (1:1)
- 6g Angostura bitters (approximately 1⅓ tsp)
- 1g orange-flavoured bitters (about ⅕ tsp)
- A dash of salt
- 2g xanthan gum powder
Method
Place everything in a large bottle. Pour in 130g water, mix thoroughly, then transfer it in the refrigerator. It will now keep for as long as three weeks.
To serve, measure out about 90ml of the Patiala peg mixture into a short glass packed with ice (ideally one big block). Enjoy straight away. To honour tradition, you could measure it in by hand instead.
