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Cocktail History
The Mexican Tricycle is a modern cocktail recipe that was created by Andrew Volk of Portland Hunt + Alpine Club in Portland, Maine. According to Volk, it’s a cool-weather variation of Jeff Morgenthaler’s Broken Bike, which is itself a riff on the Bicicletta, that pairs mezcal, Cynar, and hard cider.
Cocktail Ingredients
To make this cocktail, you’ll need the following ingredients:
Mezcal: This is one of the base spirits. We used Del Maguey Vida Mezcal because it offers aromas of tropical fruit, honey, and roasted agave and notes of ginger, cinnamon, and tangerine. For a low-proof version of this drink, try Monday Zero Proof Mezcal in place of the mezcal.
Cynar: This is an amaro. It adds a bitter herbal flavor with notes of toffee, caramel, and cinnamon.
Hard Cider: This sweetens the cocktail and adds apple flavor. The recipe specifically calls for Bantam Wunderkind, but that’s no longer being made as of 2021, so we used Red’s Hard Apple Ale instead. We recommend trying other locally made ciders for more unique flavor profiles. For a low proof version of this drink, try apple cider in place of the hard cider.
Lime Wheel: This is the garnish. It adds a bit of lime aroma and lime flavor when dropped into the drink.
Tasting Notes
The Mexican Tricycle features aromas of light lime and deep smoke and has a taste that begins with apple’s sweetness followed by mezcal’s boisterous, earthy flavor almost immediately. On the swallow, the Cynar comes forward, combining a pleasant bitterness with the mezcal’s smoky aftertaste.
Our Opinion of This Cocktail Recipe: While we agreed this drink featured one of the more unique flavor evolutions we’ve ever tried, Kendall didn’t find it quite palatable enough. Alex enjoyed the unexpected blend of flavors though and would turn to this again in the future, perhaps with a drier cider.
Which of our palates is yours most like?
Find out if your palate is most similar to Alex’s or Kendall’s by answering five questions.
Which of our palates is yours most like?
Find out if your palate is most similar to Alex’s or Kendall’s by answering five questions.
Alex’s Take: ⭐⭐⭐
“Having started my drinking career on Red’s Apple Ale, I wasn’t sure how this would go down since it was combining two of my new loves (mezcal and Cynar) with an old, long-lost, and mostly unwanted love. However, this drink had a crazy intense evolution and ended up better than I thought it would. It only barely featured apple sweetness and instead featured the effervescence of the cider to complement mezcal’s earthiness and Cynar’s bitterness, which doesn’t even show up until the after-after taste. I can’t say I would order this drink often but am intrigued by its flavor profiles and enjoyed pondering it.”—
Kendall’s Take: ⭐
“I don’t care for mezcal or Cynar, but I went into this tasting intrigued about how the two ingredients would taste when mixed with the cider. I expected them to be largely masked by the cider, but they weren’t at all. I mostly tasted smoky mezcal with a hit of Cynar’s bitterness at the end. Ultimately, this wasn’t for me, but it was interesting. I’ll give it that.”
Recipe
This cocktail recipe was adapted from The Essential Cocktail Book: A Complete Guide to Modern Drinks by the editors of PUNCH and Megan Krigbaum.
Add mezcal, Cynar, and crushed ice to a highball glass.
Stir for 5-10 seconds.
Top with hard cider.
Garnish with lime wheel.
Ingredients
Directions
Add mezcal, Cynar, and crushed ice to a highball glass.
Stir for 5-10 seconds.
Top with hard cider.
Garnish with lime wheel.
Make It a Mocktail: Use Monday Zero Proof Mezcal in place of the mezcal and apple cider in place of the hard cider to try a low-proof version of this drink.
Tools & Glassware We Recommend
More Mezcal Cocktails
If you like this mezcal-based cocktail recipe, here are a few others we’ve tried that you may enjoy:
Sabueso Old Fashioned: A tequila and mezcal cocktail made with caramel coffee syrup, coffee and chocolate bitters, and an orange peel
Privateer (Variation): A tequila cocktail made with passion fruit syrup, pineapple juice, lime juice, smoke and salt bitters, rosemary, and Tajín
Old Grampian: A Scotch cocktail made with honey syrup, Angostura aromatic bitters, orange bitters, and an orange peel
The Marriage of Maguey: A mezcal and tequila cocktail made with coffee chocolate liqueur, orange curaçao, and agave syrup
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