By rights, I should start a short series by posting the more classic Sidecar (Cognac, orange liqueur, and lemon juice), but I love this one even a little more because it adds rum (I love rum!), and I mixed one of these for my tasting at CHM last Saturday, so I’m in the mood for one.

Harry MacElhone, of Harry’s New York Bar in Paris fame, created “Between the Sheets” in the early 1930s by riffing on the Sidecar. Opinions vary on how much lemon juice to add—your mileage may vary. But also, if your first couple of copies are a little too tart for your taste, you can bump up the simple syrup to balance the lemon.

BETWEEN THE SHEETS
 1 oz Light rum
1 oz Cognac
1 oz Triple Sec
1/3 oz Freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 tsp Simple or sugarcane syrup
 
Shake all ingredients with ice and fine-strain the mix into a chilled stemmer. Garnish with a twist of lemon zest.

If you’re not into rum but like the general idea of this drink, cocktail/spirits historian and raconteur David Wondrich suggests a variation on it, replacing the rum with Benedictine for a more herbal aspect to the mix.

BETWEEN THE SHEETS (Wondrich’s Formula)
1 oz Cognac
½ oz Benedictine D.O.M.
½ oz Triple sec liqueur
¼ -½ oz Freshly squeezed lemon juice

As with the recipe above, shake all ingredients with ice and fine-strain the mix into a chilled stemmer. For this version, garnish with a twist of orange peel after flaming the peel over the drink.