Petit Zinc

1 ounce vodka

1/2 ounce Cointreau

1/2 ounce sweet vermouth

1/2 ounce orange juice

-Stir with cracked ice and strain into cocktail glass.

I looked at these ingredients and had such high expectations. I thought it would be like a leap year or new fashion, but it tasted more like Sunny D and vodka. The orange juice I bought (not Sunny D but also not freshly squeezed) was probably to blame, but I shouldn't have to juice my own oranges to make a decent drink. This one also wasn't very much liquid in my glass. Good because I was going out after, but bad if I were staying in and that was my one drink for the night. You can always double I suppose ;-)

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Beachcomber

My version did look surprisingly similar to this picture, so hooray for me! Unfortunately, I haven't gotten the blending thing down very well yet, and nothing I make comes out with the right consistency of a blended drink. Is it me or is it my blender? The soul searching continues...

Beyond the texture, the beachcomber simply joins the ranks of drinks I don't remember very well and that I took no notes on. Too sweet? Too strong? Boring? Pretty good? No idea. I imagine it wasn't as delicious as the recipe makes it sound or I would've had clearer memories.

1 1/2 ounces light rum

1/2 ounce Cointreau

1/2 ounce lime juice

2 dases grenadine

-Blend with ice and pour into wine goblet.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Martinez

I'm sorry to be such a cocktail failure, but all I remember about the martinez is that it tasted slightly better than I expected. I'm not even going to make anything up. I'll just pack it in and do better next time.

3/4 ounces gin

3/4 ounces dry vermouth

1/2 ounce Cointreau

Dash of bitters

-Stir with cracked ice and strain into cocktail glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Delilah

I don't really remember this drink much, but my notes say it was tasty -- imagine a lemon drop with gin instead of vodka. You got it. I'm trying really hard to catch up on writing these up since I forget them very quickly. I could just start making things up perhaps? This drink tasted like a jungle safari from the early 20th century viewed from onboard a spaceship millions of miles away and hundreds years in the future (since it would take a long time for the light to travel there...) by humans who secretly developed the technology to leave earth in the 1960s and who also have super telescopes that allow them to still observe the planet they left while sipping on a futuristic cocktail made from the tears of unicorns (spoiler alert: they exist!), stardust, and yoijno (couldn't even begin to explain that one). The delilah is the closest you'll ever get to this experience, unless you happen upon the time vortex.

ANYWAY, the cointreau is a little wasted in this drink, and I don't see any reason why subbing triple sec would hinder it in any way. Save yourself the money on that one. Otherwise, the only problem you might have is sounding like a sissy ordering this one in a bar: it just sounds like a girly drink in a way that a manhattan or an old fashioned never will.

2 ounces gin

1 ounce Cointreau

1 ounce lemon juice

-Stir with cracked ice and strain into cocktail glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Cosmopolitan

You have no idea how many times I started to write this post but got too bored and gave up. That's kind of where I'm at with the drink itself as well: blah blah Sex and the City blah blah New York blah blah pink yay! The bottom line: it doesn't taste so different than a crantini. Cointreau is really good, so don't waste it on this drink. Go ahead, use triple sec and save the expensive stuff for when it matters.

Honestly, I drank my cosmo easily, in my apartment, while watching some movie or other. Maybe you have to be at some New York hotspot to really appreciate the genius of the cosmo, but somehow I doubt it. Maybe when you're having as much sex as those girls did, the taste : price ratio is irrelevant. Next time, I'll save my 3/4 ounce of cointreau for a different drink and throw this one together for half the price.

2 ounce vodka

2 ounce cran juice

1 ounce lime juice

3/4 ounce cointreau

-Stir with cracked ice and strain into cocktail glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Sidecar

The sidecar is a classic that I've always wanted to order, but was always a little more than I wanted to spend. If you have the money, you should definitely go for it because it's a great drink.

The sidecar was my companion the other night as I watched Jonny Depp Jack the Ripper flick "From Hell." It was a good thing I was drinking something good because the movie was not. Jonny, you're pretty to look at and a good actor, but no. Honey, no. I'm sorry, but prostitutes in Victorian London did not look like this:

Age her by 25 years, yank out some of her teeth and infect her with any number of maladies and then maybe she would look like a 19th century Whitechapel resident. Seriously.

Umm...well that was a tiny rant that had nothing to do with the booze. Here's how you can survive mediocre (I won't use the term "bad") movies too!

1 1/2 ounce cognac or brandy

3/4 ounce Cointreau

Juice 1/4 lemon

-Shake in cocktail shake and strain into cocktail glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!