For Summer Smash(ed) Hits, "Freezer Door Cocktails"

Freezer Door Cocktails: 75 Cocktails That Are Ready When You Are

Freezer Door Cocktails provides what it promises in the subtitle: 75 cocktails that are ready when you are. And boy, you had better be ready—these are not drinks for the faint of ABV.

The concept is simple and has been knocking around on the web for years: Mix up enough cocktail ingredients to serve about six people, pour them into the original liquor bottle, and stick it in the freezer to be enjoyed later that day, week, month…as long as the cocktail ingredients contain mostly alcohol, to avoid freezing solid. Author J. M. Hirsch, editorial director of Milk Street, produced a variety of TikTok videos showing how it’s done before publishing this book.

To make amounts that fit in the original bottle, Hirsch calls for pouring off some liquor from a full bottle, for which he provides a non-frozen recipe alongside each freezer batch. Then, because his goal is to drink straight from the freezer—no melting required—his recipes contain no more than 20 percent no- or low-alcohol ingredients. That includes not just juice or sugar syrup but lower-ABV—alcohol by volume—drinks such as vermouth or sherry. But because the drinks are so cold they don’t generally call for being served over ice, a small amount of water is added to the bottle to account for the usual dilution from shaking or stirring a cocktail.

So how do fruit flavors get their turn in the freezer? Sometimes, from frozen concentrates (cranberry juice concentrate in a cosmopolitan). Often, Hirsch pulls the flavor in just through citrus zest: Chop it finely in a blender with the alcohol, infuse for several minutes, then strain out the zest for. Or, to get a flavor such as coconut without using coconut milk, which would curdle, he uses the fat-washing technique. It’s an unappetizing moniker for a tasty effect: Mix melted coconut oil, for example, into zest-infused rum, let stand several minutes, then freeze for 30 minutes, leaving an easily removed disk of white oil on top.

Coconut-Lime Daiquiri Colada uses both lime zest-infused rum and coconut oil plus a touch of water and simple syrup. A Blue Moon infuses gin with lemon zest, then turns electric blue with the addition of crème de violette and Blue Curaçao. And a more basic daiquiri simply mixes 18 ounces of rum, 2 ounces each of lime juice and water, and a dash of simple syrup. Tests of all of these produced powerful, balanced drinks.

Mint juleps, however, were somewhat less successful. To avoid freezing mint leaves, Hirsch infuses sugar syrup with 4 cups of fresh mint (he offers no suggestions of type, though spearmint is typical), but the test produced a muted mint flavor. Should the syrup have been heated more to draw out more flavor, or would it have benefited from a touch of mint extract or the mint bitters used in his mojito? Herbs can vary widely in their strength—even according to whether they picked early or late in the day—so a description of how strong the syrup should taste, and how to adjust as needed, may have helped.

Readers may also wish Hirsch gave some details about his preferences for the liquor of each chapter. Do some brands fare better after long freezer stints? Would that mint julep have been better with a different bourbon? (Interestingly, the mint seemed to come through slightly more after two weeks in the freezer, while the Blue Moon felt less balanced after a chilled week, with the floral notes suffocating the rest.)

Overall, though, Hirsch’s recipes achieve his aims. But they leave one nagging feeling: While the cult of pricey, elaborate, and classic cocktails continues to draw new converts, the book feels somewhat out of step with the rising religion of low- or no-alcohol drinks, which have risen far above the mocking “mocktails.” Everyone who participated in drinks tasting for this review—from 20-somethings to 40-, 50-, and 70-somethings—had the same reaction after a sip or two: If you want to get hammered fast, these recipes will get you there. But if you’d like more ideas of how to use them as a very tasty base for something a little less jolting, Hirsch has nothing to offer…so you’ll need to wait patiently for the ice to melt, slowly, in the drinks he serves over ice. For those with no ice in the glass, pack your Advil.

Quick takes:

Freezer Door Cocktails: 75 Cocktails That Are Ready When You Are, by J.M. Hirsch. 182 pages.

Photos: None; each recipe illustrated with simple sketches.

Organization: By type of liquor.

Index: Opens with a list of drinks by name before shifting to a traditional index.

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