Lemon-Mint Watermelon Cooler

At a summer party last month, my drink-savvy friend CJ brought this spiked watermelon.  It created quite the hen gaggle at the bar. Then we discovered that she was taking the run off from the watermelon and adding tonic and making a cocktail.  This was "limited" and the hen gaggle morphed more into a friendly cat fight over who was getting this alcoholic, summer in-in-a-glass goodness.  Post-party, I asked her to send me the recipe and she forwarded along the food and wine link. I couldn't make this fast enough. I modified the recipe, adding more liquid than called for and adding simple syrup to create more "run off" for cocktails.

1st Step:
Make the Lemon-Minted Vodka

in a 750ml bottle put a spring of fresh mint (I used peppermint but spearmint would work as well)
in a small bowl add 3/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice and 1/2 cup sugar, stir until it dissolves.
pour lemon sugar mixture into bottle over peppermint and fill the rest up with vodka. Let the bottle sit for 2 days like I did, or overnight or for several hours, depending on your time frame.

2nd Step:
Spike the watermelon

Cut a medium-sized, seedless watermelon into chunks and put into a large bowl, preferably the flatter the better for more contact.  Pour vodka mixture over watermelon chunks and add the finely grated zest of 2 limes, 3/4 cup of citrus vodka, and 1 1/2 cups simple syrup. Add freshly chopped mint and mix into the watermelon. Let sit for several hours stirring occasionally.

Lemon-Mint Watermelon Cooler:
 (makes 1 drink)

4 oz (1/2 cup) Watermelon run off juice
4 oz Simply Limeaide (sold in the cold section)
juice of 1 lime
4 oz Tonic Water

put ice in glass or mason jar,
add ingredients in order, 
stir, add a few watermelon chunks

Skinny Version:
Substitute Simply Limeaide with Minute Maid lemonade 15 (also sold in cold section)
use diet tonic
 


CHEERS & HAPPY SUMMER!

Buona Vita

Buona Vita

Buona Vita

makes 1 drink

1 oz Beefeater (or your favorite) Gin
1 oz Campari
1 oz St. Germain Elderflower liquer
5 oz Fresh White Grapefruit Juice

Put in cocktail shaker filled with ice and shake vigurously, this cocktail needs to be really cold

You could also serve it on the rocks

This drink comes from a menu that I "retrieved" at The Palace Hotel Bar in San Fransisco on one very memorable girl's night--"the after party."    This hotel, a Beaux Arts gem in historic downtown SF, was built in 1875 and is a stunning place to have a cocktail after dinner. The Buona Vita is a delicious drink and, really, who doesn't want to sip on a cocktail that means: "The Good Life" in Italian?

CHEERS!

Hibiscus Blood Orange Margarita

June's Margarita

Hibiscus Blood Orange Margarita

4 Oz Don Julio Silver Tequila
2 1/2 Tablespoons Agave Nectar
Juice of 2 limes
7 Oz of freshly squeezed Blood Orange Juice 

Blend together the agave nectar, lime juice & Tequila, pour on the rocks, add blood orange juice and stir

I was in Chicago a couple of years ago for a friend's wedding. We were staying at The Four Seasons and went down to the bar for a Bourbon tasting, which was really fun. I wore my new summer dress and my husband and I sat in a corner, chatting and sipping Bourbon. ("like a lady" -that's for you Guidi)

A couple of weeks after we returned from our trip, I went shopping for some new pajamas. As I was going through the jammies and nightgowns, I saw my "dress." I saw several of my "dresses." When I asked the clerk in so many words...." what the hell?" She said: "Oh, a customer must have put one of those nightgowns in the dress section. But, yes that is definitely a nightgown!"   So, uh, yes, to my horror I apparently wore a nightgown walking all along Michigan Avenue, to Ralph Lauren for lunch and then to a bourbon tasting at a swanky hotel bar.  classy.

Despite my treacherously embarrassing faux pas, at least I didn't find out until after the fact and AT LEAST I slipped the cocktail menu from the Four Season's bar into my purse for future liquid enjoyment. 

So, viola, this is one of the creations I tried to mimic from their menu while vising my friend Virginia in Santa Cruz last weekend. She and I drank one on her deck, talked and enjoyed the sunset, in our nightgowns.

Dubonnet Citrus Shandy

Dubonnet Citrus Shandy

Dubonnet is a French Apéritif (pronounced Dube-O-NAY)

Apéritif is a word originating from the Latin word aperio, which means to revel, bare, uncover, make clear.  Apéritifs were originally conceived to "open" or prepare the appetite for a meal. Dubonnet is mix of fortified wine, a proprietary blend of herbs, spices and peels, and the medicinal quinine. I 1st discovered this drink in my early 30's, over lunch with a devastatingly interesting French Canadian professor whom I worked with. A great memory of a sunny day at a French restaurant discovering a new drink.

Dubonnet is delicious on the rocks with just a squeeze of lemon, but I made this mixture as a fun way to drink Dubonnet Rouge in the summer.

Dubonnet Citrus Shandy

1 Cup Dubonnet Rouge
1 Cup Lemonade
4 shakes of orange bitters
juice of 2 limes
6 torn basil leaves

add all ingredients to a large cocktail shaker
pour over crushed ice, top with Pellegrino
garnish with a lemon wheel and a piece of basil

CHEERS!

Skinny Hawaiian

For those of you who know me, you know that I rarely do low-calorie, low-fat anything.  I know I should, but it sort of goes against my hedonistic philosophy in the way of food and drink.  HOWEVER, I have a lot of health-savvy, in-shape friends (Riina) who deeply care about their libations not setting them back 1200 calories.  I get it.  I have promised to feature such a drink but can't seem to bring myself, in good conscious, to recommend anything containing bubble gum vodka.  I just can't do it.  So, this is a "skinny" drink that actually has some complexity and flavor.  This drink accomplishes a lot.  It isn't an affront to my pallet while simultaneously not being a caloric affront to my in-shape chicas.  And it is, after all, swimsuit season.

Skinny Hawaiian

2 shot glasses of your favorite vodka
2 shot glasses of pineapple juice
3 shot glasses of Cherry-Pomegranate Crystal Light
(add 2 tsp Agave Nectar for a sweeter drink)

Shake in shaker with ice and serve up in a Martini Glass
top off with a generous splash of diet 7-up

you can garnish with blueberries or a pineapple ring & mint goes well with this too

Cheers!

The Bronx

The Bronx

I discovered this cocktail at The Ahwahnee Hotel one summer afternoon on the outdoor patio.  Sitting in the middle of Yosemite National Park, with the awe-inspiring rock formations surrounding you, is nothing short of elevating. Add a delicious gin concoction on top of that, someone pinch me.

 I resurrected the Ahwahnee bar's drink menu out of the "stolen menu drawer" and have recreated it for your drinking pleasure. There are a few gems on their cocktail menu that I will be exploring over the summer, stay tuned.

According to the Ahwahnee menu, and some other accounts, the cocktail was originally created at The Waldorf-Astoria hotel in NYC in 1899 by Johnnie Solon, a pre-Prohibition bartender at the hotel and that he named it after the Bronx Zoo.

Other accounts suggest that the cocktail was invented in Philadelphia where it might have remained in obscurity had it not been discovered by a restaurateur from the Bronx, Joseph Sormani. He allegedly discovered it in the Quaker City in 1905. He is mentioned as discovering the cocktail in his obituary which appeared in the New York Times.

The Bronx (makes 2 drinks)
4 oz Gin (Beefeater or Hendrick's)
2 oz Sweet Red Vermouth
7 oz Fresh Orange Juice
2 oz Simple Syrup 

CHEERS!

Bourbon Mint Sweet Tea

Bourbon Mint Sweet Tea

This is as Southern as it gets people so put on some country music, invite your relatives over and get out your mason jars!

Preparation:

The Fancy Ice Cubes
Brew some strong regular or decaf tea, pour in ice cube trays and put a sprig of mint in each cube. Once they are frozen you can store them in a large zip lock bag.

Mint Simple Syrup
heat 2 cups or water on stove, add 2 cups of sugar, stir until dissolved. remove form heat, add a large bunch of washed fresh mint and let sit 15 min. Remove Mint, let simple syrup cool to room temperature and strain into a pitcher or bottle and refrigerate.

The Tea

1. Boil 4 cups of water, take off heat and add 12 tea bags and let steep for 7 minutes

2, remove bags and let tea cool

3. add 1 cup of mint simple syrup and 1 cup of  Jim Beam Bourbon (or your favorite Bourbon)

4. taste and adjust to your taste, you may want it sweeter (add more simple syrup) or stronger (add more bourbon)

5. pour over your ice cubes and garnish with mint

I have not tried this, but you could do all sorts of variations on this idea.  I am thinking you could do lemon herbal tea with gin and make lemon-thyme simple syrup?

If anyone tries a variation with delicious results, please share!
CHEERS!