Pair The Right Alcohol With Seafood

Just like wine, good cocktails and spirits can be paired with all types of food and cuisine, especially seafood.
As a rule of thumb, its mostly white spirits and cocktails comprised of them can be paired with seafood but there are some exceptions to this rule, a good example would be dark rum and white fish. 
A fillet of white fish (Basa) can be enjoyed even more by a simple splash of rum, some fresh lime, and a sprinkle of thyme before cooking.  The sweetness from the molasses pairs well with the sour lime and fresh herb. 
Cocktails best suited to enjoying seafood can be so simple to make, you can also do it at home!
*A little hack is to take either 50ml of tequila (white) rum (white) gin or vodka and add 20ml FRESH lime juice and 20ml 1:1 ration sugar syrup shake and strain, works every time (just make sure the lime juice is straight out of the lime!)
Here are some more recipes by our in-house expert, Zachary Abbott – Brand Ambassador for Diageo, that you can make at home for your friends and family.

Avocado Collins
If you’re looking to bring drinks into your food experience, sometimes it’s best to bring the culinary world into your mixology.  The best two ways to do this are through the use of ingredients and use on technique. This cocktail uses avocado, a not so common cocktail ingredient and blending a common culinary technique used for creating purees and such.

Seafood Pairing: The light and citric notes of the avocado and lemon allow a base to form on the palate for the Umami flavours of the fish to lay. Perfect with salmon!

Ingredients
50ml Ketel One
20ml fresh lime juice
20ml honey water
Half Avocado
2 dashed bitters
Cucumber slice

Method
Blend all ingredients with ice and pour into a tall glass. Garnish with a touch of salt and pepper. And a cucumber slice.

Image Credits: Ketel One

The Red Samurai 
Based upon the Red Snapper, the gin cousin of the Bloody Mary, this oriental version of cherry tomato, wasabi instead of tabasco and soy sauce instead of Worcestershire sauce aim to pair umami flavours together. This cocktail uses comparison rather than contrasting to flavour and makes for a very balanced and enjoyable experience.  

Seafood Pairing: Perfectly paired with fish curries as the tomato defuses some of the spice in the curry yet the wasabi and soy pair with the spices also. 

Ingredients
50ml Tanqueray 
60ml fresh cherry tomato juice
5ml wasabi
Pinch sea salt and pepper muddled peppercorn 
10ml lemon juice
10ml soy sauce

Method
Shake ingredients rigorously, strain over ice in a tall glass. Garnish with a slice of cucumber, a chilli, some mint leaves and a lemon wedge. 

Wasabi-Tini
The perfect cocktail to enjoy with sushi! Don’t bother putting the wasabi in the soy or directly on the sushi, just eat and sip your day away.  The martini is already the perfect aperitif but with the addition of wasabi, it makes a far more elegant way of introducing those raw spice notes into one’s Japanese culinary adventure. 

Seafood Pairing: Perfect with crab or salmon maki. 

Ingredients
50ml Ketel One 
10ml Sake (if you don’t have Sake just add more Vodka)
Small dab of Wasabi
Olives for garnish

Method
Mix all together in a mixing glass, add ice and stir until chilled.  Strain into martini glass and garnish with stuffed olives.

Dutch Gimlet
With the addition of fresh citrus this cocktail is a perfect matching beverage during seafood as the cocktail itself does not overpower the food but allows each to complement each there.  

Seafood Pairing: This is a balanced classical cocktail best served with any sea food.

Ingredients
50ml Ketel One
20ml fresh lime juice
20 ml 1:1 sugar syrup

Method
Shake and strain into a chilled martini glass. 

Martini
If it isn’t broke don’t fix it, isn’t that what they say? The martini is the aperitif cocktail which means it is supposed to stimulate an appetite without over loading the guest.  The martini made well, can stimulate the senses, sooth the soul and pair itself to nearly any flavour profile, yet with seafood the delicacies of the juniper are allowed to expand over the palate and make for a far more satisfactory gourmet experience. 

Seafood Pairing: Grilled salmon goes well. 

Ingredients
60ml Tanqueray 10
10ml dry vermouth
Ice

Method
Stir ingredients over solid ice and strain into chilled martini glass. 

The Fish-Tanq Punch  
Based on the classical fish house punch created in Philadelphia to celebrate women’s inclusion in the fishing club this gin altered version is perfect for small seafood canapés especially shellfish.

Ingredients
50ml Tanqueray 
10ml cognac
10ml peach brandy
 20ml sugar syrup
20ml chilled water
Lemon slice

Method
Shake all ingredients and strain over large fresh ice in a tall glass. Garnish with lemon slice. 

Now you know what to order to drink as well as the food that goes along with it.

Don’t forget to DRINK RESPONSINLY!