Thunderbolt

• 1½ oz Irish Whiskey
• ½ oz Banana liqueur
• ½ oz Ginger liqueur
• ¼ oz St. Elizabeth Allspice Dram
• 2 dsh Angostura bitters
• 2 dsh Mole bitters
• Stir with ice for 20-30 seconds
• Strain over large clear cube into a chilled Old Fashioned glass
• Express an orange peel over the drink and garnish.

Happy Friday, friends!

We made it.

It has been a full week, the kind where emotions run high for all the right reasons. It began with my wife returning from London, where she helped our daughter get settled into her new circus-school life. There is nothing quite like seeing the person you love return home after helping the person you both love most begin an entirely new chapter.

To match the fullness of this week–and for other reasons I will get to below–may I present the Thunderbolt.

The Thunderbolt is a fitting cocktail for the week that was: strong at first glance, unexpectedly tender at its centre, and made more compelling by the way a seemingly unruly collection of ingredients learns to work together.

Created by Jack McGarry at New York’s Dead Rabbit, it is essentially an Irish-whiskey Old Fashioned pushed deeply into autumn-spice territory. McGarry has described it as a natural fit for people who already love whiskey, stirred cocktails, and the Old Fashioned format.

The build begins with Irish whiskey, providing the drink’s backbone: cereal sweetness, orchard fruit, gentle vanilla, oak, and the peppery, creamy spice found in many Irish styles.

For this version, I used Teeling Small Batch. It is a terrific sipping and mixing whiskey: present enough to hold its own in a complicated build, but not so pot-still funky that it wrestles every other ingredient for control.

Then comes the surprise.

Banana liqueur adds ripe banana, caramel, and tropical softness. The original recipe calls for Giffard Crème de Banane, which I do not currently have. So Bols has been pressed into service. It is not quite as nuanced, perhaps, but it gets us where we need to go.

Ginger liqueur contributes warming heat, citrusy lift, and a clean, spicy bite. On paper, I worried it might take over the drink. It does not. Instead, it acts like the person at the table who knows exactly when to say something interesting, then lets the conversation continue.

Then there is our household’s favorite: St. Elizabeth Allspice Dram.

This bottle was a gift from visiting friends last year, and I remain very grateful for it. Allspice dram is made from pimento berries–the same berries whose combined flavour profile evokes cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, and pepper. St. Elizabeth is built on Jamaican pot-still rum, which gives its spice a slightly dark, molasses-adjacent edge.

Two dashes each of Angostura bitters and mole bitters add further layers: bitter roots, cinnamon, clove, cocoa, chile, and toasted spice. Finally, orange-peel oil completes the architecture with a bright aromatic signal over an otherwise warm, dark drink.

That ingredient list should be chaos.

Banana, ginger, allspice, mole, Angostura, Irish whiskey, and orange sound like a crowded dinner table where everyone has something important to say. Instead, the Thunderbolt drinks like a deeply seasoned, fruitcake-adjacent Old Fashioned: orange and caramelized fruit on the nose; a rich, caramel-led entry; then whiskey, banana, ginger, and allspice rolling together across the palate. The finish is warmly spiced, chocolate-tinged, and quietly powerful.

It may be my new favourite drink for autumn.

For a week centred on strength–and on a strong woman–the Thunderbolt feels especially right.

The Thunderbolt’s strength is not blunt force.

It is balance: warmth held in check by spice, sweetness given structure by bitters, and several distinct voices becoming something fuller together.

That feels like a worthy toast to the 24 years of marriage my wife and I celebrated this past Monday. Not a simple recipe, perhaps, but an extraordinary blend built through patience, humour, shared heat, hard seasons, beautiful reasons, and the ongoing choice to make room for one another.

Twenty-six years ago, I met her.

Twenty-four years ago, I married her.

And somehow, through every turn since, I have found myself more certain that I am the lucky one.

In celebration of our anniversary, our move to Canada, and the woman whose strength has quietly made so much of our life possible, I offer this:

My Dearest Canadian

You arrived like a Thunderbolt–
not loud for the sake of being heard,
but warm at the centre: whiskey-strong, ginger-bright, banana-sweet,
with the steady burn of spice
that lets a long evening know who is in charge.

You are winter driving through over the Coq,
ice on the shoulder, white-out ahead,
the calm hand still on the wheel.
You are the lake wind that will not yield,
the rain that arrives from the coast,
the northern light refusing to be ordinary.

This country has taught the world its abundance:
mountain stone, river water, wheat, forests,
copper below ground and possibility above it.
But its truest resource is quieter–
the people who wake, show up, endure,
and build again without needing applause.

That is you.
No pomp, no circumstance, no borrowed bravado.
Just the courage to face the steep grade,
the patience to take the next turn,
the humour to survive the storm,
and the love to make shelter out of a life.

Twenty-six years ago, I met you,
and somehow the world grew wider
while becoming more like home.
Through every hard season and unexpected horizon,
I have been the lucky one—
still astonished, still grateful, still yours.

After 24 years, I raise this Thunderbolt to the next 24.

May they be as bold as they are quiet.

All my love. 💖🍁🥃