Paper Plane Cocktail Recipe
The Paper Plane was first developed around 2007 by Sasha Petraske and Sam Ross of Milk & Honey for their former colleague Toby Maloney’s Chicago bar The Violet Hour. The recipe is a riff on the classic Last Word. The cocktail consists of equal parts Bourbon, Aperol, Amaro Nonino, and lemon juice (.75oz ea). The cocktail’s name is a reference to the M.I.A. track “Paper Planes,” which was apparently a guilty pleasure of Petraske’s.
Ingredients:
– 0.75oz Beefeater Gin
– 0.75oz Aperol
– 0.75 oz Lemon Juice
– 0.75oz Cointreau
Method:
To make the Paper Plane, measure 0.75oz each Bourbon, Aperol, Amaro Nonino, and lemon juice into a shaker. Fill with ice, shake vigorously, then double strain through a mesh strainer into a chilled cocktail coupe. You can garnish with a lemon peel (but we like to use a tiny paper airplane speared on a toothpick.)
The equal parts recipe for this drink provides a great format for plugging and playing to make your own original cocktails at home. The foundation is: Spirit (Bourbon), Amaro (Nonino), Bitter (Aperol) and Citrus (Lemon). Most of these items can be subbed out for another in the same category, such as subbing Campari for Aperol, or Cointreau for Amaro Nonino. If one of your substitutions is significantly more bitter or sweet than its original counterpart, you can adjust the recipe to balance your new creation. My favorite recent riff, which is perfect for the approaching summer, is as follows: Shake, double strain, and top with dry sparkling wine.
