There are many ways to make a cocktail. We can blend it, stir it, “build” it (just add ingredients together and go), muddle it, and of course, SHAKE IT.
But why do we shake? Why are some of the most famous cocktails like to daiquiri, clover club, Champs Elysees, or the pisco sour shaken vigorously? Is it to “look cool”?
It is for many different reasons. The prime reason is to dilute the drink, of course. As we add to our drinks, ICE. Water is the most important ingredient in our cocktails after all. But that still doesn’t explain the need to SHAKE in a cocktail shaker to finish the drink.
This could shed a bit of light on that…
THE JUICE
The best cocktails, even the rum cocktails we spoke about in other posts, require fresh juice for optimal flavor. The juice gives the spirit a new life, a new breath of freshness and flavor.
BUT, with juice, it is not so easy to get both flavors together. So much so, that the shaking allows for not only dilution to happen, but EMULSIFICATION. The process of emulsifying something into another is simply to incorporate two substances entirely.
Lets take a gimlet for example: Gin, lime juice, and simple syrup.
Two options: shake or blend. Lets shake, as the flavors are better pronounced and we can more easily control dilution. By shaking, we can properly combine the gin with the lime juice and simple syrup. If we were to NOT shake it, and just build it as is, then we would have the simple syrup floating on top (or bottom, usually) and the lime juice separated from the gin. This would have flavors all over the place, and would not help for us to create a cohesive, citrus and sweet balanced experience when our patron enjoys the cocktail.
BUT HOW LONG DO WE SHAKE?
How long we shake depends on two things: the type of ice we use, and how the end cocktail will be presented. Overall, ice is the controlling factor.
If the cocktail is going to be shaken with crushed ice, then we do not have to shake much at all, because the ice will melt much quicker (due to more surface area). If the cocktail is shaken with larger ice, then we must shake for a longer period of time, to properly dilute (average ice cubes, filled in the shaker about 3/4 full, require 10-15 seconds shake, if it is a large shard of ice, then even more so, about 20 seconds).
HOW HARD TO SHAKE?
The strength of the shake is just as important as how long we shake. There is something we call a “whip shake”, which is a shake with a few small pieces of crushed ice to get the mixture inside the shaker cold. This is to prepare the drink to be served over more crushed ice (we do not want too much ice during the shake, because our drink could get overly diluted). A perfect example of this is the mai tai cocktail.
Typically, shaking “too hard” is never really an issue. There actually gets to be a point within the shaker where there is an EQUILIBRIUM of all of the ingredients’ temperatures. The trick, again, is if you serve it over ice… DONT SHAKE TOO MUCH. Keep it light.
…
In all, shaking is a critical part of making cocktails. When we shake, the philosophy is that we shake whenever there are any juices added to the drink. So, with your daiquiris, clover clubs, pegu clubs, margaritas, don’t think twice about giving it a good shake!
Jonathan Echavarria 