Episode 282

RTD Redux

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RTD Redux

Episode 282

What’s shakin’, cocktail fans?

This time around, I’m absolutely stoked to revisit an important topic in the beverage world, namely: ready to drink cocktails. WAY back in Episode 137 (that’s almost 150 episodes ago…), we opened up the conversation about these canned and bottled libations at the 2020 American Distilling Institute International Spirits Competition, and now, four years later, it’s high time that we come back to see how the landscape has changed.

I’m joined once again by spirits and cocktail experts David T. Smith, Keli Rivers, and Joe Barber, who have all spent a lot of time thinking about and tasting RTDs from the far reaches of the globe. Joe was a panelist in our first RTD episode, and David & Keli have made multiple appearances on the podcast to talk about everything from Martinis, to Negronis, and beyond.

In this RTD redux with Keli Rivers, David T. Smith, and Joe Barber, some of the topics we discuss include:

Emerging trends in the post-pandemic RTD (ready to drink) and RTS (ready to serve) cocktail space, including more bottled RTS SKUS, continued innovation by small producers, and marked improvements across the board in stability and flavor.
Thoughts on the very real limitations of launching an RTD, such as flavor drift, limited off-premise shelf space, and market saturation.
Increased adoption of RTDs by event venues and airlines, including a stunning demo of flight attendant choreography by David.
A breezy romp through some of the more “populist” categories of RTDs, including boozy iced teas and vibrantly colored mermaid lemonades.
And some discussion about the pros and cons of using a malt alcohol (i.e. fermented) base, versus employing distilled spirits in RTDs and RTSs.
Along the way, we explore the use cases for “urinal cake” as a tasting note, the color “bleen” (coming to a crayon box near you), a spicy debate about sidecars and dividends, and much, much more.

This is a light-hearted departure from our normal, buttoned up interview format, but don’t let our casual rapport and bubbling excitement fool you: there’s a ton of great insights here for anyone who’s interested in producing or enjoying RTDs in the year 2024 and beyond.

Featured Cocktail: Eric’s Boat Negroni

This episode’s featured cocktail is: my patented Boat Negroni!

To make it, you’ll need, well…everything you need to make a regular negroni. Gin, Campari, Sweet Vermouth, and some sort of citrus garnish, whether orange, or grapefruit, or lemon.

The key to the Boat Negroni is your ability to easily batch and enjoy it…you guessed it…on a boat, which begs certain questions about the realities and constraints of enjoying beverages on a boat. And as someone who has extensive experience in this domain, I can tell you that your limiting factors are absolutely going to be: space in the cooler, availability of ice, and the almost complete non-option of bringing any meaningful cocktail equipment with you. Now, this assumes you don’t live in a mega-yacht with a full kitchen…but I assume if that’s your situation, you’ve got somebody on the payroll to make your drinks for you anyway.

So the ideal Boat Negroni possesses these qualities:

It doesn’t take up a ton of room
It’s pre-chilled, if possible
And it’s essentially “ready to serve.”

To me, that means you need to be able to pull it out of your freezer right before your boat trip, stick it in the cooler, and break it out in the precise moment when you’re ready to enjoy it.

The only equipment you need to execute my Boat Negroni is an empty 750ml bottle (this volume is important because we’ll have to do a tiny bit of math here), a measuring cup, and a simple kitchen funnel.

In your empty 750ml bottle, you’ll combine:

6-7 ounces gin
6-7 ounces Campari
6-7 ounces Sweet Vermouth
3-4 ounces of water

Depending on how carefully you measure and pour, these measurements are going to put you somewhere between 21 – 25 ounces of liquid, which (fair warning) could expand a little in the freezer, so beware. The water calculation is based on a roughly 15-20% dilution ratio, which approximates what will happen in the mixing glass when you hand-stir a negroni.

From here, it’s up to you to figure out the adornments. If you want to dash some orange bitters in the bottle before you chill it down, please feel free. And if you also want to peel and trim some nice citrus twists and stick those in a plastic bag with a paper towel, those can go right in the food or the drink cooler and be expressed a-la minute when you’re adrift on the high seas.

This bottled boat Negroni is good for about 6 servings. And if you have a truly diabolical mind and are preparing drinks for a large crowd of people, you could easily scale up this recipe by a factor of 3 or 3.5, which would incorporate which would allow you to pour a full bottle each of Campari, Vermouth, and Gin into a large mixing vessel, then dilute, and re-bottle.

As you can tell, the Boat Negroni isn’t so much a recipe as it is a vision and a set of tools used to achieve that vision. So your tools and ingredients may vary slightly depending on your circumstances and the type of boating that you enjoy, but the principle stands: make it cold, make it compact, make it…ready to serve.

This episode was made possible with editing and sound design by Samantha Reed, and RTD & RTS insights courtesy of David T. Smith, Keli Rivers, and Joe Barber.

RTD Redux

Featured Cocktail: Eric’s Boat Negroni

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