An orange cocktail in a coupe glass perched upon a bartop. Atop the glass rests a small paper airplane. The glass stands on a sheet of paper adorned with images of Paper Mario. A blackboard behind says "Cameroxn's XBar Paper Mario The Thousand-Year Door"

A light blue tropical drink cartoon with a straw and a citrus wheel

You've likely heard of Sam Ross' Paper Plane before and perhaps have even had the chance to sip one yourself. Consider for a moment an occasion where you've witnessed a paper airplane soaring across your gaze ahead of you. Is it soaring through a classroom? Was it blown away from atop a balcony and subsequently flew down to the city streets below? Or was it on a television screen sporting the folded visage of your favorite video game, Japanese-created, Italian plumber?

Inspiration

A Paper Plane cocktail normally includes four ingredients in equal parts: Bourbon, Aperol, Amaro Nonino, and Lemon Juice. For this riff inspired by our paper-thin hero, I introduced a slight modification of the original to better suit the origins of Mario Mario.

Swap the Bourbon

Bourbon is an American spirit, so I thought it appropriate to use a base fitting Mario's origins at Nintendo, a video game company from Japan. Swapping the bourbon out with a Japanese whiskey felt like the way to go. I'm much less familiar with what makes a Japanese whiskey compared to what makes an American bourbon. Evidently, the requirements for Japanese whiskey have changed in the last couple of years (Wine Enthusiast). The swap with the blended Japanese Suntory Toki lends a more vegetal flavor to the drink instead of the more caramelly notes that I tend to get from bourbons.

Rinsing with Fernet

When I originally workshopped the Paper Mario, I originally wanted to showcase an additional Italian amaro like Fernet Branca. Fernet's powerful mint and bitter notes just didn't play well with the other ingredients in equal parts, and I wound up dropping the amount so much that I almost just added a barspoon of it. An idea struck that we could instead rinse the glass, borrowing a technique from the Sazerac cocktail. What remains is a slight hint of mint and a subtle yet noticeable bump in the bitter qualities of the drink.

The Paper Airplane

It's a no-brainer that if you're going to garnish with a paper airplane, then it might as well be Plane Mode featured in the game. Since there didn't seem to be any official source on how to fold your own Paper Airplane Mario, I went ahead and made my own. Please, feel free to make a few of your own! A link to the cutouts can be found here.