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!

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!