I am not very good at math and/or formulas, so I was curious to know what the “toxicity” or alcoholic content would be of a cocktail of these proportions:
1.5 ounces Venezuelan Rum
0.5 ounces sweet vermouth
1 teaspoon Grand Marnier
2 dashes orange bitters
Absinthe rinsed coupe glass
I get 60% from the rum (40% x 1.5)
12% from the vermouth
5% from the Grand Marnier
and less than 3% from the bitters & absinthe rinse
If stirred over ice, Would that still make the entire drink make 80% alcohol?
You’re thinking about the math a little backward. You need to figure out the volume of pure ethanol in each ingredient, and then determine what percentage that is of the total drink volume.
For simplicity, I’ll ignore the bitters/absinthe since the quantities are pretty small.
So .74664 oz of alcohol in 2.1666 oz total volume = ~34.5% ABV pre-stirring.
Factor in ~20% dilution from stirring and the finished drink is more like 28% ABV.
Shameless plug: the private recipe feature of Total Mixology/Total Tiki Online will estimate total alcohol and ABV for you just by plugging in the recipe. For 95%+ of recipes, this is little more than a copy/paste and button press. (In this case, one additional edit was required to handle the rinse.)
Frequent talking point that seems slightly appropriate to reiterate here: cocktail menus should tell you how much alcohol is in each cocktail.
Occasionally menus tell you the ABV. This is relevant to a guest’s sensory experience, but without knowing the total volume of the drink, they still don’t know how much alcohol they are consuming. A daiquiri with 1.5 oz of 80 proof rum is 1 “standard drink.” An equal parts Last Word with 1 oz of each ingredient is more than 2 “standard drinks.” After 2 daiquiris you’re probably under the legal limit to drive, after 2 Last Words you’re probably over, yet there’s no way for the guest to know. The math is straightforward, or for the math-averse there’s an app.
Possibly relevant: I live in Detroit where everything is far apart and public transit is actively opposed.
I agree 100%. There’s a related thread here: Indicating drink strength on drink menus
