Pineapple juice, lychee liqueur, white cranberry juice, Champagne...it’s all fruit, in one form or another. Photo by Bruce Shippee.
September 2006
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Lychee Liqueur Cocktails
No Need To Wait For Fresh Lychee Season With SOHO® Lychee Liqueur
Click to jump to the recipes
In pursuit of the newest and most interesting ingredients, mixologists in trendy boites have been making lychee cocktails for the last few years. Fueled by the expanding interest in Pacific Rim cuisines and Asian-fusion cooking, customers have been excited. But fresh lychees are in season only briefly, and even frozen lychee purée is hard to come by in many markets.
SOHO® Lychee Liqueur*, the number one international brand, has recently arrived in the U.S., imported by Pernod Ricard USA. It makes lychee cocktails within the grasp of most of us amateur mixologists. Whether your preferred mixer is Champagne, vodka, sake, rum, or a combination, you can serve up something your guests won’t have had before, relatively easily.
*The liqueur is 21 proof
The lychee (pronounced LEE-CHEE), a fruit indigenous Southern China, has been a symbol of love and romance for more than 2,000 years. According to legend, back in the eighth century in the T’ang dynasty, Lady Yang Kuei Fei, the imperial concubine of Emperor Hsuan Tsung, had a passion for lychees. The emperor arranged for guards on fast horses to ferry lychees 600 miles to his palace, so they could arrive still fresh for his lady-love.
 The heart-shaped fruit, often erroneously called a lychee nut, has a thin, brittle red skin that peels easily. The flesh is a viscous white and surrounds a large, inedible brown pit that does look like a nut. Today, the fruit is grown around the world: through southeast Asia, the West Indies, South Africa, Madagascar, France and England. In the U.S., they’re grown in Hawaii, Florida and California.
SOHO Lychee Liqueur is distilled from the finest natural Asian lychees. It has a smooth, light, fresh taste, revealing hints of citrus and rose petals. It can be enjoyed straight from the glass, as well as in cocktails. If you’d like a cocktail, where would you like to begin?
- Cocktail Favorites—classics reinterpreted in lychee
- Celebration Drinks—trendy new drinks created by some of New York’s top mixologists
Cocktail Favorites
 Lychee Martini
- 1-1/2 ounces SOHO Lychee Liqueur
1 ounces Stoli vodka
1 dash lychee juice
- Combine all ingredients in a cocktail shaker with or without ice.
Shake well, strain into a cocktail glass, and serve in a cocktail glass.
Lychee Sublime
- 1-½ shot Stoli vodka
¼ tablespoon SOHO Lychee Liqueur
Squeeze of lime
Lychee, for garnish
Ice
- Combine vodka, liqueur, lime and ice and strain into a chilled glass.
Garnish with the lychee and serve.
Tropical Lychee
- 1-½ ounces Pernod®
1-½ ounces SOHO® Lychee Liqueur
5 ounces pineapple soda
- Combine Pernod and SOHO® Lychee Liqueur over ice in a rocks glass.
Fill with pineapple soda, stir, and garnish with a lime twist.
SOHO Spice
- 1 jigger of premium rum
1 ounce of SOHO Lychee Liqueur
Ginger ale
1 lychee, peeled and pitted
- Fill a tall glass with ice, add ingredients and stir.
Citrus SOHO
- 2 ounces Stoli Citros vodka
1/2 ounce grapefruit juice
1 ounce SOHO Lychee Liqueur
1 fresh, frozen or canned lychee, pitted and peeled
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Fresh lychees are available in season at Melissas.com. |
- Pour all ingredients over ice and shake.
Strain into chilled martini glass and garnish with a lychee.
SOHO Lemonade
- 1 ounce Stoli Vodka
1 ounce SOHO Lychee Liqueur
1 ounce lemonade
- Shake and pour into a martini glass.
Top with a splash of club soda.
Garnish with a pitted and peeled lychee and a lemon twist.
SOHO Mojito
- 3 fresh mint sprigs
2 teaspoons sugar
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
1-1/2 ounces light rum
1-1/2 ounces of SOHO Lychee Liqueur
club soda
3 lychees
- Combine and serve in an old-fashioned glass.
Garnish with mint and lychees.
Celebration Cocktails
To welcome SOHO Lychee Liqueur, New York’s premiere palatial Asian restaurant and four four top downtown lounges have developed celebratory cocktails. These cocktails aren’t on the menu, to enjoy them, just follow the recipes below.
Bubbling Lychee-Grapefruit Martini
- 2 parts SOHO Lychee Liqueur
2 parts Stoli vodka
Splash of grapefruit juice
2 parts Champagne
- Serve in a martini glass with a lemon
twist garnish.
Candy Lychee
- 4 pieces muddled watermelon
1 ounce rum
1 ounce simple syrup
1/2 ounce SOHO Lychee Liqueur
- Fill shaker with ice and add all ingredients.
Shake and strain into a martini glass.
Garnish with watermelon.
Downtown Style
- 2 muddled kumquats
1.5 ounces sake
1 ounce Stoli vodka
1.5 ounces SOHO Lychee Liqueur
Splash of grapefruit juice
Splash of simple syrup
- Shake and serve in sugar-rimmed martini glass. Garnish with kumquat.
Jade
- 1 ounce SOHO Lychee Liqueur
1 dash Midori
2 ounces white cranberry juice
1 ounce pineapple juice
1 dash sour mix
Top off with Champagne
- Serve over ice in an old-fashioned highball glass
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If you can’t get fresh lychees for garnish,
canned lychees are available in Asian or
international supermarkets, or from
Amazon.com. Kumquats also can be
purchased canned at the same markets,
on Amazon
or fresh in season from Melissas.com.
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Peachy Lychee
- 1/2 muddled fresh peach
1 ounce light rum
1 ounce SOHO lychee liqueur
Top off with white cranberry juice
- Mix all ingredients in blender. Serve in a martini glass with lychee garnish.
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