Recipe: a ginger-spiked rum cocktail from Momofuku bartender Benjamin Deacon

PREP TIME: 1 hour 5 minutes Serves 1

GINGER SYRUP (optional; you can also buy it) ½ cup fresh ginger, unpeeled, washed, roughly chopped ½ cup granulated sugar 1½ cups water

COCKTAIL 2 oz Appleton rum 1 oz fresh lime juice 1 oz ginger syrup 2 oz Spearhead Hawaiian pale ale Candied ginger for garnish

1. Place ginger, sugar and water in a small pot. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer over medium-low heat. Cook for 1 hour until the mixture reduces to a thick syrup. Strain the syrup twice through a sieve into a jar or bottle. Refrigerate. Makes 1 cup.

2. To make cocktail, place all ingredients except Spearhead in a Boston glass. Add extra ginger syrup to taste. Add ice, shake and pour into glass. Top with beer.

BENJAMIN DEACON MOMOFUKU Brisbane native Benjamin Deacon has found kindred spirits in Toronto: tipplers who, he says, have adventurous palates and appreciate a well-balanced cocktail. Deacon started at the Little Italy restaurant Acadia and last year decamped to Momofuku at the Shangri-La Hotel. He likes to reinvent classic cocktail recipes—he describes his Bundy-Bear as “a dark and stormy on steroids,” with ginger syrup and Hawaiian pale ale in lieu of ginger beer.

Recipes developed by Victoria Walsh. Recipe photography by Ryan Szulc. Portrait photography by Raina and Wilson. Illustrations by Aleksandar Janicijevic. Interviews by Denise Balkissoon, Ariel Brewster, Andrew D’Cruz, Jennifer Goldberg, Matthew Hague, Claire Hastings, Bronwen Jervis and Simone Olivero.