Steak 954 Rio Mar

1 1 / 4 ounce black cherry bourbon
1 ounce blackberry-infused St. Germain
1 ounce lemon juice
Dash Angostura bitters
Ice
1 1 /2 to 2 ounces prosecco
3 St. Germain-infused blackberries

"How to make the drink: Put the bourbon, black-berry infused St. Germain, lemon juice and Angostura bitters into a shaker filled with ice. Shake well. Strain into a chilled champagne flute. Add enough prosecco to fill the glass to about an inch from the top. Garnish by floating 3 infused blackberries on top of the drink. Makes 1 serving. — Tracey Broussard"

Found this recipe at the Sun Sentinel You can read about infusing the St-Germain and more in the source article.

St-Germain Liqueur

I think the amazing bottle is really what got my interest, but never the less I had to give this one a try. It was $35 so not too pricey.

Background:

Doing a little reading a about St-Germain is interesting. Turns out it is a flower or floral liqueur made from Elderflowers and various other ingredients. St-Germain contains 100% natural ingredients and no preservatives which is points in my book. Worthy of note as well is the mention that St-Germain has roughly half the sugar of most Liqueurs. Though I have not seen the actual amounts in grams yet.

It imported from France by Maison 6ème Arr., Philadelphia, PA.

On the St-Germain website you can learn that every load of elderflowers they use to make this stuff is hand-picked and then bi-cycled.. yes bi-cycled from the foot hills of the Alps down to a market where they purchase them to make the liqueur.

Visual:

As I said previously, the fancy French bottle is probably what drew my eyes to it. The bottle is really sweet; the label and metal cap all create a really artistic old world look.

The liqueur inside is a pale but golden yellow. It is actually quite inviting. I think the bottle really adds to the color, if it was a simple plain bottle then the pale yellow liquid may have looked less appealing. You don't see many pale yellow colored Liqueurs, or if you do they are in a darker bottle.

Overall a very pleasing and impressive bottle. Lots of French words and it includes a miniature tag-like book with a story about the liqueur.

Nose:

Needless to say, I would go out on a limb and say a floral liqueur should have a good nose. They ARE made with flowers.

St-Germain does not disappoint! It smells like sweet nectar. Honey-dew, sugar, vanilla, pear and melon are all words that came to mind when I take a whiff.

I have to say with this being my first floral liqueur that the smell is good, but it does not smell like it would *taste* good. The flowery smell is strange if you are new to floral liqueurs. That all changes though once you take a sip.

Taste:

Sweet, like any liqueur very sweet. It is hard to separate smell from taste with something as aromatic as this, but some of the nose remains in the taste. You get citrus, orange, lemon along with a nectar type flavor. It's fairly thick and The finish is a bit syrupy for my taste but overall satisfying.

Final:

I like this liqueur. I didn't think I could get into floral liqueurs, but my goal here is to try every liqueur possible. This is really good stuff, I especially like the citrus taste combined with the sweet floral smell. It is very well balanced.

Due to syrupy finish I don't think I could drink much more than a single serving by itself, but it will make a great after dinner drink and an even better mixer. I'm imagining it right now with ginger ale...

For more reading check out

St-Germains Website and the wikipedia page on Elderflower