Gunflint Spritz

The Gunflint Trail is a fifty-seven-mile paved road that runs northeast from Grand Marais on Lake Superior into the heart of the Boundary Waters. It is one of the most dramatic drives in Minnesota, climbing slowly out of the lake basin through aspen and birch and into the boreal forest that defines the northeastern corner of the state. The road ends at the edge of the wilderness, where the canoe outfitters and the few remaining lodges sit on lakes that drain toward Hudson Bay. The trail has its own time signature. The cell coverage is intermittent to nonexistent. The lodging is rustic by design rather than by neglect. The evenings are long and dark and quiet enough that the loons are audible from the porch of any cabin worth renting.

The Gunflint spritz is a drink for those evenings — and for any other Minnesota evening that has the same shape. It is low-proof by design, light on the palate, with enough flavor complexity to hold the drinker's attention across a long stretch without producing the kind of heavy fatigue that a higher-alcohol drink would. The spritz form has been having a moment in American bar culture for the last decade, and most of the conversation has been about Aperol and prosecco. The Gunflint version makes a different argument: that the spritz framework — bitter or aromatic modifier, citrus, and an effervescent stretcher — works equally well with regional ingredients, and that Minnesota happens to have all three.

Minnesota Hard Cider

The Minnesota hard cider scene has grown into something serious in the last fifteen years. The state's apple-growing tradition — the University-bred varieties, the cold-climate orchards that run from Hastings down through the river valley and out into the central farm belt — has produced the raw material for a cider industry that now includes operations in the Twin Cities, the river valley, and the lake country up north. Look for ciders that lean dry rather than sweet. The German and English cider styles that have influenced the most thoughtful Minnesota producers tend toward an austere, food-friendly dryness that is the opposite of the sugary mass-market ciders that built the category's earlier reputation.

For this drink, the cider needs to be dry, cold, and lively. The carbonation is doing structural work — it is what makes the drink a spritz rather than a long drink — and a flat cider will produce a flat spritz. Open the bottle just before you pour. If you are building several spritzes for a group, do it one at a time rather than batching, or the carbonation will be gone by the third glass.

Elderflower as Nordic Vocabulary

Elderflower has a complicated place in northern European drink culture. The Scandinavians have been making elderflower cordial — flaedersaft in Swedish, hyldeblomstsaft in Danish — for generations, mostly as a nonalcoholic syrup mixed with cold water for summer drinking. The contemporary American bar's elderflower is mostly the French liqueur St-Germain, which launched in 2007 and changed the American cocktail vocabulary almost single-handedly. Either works in this drink. The Scandinavian cordial gives a less alcoholic, slightly fresher result; the liqueur gives a more concentrated, slightly honeyed effect. Both fit the Nordic thread that runs through northeastern Minnesota's drinking culture, which has been quietly Scandinavian for longer than most of the rest of the state.

Grapefruit as Counterweight

The grapefruit juice is the element that keeps the drink from going saccharine. Elderflower is sweet. Cider, even dry cider, carries residual sugar from the apple. Without a counterweight, the drink would drift toward dessert. Half an ounce of fresh grapefruit juice does what a smaller measure of lemon would not: the grapefruit's bitterness, which is the single most underused flavor in American home bartending, balances against the sweetness without introducing the sharp acid spike that lemon or lime would produce. The express of grapefruit peel at the end picks up the same character in aromatic form. Use a wide piece of peel and twist firmly over the surface to release the oils.

Pink grapefruit and white grapefruit will both work. Ruby red is a touch sweeter and gives the drink a faint pink tint that is not unwelcome. Whatever you use, juice it fresh. Bottled grapefruit juice is one of the saddest products in the supermarket and will ruin this drink by introducing a cooked, slightly metallic note that the fresh juice does not have.

Building for a Group

The spritz is a sociable drink. It is built for the moment in a long Minnesota evening when the outdoors is just outside the window — visible, present, occasionally walked into, but not the focus of the moment. The screen porch in summer. The cabin living room in early autumn with the windows open to the lake. The kind of indoor-outdoor edge that the northern Minnesota lake country specializes in. Build the spritzes individually rather than batching, and serve them in large wine glasses with plenty of ice. The dilution from the ice is part of the structure; the drink should be long and gradually colder as it sits.

Fill a large wine glass with ice. Add the elderflower and grapefruit juice. Top with the cold cider, slowly, to preserve the carbonation. Express a wide piece of grapefruit peel over the surface and drop it in. Drink while the loons are calling, or while the loons are audible only in memory.