How the rotovap is creating a flavour revolution
The first cocktail I had the pleasure of trying in the recently revamped Library Bar at Toronto’s Fairmont Royal York was the Sacred Beast, a spirit-forward lowball made with bourbon, mezcal, verjus, lapsang souchong tea and habanero.
Before you get to sip, though, the drink puts on a little show. Atop the glass is a slate coaster that entirely covers the cocktail and supports a small nest of steel wool that the bartender ignites to create a “cinnamon explosion”—sparks sprinting through the threads to create a mini-pyrotechnic display and a puff of baking spice smoke.
It’s a neat trick. The real magic, however, is the flavour profile. Given the ingredient list, you might expect a jacked-up spicy smoke bomb, but instead the Sacred Beast drinks like a mellow and perfectly balanced mid-century classic that delivers plenty of sweet, sour and delightfully fruity notes to tamp down the char. One of the key elements bringing it all together is the habanero distillate, which is made in the basement of the hotel with a fancy piece of equipment called a “rotary evaporator”—a device better known as a rotovap that separates out compounds to create flavour-packed extracts from raw ingredients.
“Because the rotovap can separate certain compounds such as tannins, colours or spice, you can make an extract that’s focused on one element of a raw ingredient’s flavour,” explains James Grant, beverage director at the Fairmont Royal York. “In this case, the habanero distillate showcases the pepper’s fruity essence instead of the heat.”
Since the habanero is famous for how high it scores on the Scoville scale, few of us are aware that the pepper even has another dimension, but there’s a seriously tasty tropical fruit side to its personality. Even though few have consciously noted this, the moment you smell its floral aroma and taste the sweet and crunchy fruit, you realize it’s been there all along. It’s magic, thanks to the rotovap.
Culinary potential
Invented in 1950 by Lyman C. Craig, a chemist at the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, rotovaps remove solvents with different boiling points, much like traditional distillation. However, unlike a still, rotary evaporation is a very gentle process, which is why it was widely adopted in chemistry labs within a couple of decades.
About 15 years ago, modernist chefs and bartenders realized the rotovap’s gentle process had massive culinary potential, since it can be used to preserve and distill the flavour profile even with extremely delicate ingredients. Thanks to a couple of obstacles though (mostly cost), it’s only now starting to pop up at some bars in Canada.
“The rotovap is on my wish list for next year, for sure,” says Shawn Soole, bar manager at Clive’s Classic Lounge in Victoria. “The only one I’m aware of on the West Coast is at Botanist Bar [at the Fairmont Pacific Rim]. Between cost and our tyrannical liquor inspectors, I think a lot of people aren’t even considering it.”
Although rotovap distillates are closer to refined versions of infusions than new-make spirits, British Columbia, after years of hassles, only allowed aged cocktails and infused spirits in bars in late 2016. In Ontario, bar owners seem to be less concerned about problems, but there’s still a hefty price tag (five figures) attached to a rotovap, which is partly why there are only a few in Toronto—at Mother, Civil Liberties, After Seven and Bar Pompette.
Plus, because it takes hours to make even relatively small quantities, there’s a labour cost involved. At the Royal York, Nick Incretolli, former head bartender at the hotel’s Clockwork Champagne and Cocktail Lounge, took a break from working behind the wood and is now in charge of the lab full-time. Rotovap operators may well be the new unsung heroes of the cocktail program.
Flavour pack
“Other than people in the industry who ask questions, almost no one knows where the flavours come from,” says Hugo Togni of Bar Pompette, whose first big rotovap feature contained a Thai curry extract. Cornichon and birria have since been added to the program.
Togni says he thinks of these extracts as “flavour packs” and uses them the same way a chef would use spices in the base of a sauce.
“I mean, if someone wants to know, we can tell them,” Togni continues. “But more people don’t really think about the guy downstairs distilling for five hours and stuff like that. At the end of the day, all they want is a great cocktail.”
And, at Pompette, they’re certainly going to get exactly that.
