Sam Heughan whipped up a special spirit for the cast of Outlander as they bid farewell to the long-running series.

Heughan — who was named one of PEOPLE’s 35 Food Faves of 2025 — has a passion for good drinks, as evidenced by his award-winning Scottish whisky and gin line Sassenach Spirits. On Tuesday, Sept. 23, the actor’s latest endeavor, The Cocktail Diaries, which features a mix of cocktail recipes created or beloved by the star, hit shelves. Ahead of the release, Heughan, 45, spoke with PEOPLE about the cocktail he served to the cast at the Outlander wrap party held at his home in Scotland.

In the book, Heughan notes that he created Sam’s Garden Appletini out of crabapples grown on trees from his own yard.

“The reason I made it [Sam’s Garden Appletini] was that obviously I had my extended family, let’s call them, you know, friends and family from Outlander coming around to my house, and I have this apple tree in my garden that has lots of these crabapples, which are extremely sour,” he tells PEOPLE.

ook, Heughan notes that his trees had never borne fruit before, writing, “Maybe they knew I’d come to the end of my journey with Outlander.”

While he says the sour fruit isn’t “great to eat” he “wanted to use them, and using the Sassenach gin, one of the botanicals we use in the gin is these green apples. So I thought this would work.”

The cocktail was a smash with his friends.

“They all like a tipple,” Heughan jokes. “But also yeah, it just felt nice to create something from my garden. It was a really nice moment to share with everyone that I have been working with — it was cast and crew that were there — and just to [celebrate] an amazing journey we’ve all been on for the past 11 years.”

He adds, “We did finish the bottle that I created and had many other cocktails as well. I think by the end of the night I started making Tommy’s margaritas.”

The evening also included an apple fight as Heughan’s guests used the rest of the crabapples to throw at one another. Although he’s not sure which one of his castmates kicked off the antics, he tells PEOPLE “it was probably Richard Rankin or Sophie [Skelton], one of the two.”

“It escalated pretty quickly; I think everyone was involved,” the Sassenach Spirits co-creator shares of the apple fight. “It was a really wonderful way to end the summer as well.”

The eighth and final season of Outlander is set to premiere on Starz in early 2026.

In his book, Heughan shares more details about his appletini, including that he “used a bottle of gin and a bottle of vodka, then I cut up 10 apples and left them to infuse in the alcohol for a few days. Once strained, it had this beautiful pale green colour that I stirred some vermouth into and it went down a storm at the party.”

The author says the cocktail’s flavor is that of a “crisp, clean apple” with a “burnt butter or buttery kind of creaminess to it as well.”

Heughan also shared that his appletini recipe makes for the perfect date night drink.

“If you want to impress your partner that you’ve gone through this effort, you’ve gone out and bought apples or picked them off a tree and you’ve been making this for a couple of days,” he says, adding, “I think it’s really cool, but it’s also really easy to make. So, if you’re worried about cooking them dinner you want to make a really easy cocktail but make it feel very special, I think that this is the one for your date night.”

The Cocktail Diaries is available now wherever books are sold.