Strawberry Margarita

Last post for today! Hopefully I'll have more for you soon though.

The strawberry margarita was my cocktail entertainment just last night so I actually remember it (surprising considering tequila's reputation). I didn't buy enough limes at the Kiva and the grocery store across the street didn't have limes (serious problem), so I had to use mostly lemon juice (not ideal). However, the berries we really delicious and I felt happy and refreshed playing Sorry! with Mahala in my backyard on what felt like the first real day of summer in Oregon. In the future, I might also puree some of the fresh strawberries to put into the mix as well as have some floating slices.

Unfortunately, the effect tequila seems to have on me is not crazy party drunkness, but lame party slumber. After 3 of these babies, I was falling asleep on the couch while watching Arrested Development. Poor Mahala who came over expecting fun! I promise to be a more fun drunk in the future.

The tequila sleeps are not an unknown phenomenon with me: at the end of my 2nd year of college, Lesley and I decided to have Tequila Friday and make margaritas in our place. This turned into a total disaster of terrible tasting drinks and a huge mess in the kitchen. If only I knew then what I know now about making cocktails. We each had one drink, took a nap for an hour or so, then tried to come back and drink more, which still did not get any kind of party started. We'd been hyping it up all week, but nothing popped off.

1 ounce tequila

1/2 ounce triple sec

1/2 ounce strawberry liqueur

juice of 1/2 fresh lemon or lime (go with lime)

1 ounce frozen strawberries (but actually go with fresh if available)

-Salt the rim of a glass, shake ingredients in shaker, and pour with ice into the glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Flamingo Cocktail

Hey, so I'm back but with the sad news that my project is definitely not getting done on time (or on budget). I have 64 drinks to get through in 79 days, which means I have to have a new recipe every 1.2 days. My wallet simply cannot handle that unless someone cares to donate any of the following:

Chartreuse liqueur

Pernod

Galliano

Chambord

Benedictine

Cordial Medoc

Fangelico

Black Sambuca

Kümmel

Pimm's No. 1

Midori

It doesn't hurt to put it out there, does it?

Well, now we're back in the boat where I had this drink so long ago that I don't remember much about it. I know that the apricot brandy I bought had the most 70s-looking label I've ever seen (brand = Mr. Boston if you want to google). I think I was drinking it while watching either Skins or Bones (ha!) towards the end of my apartment living experience about 6 weeks ago. I seem to remember not hating it, but not being inspired by it. Take that for what it is.

1 1/4 ounce gin

1/2 ounce apricot brandy

dash of grenadine

juice of 1/2 a fresh lime

-Cocktail shaker it up and pour into cocktail glass. Ta da!

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Mai Tai and Piña Colada

Unfortunately I had only had blue Curaçao instead of regular, so we drank blue mai tais the other night. Blue drinks will just never seem classy, I don't care what they are called or what they contain.

In fact, the mai tai is a pretty tasty drink, and a nice choice for the nicer weather we had here on Saturday. A lot sweeter than what I am now accustomed to, but still delicious. I can only imagine how amazing these would taste in their proper environment, but those musings will have to stay in my mind until I get some cash money in my bank account.

2 ounces golden rum

1/2 ounce Curaçao

1/2 ounce orgeat (almond flavored) syrup

1/4 ounce simple syrup

juice of 1 fresh lime

-Shake in cocktail shaker and strain into old fashioned glass.

Two drinks in one post! I haven't done that in awhile, but these two happened in the same night I have very similar things to say about them. Yum, but sweeter than I usually drink. Might be making these come summertime. Yay! Recipe:

1 1/2 ounces golden rum

1 1/2 ounce coconut milk

4 ounces pineapple juice

4-5 ice cubes

-Blend it, pour it, drink it.

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!

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!

Cranberry Margarita

Unsurprisingly, cranberry juice works well as a mixer with tequila. Cranberry margaritas are good, but not exactly a revelation. If you prefer tequila to vodka, then get this instead of a vodka cran, otherwise don't bother.

1 ounce tequila

1/3 ounce triple sec

3/4 ounce lime juice

1 1/4 ounce cranberry juice

splash of simple syrup

-Shake in a cocktail shaker and strain into iced rocks glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Matador

We have a winner! The matador is one glass of complete delicious and gets four thumbs way up (I shared this one with an amiga)! It's definitely tropical and girly, but why does that have to be a diss? 'This drink actually tastes good, must be for light weights!' Bah, I like it.

I have to admit that I've been a very bad blogger of late, but I've still been doing the drinking, so I'll catch up eventually. I've had some friends back in town, some of my friends who actually drink, so I've had a chance to re-make some drinks of the past, and even did a bit (very small bit) of mixology. Masha was adorably impressed with my cocktail shaker, a I love her for it ;-)

Now I'll spend the next couple days immersed in Christmas prep at my parents' house, and hopefully catching up on a couple drinks I've yet to post about. Hope everyone's having a great holiday!

2 ounces tequila

1 ounce lime juice

4 ounces pineapple juice

splash of simple syrup

-Shake ingredients in cocktail shaker and strain into iced highball glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Frozen Margarita

Boo, this was a blending failure for me. I've really had mixed results with my blended drinks (the strawberry daiquiri being my highest achievement), and I can't figure out what I do wrong sometimes. I guess I'll have to have people over during break and practice a bit more ;-)

I actually had this one two nights ago after doing who knows what. I can't remember back a whole 48 hours! Last night I stayed at my parents' house and helped them host a party for my mom's work. Basically, I made a pizza that I couldn't eat (salami and roasted peppers with goat cheese) and mulled wine. I was kind of hoping my parents would offer the rum to me after the party (they're not big hard liquor drinkers), but no. I've just got a little bit left too, and I'm getting rather low on gin and whiskey as well. Yikes!

ANYWAY, the frozen marg is the same as the basic marg except you add 4-5 ice cubes and blend it. Have fun with that: I hope you do better than I.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Blue Margarita

The blue margarita is kind of a silly drink. It basically tastes like a margarita except that it's blue. Does what it says on the tin? Warning: will leave your tongue stained!

1 1/2 ounce tequila

1/2 ounce blue curacao

3/4 ounce lime juice

-Shake over cracked ice in a cocktail shaker and strain into an iced highball glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Basic Margarita

I've had this tab open for about 12 hours without actually writing the post. It's bad when your fun project turns into something you can procrastinate from. Yikes!

Margaritas will always remind me of the end of sophomore year when we decided to have Tequila Friday Woohoo! We (my roommates and I) hyped it so much, and it just didn't live up to the expectations at all. We were trying to make blended margs and looked up a recipe online, and they turned out terrible! And we made way too much! After we finally got them to a drinkable point by adding some more lime juice, we each had one before needing to take a nap. We convened a couple hours later and tried for another go of it, but it just wasn't there. Fail.

This margarita was better than those, but still could use some work. Luckily, there are several different types of margarita in my book, so I'll have a chance to get it right.

1 1/2 ounce tequila

3/4 ounce triple sec

3/4 ounce lime juice

-Shake in cocktail shaker and strain into iced glass.

If you are really looking to make this, I would double this recipe. It wasn't very much.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Strawberry Daiquiri

Oh how delicious! This one certainly gets the girly drink tag: just tasted like a strawberry smoothie. I used some fresh strawberries leftover from some cupcakes I made, and it was ahmaaaaaaazing!

The daiquiri was part of a pretty epic meal I had last night too: baked pasta and boca chicken nuggets. It felt like such a little kid meal, despite the alcohol. Plus, whoever first thought, "You know what this pasta needs? More carbohydrates. Let's add bread!" was a motherfucking genius. Bread crumbs on baked pasta own my life.

A recipe for regressing to childhood:

1 1/2 ounce rum

3/4 ounce triple sec

3/4 ounce lime juice

splash of simple syrup

6 hulled strawberries

4-5 ice cubes

-Add all ingredients to blender and blend until smooth. Pour into wine glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Crantini

I can't believe I've found a crantini image that is also a Christmas image. It's going to be a fabulous day!

Someone commented that there should be more back story (hi Alex!), so now you're going to get to hear about the events that led up to the first sip of the drink, at least the events of yesterday.

I mentioned last post that I have been feeling the Christmas spirit, and yesterday I officially did it: I put Christmas music on my ipod. So epic! I took the EmX downtown and walked around listening to carols before meeting Ben and El for some lunch and library before going to the holiday market. We made the rounds there, seeing some nice things but only Ben made purchases (good ones at that).

From there, my mom picked me up and we hit up Tjoes before the game where the Ducks beat Arizona in double OT! These kinds of football games are really exciting but also really upsetting: I get so nervous that I can't even watch the play and just use "it's only football" as my mantra. I watch these kinds of sports games like some people watch horror films: through my fingers.

After all that, I came home and had a cratini to wind down. It is pretty much like a cape codder only not on the rocks. Still, it was more welcome than I expected it to be:

1 1/2 ounces vodka

2 ounces cranberry juice

1/3 ounce lime juice

-Stir over cracked ice and strain into cocktail glass.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Gin Rickey

If you know what a gin rickey is, and you've been reading my blog, you probably can guess that I would like it. I love lime. I love soda water. I actually even love gin these days. It's another in a line of really refreshing but also really generic cocktails. Not so much different than a collins really, but still good. I can picture drinking this one outside on a hot day. Here's how it goes:

1 1/2 ounce gin

1/2 ounce lime juice

soda water

-Put gin and lime in iced highball glass, fill with soda water.

After having a few sips, I decided to do a bit of very amateur mixology to make it a little more exciting. I add just a splash of peach schnapps, and it was a nice little something extra. Add a little more interest to the situation. If you, like me, only have poor quality peach schnapps, I would be very very careful to only add a splash.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Cranberry Collins

Really crazypants busy this week, so here's the gist: thumbs up. Good drink. Recipe:

1 1/2 ounce gin

1/2 ounce cranberry juice

1 ounce lime juice

Club soda

-Mix first three ingredient in highball glass with cracked ice. Fill with soda.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Banana Daiquiri

Oh banana daiquiri, you are so delicious...in theory. The reality, a little disappointing to be honest. The banana and lime combined in a weird way that was drinkable, but not scrumptious like I was expecting. And when you make a daiquiri, you're not looking for something that's going to challenge your palette. It was my first blended drink though, and that was a success.

1 1/2 ounces light rum

1/3 ripe banana

1/2 ounce lime juice

1/2 ounce simple syrup

3-4 ice cubes

-Blend in a blender and pour into cocktail glass.

I think I used too ripe of a banana...maybe. Given the chance, I might try this in a bar or restaurant to see if it has potential that my budding bar tending skills couldn't bring about.

Also, bought a bottle of gin today despite severe lack of funds. Look forward to endeavors in that direction very soon.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Mojito

Mojitos! Yay! Something I've had at a bar before so I have a frame of reference! And I have to say, I think mine was pretty damn good. Very traditional, but definitely did the job. Here's the recipe:

1 1/2 ounces light rum

1/2 ounce simple syrup

1 ounce lime juice

soda water

mint leaves

-Muddle mint leaves with simple syrup in the bottom of the glass. Add cracked ice, rum, and lime. Fill glass with soda water and garnish with more mint.

This was really refreshing and delicious and definitely recommended. However, you should learn to know and love this recipe as it is something bartenders don't like to make: takes too long when there's a group of people waiting for drinks. At least according to this article: Making friends with your bartender.

That's all for now. Enjoy and bottoms up!

Bacardi Cocktail

Only one cocktail this evening, and it was a good one! Here is the recipe:

1 1/2 ounces Bacardi light rum

Juice of 1/2 a lime

Dash of grenadine

-Mix in a cocktail shaker over cracked ice and pour into chilled glass.

Now, since I couldn't really taste the grenadine, this pretty much tasted like the daiquiri I had awhile ago. Delicious, but pretty basic. Thinking about the better drinks I've had, I guess I just like lime with about any alcohol. Good to know. I should say that this is really supposed to have Bacardi rum in it, but I don't think it's that big a deal. I made it with Bacardi because that's what I had.

In other news, vote in my poll! Please? It's up there in the corner waiting for you to click on it.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Hemingway's Floridita Daiquiri/Blue Velvet Martini/Wild Blue Yonder/Extra Dry Martini

Yes, all of those were from last night in a relatively short period of time. I am currently in bed recovering, eating the crumbs of my tortilla chips since I have no food in the house. I actually ended up writing notes to my future sober self in order to remember what to blog like a less riveting version of Memento. The notes are, however, surprisingly coherent and very helpful.

Hemingway's Floridita Daiquiri:

2 ounces light rum

2 ounces grapefruit juice

1 ounce fresh lime juice

1 ounce simple syrup

-Mix in cocktail shaker, pour over crushed ice.

Pretty girly drink, eh? Not really that surprising: his books doth protest a little much in the masculinity department. Despite my distaste for grapefruit juice, this was really yummy! I actually juiced my own lime as well, so that was fun and delicious. I didn't have crushed ice though, so mine was with cracked ice. I drank this while chatting with one of my besties from NY on the phone, which made the drink that much sweeter ;-)

Blue Velvet Martini:

1 1/2 ounces vodka

1/4 ounce blue Curacao

Dash of Rose's lime juice

-Stir over cracked ice and strain into cold cocktail glass.

To be honest, this drink and the next one have blended together in my mind and I don't really remember it that much. My notes tell me that I am learning to appreciate the burn of vodka when it's not mixed with much. Maybe I will start enjoying martinis. This drink should have been my last of the evening. I really hadn't eaten enough to have four drinks in quick succession while sitting down.

Wild Blue Yonder:

1 1/2 ounces vodka

1/4 ounce peach schnapps

1/4 ounce blue Curacao

-Shake with cracked ice in cocktail shaker and strain into rocks glass over ice.

This drink was hindered by my terrible peach schnapps. I'm going to say that no one should buy Potter's Peach Schnapps. You will regret it. This and the previous drink were about the color that my blue Hawaiians were supposed to be, so I think I get points for presentation. Still, even with good peach schnapps, I don't think this one is anything particularly special.

Extra Dry Martini:

2 3/4 ounces gin (or vodka)

1/4 ounce dry vermouth

-Stir with ice cubes and strain into chilled glass.

So I don't think I could have tolerated this without the previous 3 drinks. Talk about the burn of vodka...It was really intense and not very enjoyable. Good if you want to get drunk fast and don't mind the pain. Unfortunately, I was already pretty drunk at this point, talking to myself while watching Project Runway. Complete disaster. I think this is the point when I started looking up strictly platonics on craigslist. Yikes.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Basic Daiquiri/Sea Breeze

Well, I'm certainly making progress on this project. I don't know how I should feel about being ahead of schedule: proud for sticking with the project or afraid for my waste line that I'm drinking so much more than usual. I will say that it's been more than 6 weeks since I made a drunken fool of myself, so that seems promising.

The basic daiquiri actually came to fruition last night, and it was a minor success. Here's the recipe:

1 1/2 ounces light rum

1 ounce lime juice

1 tsp sugar

-Shake well with cracked ice and strain into glass.

The drink was generally good, but there was a problem with the sugar. I don't think I took the "shake well" instruction seriously enough so I ended up with a bunch of sugar that wasn't properly incorporated into the drink. By the end of the drink I had a sludge of sugar at the bottom that was not at all like the milk at the end of the cereal bowl. Next time I would shake more or use simple syrup.

So the above picture is more conceptual than literal: I'm vegan so I would never drink a bird no matter what my cocktail book told me to do. Here is the recipe for a sea breeze:

1 1/2 ounces vodka

2 ounces cranberry juice

2 ounces grapefruit juice

-Shake in cocktail shaker and add to iced glass.

This is a case where I bought the quality mixer and it turns out that I just don't like grapefruit juice. This drink was overall okay as in, I think it was made properly, but I didn't particularly care for it. If you like grapefruit, then you'll probably like this drink since that's all it tastes like.

When I'm not drinking cocktails for this project, I am mostly drinking wine. Tonight, post sea breeze, I had a glass of pinot gris from A to Z in Newberg, Oregon. Very nice. I am no wine expert (another project for another year), but I am enjoying this one.

Also, while I'm reviewing things, I'll put in a plug for No Logo by Naomi Klein. Yes, it's 10 years old and a little out of date at times. Yes, if you've spent enough time with Maria B or in Eugene in generally, you probably know a lot of the information in there. However, I still think it's a really good and important read, especially the first three sections. I've dedicated most of my summer to reading this and Alex Ross's "The Rest is Noise," and both were worth the time commitment.

Not to end the post on a down note, but I have to give my movie choice for the evening, the 2002 version of The Importance of Being Earnest, a thumbs down. I thought this movie adaptation didn't play to the play's strengths at all. I know that English people in the countryside saying clever things isn't always movie magic, but trying to infuse the movie with additional locations and fantasy scenes was unnecessary. Boo.

Enjoy and bottoms up!

Classic Martini/Sex on the Beach/Cape Codder

Okay, so this the drunkest blog so far by a mile. There will likely be typos and droning on and other forms of confusing nonsense. A predictable flaw when blogging about drinking.

My first cocktail began when I realized that vermouth is a type of wine and can therefore be purchased in Oregon grocery stores, forgoing the annoying trip to the liquor store. I should mention that I do not have a driver's license and the liquor store is not exactly walking distance. I consider it simply another challenge to be overcome along my road to cocktail glory.

I was at local grocery store MoC when I spotted the vermouth for a price I could afford and decided it was time to put a check mark in the chapter dedicated to martinis. I will give you a condensed version of what said chapter has in its introduction: gin or vodka blah blah lounge lizards blah blah purists blah blah 1960s blah blah cold cold COLD COLD! Yep.

The moral of the story is that the traditional martini is made of gin and vermouth, but vodka is often substituted for gin, which is what I did since I haven't purchased gin yet. Also, I hate gin. The less vermouth (or more gin/vodka) a martini has, the drier it is. Over the years, the zeitgeist has moved toward a drier martini. Also, everything involved in a martini, from the glassware to the alcohol to the utensils should be cold...from the freezer where appropriate.

The version I made tonight is the "Classic Martini." There are many different ratios in my book, and I will explore them in the future. There are also other flavors of martini that I will explore. Blather blather here's the recipe:

1 1/2 ounce vodka

1/2 ounce dry vermouth

-Ignore Bond and stir don't shake. Stir over ice cubes, not cracked ice. Strain into chilled cocktail glass.

I have heard stories about how terrible martinis are, and I don't think I would have enjoyed this at an earlier point in my drinking career. However, tonight it was pretty alright. It's definitely not a yummy yummy I-can't-even-tell-this-is-booze type of drink, but I liked it. I drank it while re-watching "Goodnight and Good Luck" and eating pasta, which I recommend as a mighty fine trio. Fab film. I used Absolute vodka and Boissiere extra dry vermouth.

Sex on the Beach, however, was a delicious experience, and one that I wasn't particularly expecting. As follows:

1 ounce vodka

3 ounce cranberry juice

2 ounce pineapple juice

1 ounce orange juice

1 ounce peach schnapps

This is pretty much the definition of girly drink. I couldn't taste the alcohol at all. You can also do either all pineapple juice or all orange juice if you aren't mixer rich like me. I couldn't even tell how cheap and terrible the peach schnapps were. Also, was watching From Justin to Kelly while drinking this one. I really think the stars aligned for my movie/drink combinations tonight, haha.

My last drink of the evening was a Cape Codder. I mostly made this because I invested in some cranberry juice the other night and this is an easy drink. Now, I'm usually not such a cran fan, but it's a pretty popular mixer so I made the leap. I stood in the aisle having the debate with myself: cran cocktail or proper cran juice. Cran cocktail seems terrible, but it's cheap for a college student. Cran juice doesn't add sugar: who doesn't want sugar? In the end, despite myself, I went home with the real thing: L&A's 100% no sugar added cranberry juice. BEST DECISION EVER. This drink was about 10 million times better than I thought it would be and I think the quality of the mixer had everything to do with that.

2 ounces vodka

4-6 ounces cranberry juice (I went with 5 personally)

-Mix in a cocktail shaker with cracked ice and pour into iced glass. Can add a bit of lime juice if desired (I definitely desired).

Enjoy and bottoms up!