Thinking about citric acid in cocktails

[Fat Guy]

I'm in possession of more citric acid than I'll ever use. I only needed a few teaspoons but the brutal economics of Kalustyan's has my kitchen looking like basically like a meth lab. Anyway, I've been thinking about what else I can use the citric acid for. I have a few ideas, and there are a couple of past topics, but I was wondering if anyone has experimented with using citric acid in cocktail making.

[bostonapothecary]

I'm in possession of more citric acid than I'll ever use. I only needed a few teaspoons but the brutal economics of Kalustyan's has my kitchen looking like basically like a meth lab. Anyway, I've been thinking about what else I can use the citric acid for. I have a few ideas, and there are a couple of past topics, but I was wondering if anyone has experimented with using citric acid in cocktail making.

i've used it in the past to make dry vermouth as tart as a lemon. certain abandoned brands like gallo have barely any botanicals and just taste like elder flower-muscat. if you need to make tart drinks for large amounts of people, it works out pretty well.

but most of the time i prize the sensory quality of my acid providing citrus above that of my spirits.

[KatieLoeb]

Steven, my recipes for lime and lemon cordial in RecipeGullet both call for citric acid powder, as well as a bit of tartartic acid. The upside is the cordial keeps really well refrigerated once made and I think I recall that you do enjoy a good gimlet. Just a thought...

[pastrygirl]

If you ever make meringue and find it too sweet, a little citric acid will balance that out.

[Shalmanese]

I find it more convenient than lemons to add a bit of brightness to a dish at the end of cooking. At that concentration, I can't distinguish a difference between citric acid and lemons but with quantities of more than a tablespoon, I'd rather just use fresh lemon juice for it's rounder and more complex flavor. Citric acid shouldn't cost more than 2 or 3 bucks a pound so I don't feel too bad about not using it up completely.

Edited April 28, 2012 by Shalmanese (log)

[Mjx]

I often add citric acid to mixed drinks (can't really call my random experiments 'cocktails'), and I particularly like the way it balances out sweeter combinations of ingredients, where added citrus might be out of place (e.g. when I want another fruit flavour to remain dominant). Alcohol seems to slow the rate at which citric acid dissolves, which I like, since you get these little sparks of intense sourness.

Can't you get little bags of citric acid in supermarkets, or is that just an EU thing?

[EvergreenDan]

I would be very interested in this. I tried using it with sweet vermouth to retain the flavor (no added citrus notes) but adjust the cloying sweetness. It was not successful, but perhaps I didn't try hard enough. Does anyone have a great recipe that shows of citric acid in a context where lemon or lime would not work as well or better?

Side note: I was thinking of this as a sweet/sour vermouth, in contrast to dry vermouth which has minimal sugar and fairly minimal (at least compared to citrus) acidity. In the context of a 5:1 Martini, this is my definition of a "dry" cocktail -- neither sweet nor sour. Contrast this to say a Margarita which is balanced just so that it seems equally sweet and sour. I would not call this dry, but sweet/sour. And if it had more lime, I would call it sour, rather than dry.

Edited April 28, 2012 by EvergreenDan (log)

[Lisa Shock]

It's used in some sour candies, might make an interesting component of salt/sugar used for rimming.