Where Should You Put the Banana in Your Banana Boulevardier?
An investigation.
Today we’re going to make a Banana Boulevardier. Fine, yes, I know what you’re thinking: That sounds like a pretty silly drink. Maybe it is. But I promise it’s actually quite delicious.
And, if nothing else, it’s also a surprisingly useful exercise, because you have to find a way to add banana flavor to a Boulevardier, and there are multiple ways to do so. So you can just skip to the recipes. But if you read the whole thing, you can also think of this newsletter as a lesson in the complexities and challenges of modifying a classic cocktail.
I wrote an extended brief on the Boulevardier last year. But even still, we should briefly review the basics. It’s a cousin of the Negroni consisting of whiskey, sweet vermouth, and Campari.
Although it’s an equal parts drink in its traditional form, it’s quite common for bartenders to serve it in modified ratios that boost the whiskey portion. My personal preference is for a 5:4:4 version that splits both the whiskey and vermouth portions of the drink, but one of the strengths of the Boulevardier is its flexibility. Not only can it be made well in any number of ratios — 1:1:1, 2:1:1, 3:2:2, 5:4:4 — it can also be made with either rye or bourbon, and served either up or on the rocks. It’s also a simple drink, requiring just three ingredients that are quite common. All of which means that it’s a great drink to play around with, and to modify with other flavors.
Like banana. Don’t laugh!
The Case for Banana Liqueur
Now, there are various ways you could add banana flavor to a Boulevardier. You could make a banana syrup and try to find a way to mix it in, although you’d struggle to balance the sweetness. You could infuse banana into one of the ingredients (probably the whiskey, but in theory a banana-infused Campari could work too), although this would probably take some experimentation to get right. But even if you had the process all figured out, both of these methods require some prep and production.