Anyone who is a bartender or an avid home bartender such as myself, can tell you how difficult it is to come up with a good cocktail recipe from scratch. I've spent hours staring at bottles trying to come up with an idea just to get nowhere or hate what I made.

In preparation for Sagamore Rye's innagural cocktail competion, my friend and I spent hours (days really) coming up with new and unique recipes. After a least a dozen failed or partial successful attempts we almost gave up. Our notebooks were full of scribbled out notes and we decided to cobble things together to make this recipe. It's a fusion between a White Negroni and a Brooklyn that is bitter, funky, aromatic, and deliciously oaky. It's an amazing hybrid that came with a lot of trial and error.

Why I like this recipe so much is because it highlights the labor of love that is home bartending. Once you become comfortable with your own abilities, you become comfortable experimenting. Whether it works or not, you learn and build an appreciation for the craft.