Friday 5 o’Clock Cocktail – The Hurricane

If you’ve ever been to New Orleans then you can probably appreciate the benefits of a strong Hurricane. And no, I’m not talking about Katrina or Andrew. I’m talking about the kind of Hurricane every drunk should know how to make.

Now, there are some fancy pants bartenders who aren’t from the Big Easy who get stingy with the booze. I’ve seen recipes for Hurricanes that only include one ounce of liquor in a big glass of juice. Sorry, that’s not how you make ’em.

When you order your Hurricane from one of the open, walk-up bars on Bourbon street , the drink is strong. Like “knock-you-on-your-a$$-strong”. I mean, it’s called a Hurricane, not a “drizzle”. Hurricanes destroy things, so it follows that if you drink one, you should be likewise destroyed, right?

But you don’t have to go to Louisiana to get a good Hurricane because you’re a Drunk and you can make your own. Here’s how to do it:

• 1 oz Vodka
• 1 oz Amaretto
• 1 oz Gin
• 1 oz Light Rum
• 1 oz Triple Sec
• 1/2 oz 151 Rum
• 1/4 oz Grenadine Syrup
• Pineapple Juice
• Grapefruit Juice 

Directions: Pour the liquors into a Hurricane glass (or pint glass, or collins glass, or whatever big glass you have) 3/4 filled with ice and stir. Fill the rest of the way with equal parts of the juices. Enjoy.

Remember there are Thousands of Cocktail Recipes at the Drunk Man’s Guide!

Friday 5 o’Clock Cocktail – Loco Lemonade

Layered drinks always make things fun. They add visual interest, and they give an extra dimension to your drinks. Ideally, as you drink them, the drink should change from one extreme to another; tangy to sweet, or spicy to mild. That kind of thing.

The Loco Lemonade is an easy and fun drink you can make that gives the extra visual and taste appeal of a layered drink. Just as with a Tequila sunrise, the drink starts off tart, and gets sweeter toward the end. Because it is made with lemonade, however, it is much more tart than a Tequila Sunrise. But it is still great on a hot sunny day!

For this drink I used pink lemonade, but you can use whatever you have laying around. The pink lemonade, in combination with the Grenadine made the drink a little more red.

Here’s what you need:

• 1 1/2 oz Tequila
• 4 oz Lemonade
• 1/2 oz Fresh Lemon Juice
• 1 oz Grenadine Syrup

Instructions:

Pour the ingredients into your glass (2/3 filled with ice) in this order: Tequila, grenadine, lemonade, lemon juice. If you do it carefully, the layers will make a cloudy, swirling effect.

Remember there are more cocktail recipes at www.drunkmansguide.com

Friday 5 o’Clock Coctail – The Mojito

Last week we did the Mint Julep in honor of the big horse race in Kentucky. This weekend we’re doing it Cuban style with the Mojito!

Hopefully you still have some Mint left over from last week, because the Mojito is very similar to the Mint Julep. Here’s what you will need:

Ingredients:

• 1 ½ oz Light Rum
• 6 Mint Leaves
• 1 Lime
• 1 tbsp Sugar
• 4 oz Club Soda

Cut the lime into quarters and sqeeze the juice from each into a tall glass. Mix the sugar and lime juice then toss in the mint leaves.

GENTLY muddle the mint leaves against the side of the glass with a spoon. Don’t damage them too much. You don’t want small bits of mint leaf floating in your drink; you want to keep them whole.

Next, fill the glass almost to the top with ice; add the rum and Club Soda and stir. Garnish with a lime slice and sprig of mint. Delicious!

Remember, there are thousands of Cocktail Recipes on DrunkMansGuide.com!

Friday 5 o’Clock Coctail – The Mint Julep

Tomorrow is the Kentucky Derby, and you know what that means!  That’s right – big hats and Mint Juleps.

The Mint Julep is a real blast from the past. It was developed in the Southeastern United States in the late 18th century, and has been the subject of songs, and featured in artwork, stories, poems and literature for over 200 years. It is truly an historic drink.

Here’s how to make a Mint Julep:

• 4 oz of Good quality Bourbon
• ½ oz of simple syrup (equal parts sugar and water)
• 6-10 Mint Leaves (the small leaves are the sweetest for flavoring, but the big ones are great for garnishes)
• Glass full of crushed ice

Directions: This drink really is supposed to be made with crushed ice. You can crush your ice in a blender, or use a mallet and a clean towel. Or, perhaps you are lucky enough to have a refrigerator that can make crushed ice for you.

Put a small amount of the ice in your glass and add the mint leaves. You will muddle the mint leaves with the ice – but don’t KILL it! Just mash it around a few times with the back of a spoon. If you muddle the mint too much it will get bitter.

Next, fill the glass the rest of the way up with ice so that the ice is actually mounded on top of the glass. Next, pour the Bourbon over the ice and let it settle to the bottom. As it does this it will cause the ice to melt somewhat. Then add the syrup, on top. There is no need to actually mix this up.

Garnish with a sprig of mint.

This Mint Julep is intended to be sipped from a silver or stainless steel cup on a hot day. As you drink the ice melts and the flavors of the mint and syrup blend with the whiskey in a delicious way. These days, most people serve them in glass Collins glasses – simply because that’s what we all have. Either is ok, but the metal cups get a nice frost on them from the condensation that is really cool.

How to Make Grenadine

A few weeks ago we did a feature on the Tequila Sunrise. That was a fun article because the drink has these three great layers. The drink starts off sour with the lemon juice on top, then it becomes tangy with the orange juice, and then sweet and fruity with the Grenadine. Yum!

But there is one great way to improve the Tequila Sunrise; in fact, this can improve many of your mixed drinks. You can make your own Grenadine.

Real Grenadine is made from Pomegranates, but the stuff you buy in a bottle at the liquor store doesn’t have any pomegranate juice in it – which is why it isn’t nearly as good as homemade. Also, as with everything else, when you make your own, you can control the flavor. And in the case of making Grenadine, that means really pumping up the pomegranate flavor.

Here’s how to make it:

• 4 cups of Pomegranate Juice (you can find it on the juice aisle at your grocery store)
• ½ cup of Sugar
• 2 tbsp Lemon Juice

Stir all the ingredients together in a saucepan and bring to a boil for about 45 – 55 minutes. You’ll want to test the consistency to make sure it doesn’t get too thick. Here’s how:

As you approach 45 minutes, use a spoon to get a little bit of the grenadine out. You only need a couple teaspoons to do the test. Put it on a plate and let it cool for a minute or so.

Once it is cool to room temperature, tip the plate and watch what it does. It should leave a nice coat of syrup as it easily slides down the plate. If it just sits there in a pile of purple goo, then it is way too thick. If it runs like water, then it’s still too thin.

A great comparison is to just use a little bit of the bottled Grenadine to see how the correct consistency looks. Although the bottled stuff doesn’t taste so great, it is the correct consistency.

The reason you need to get the consistency correct is that if the syrup is too thick then it will just pool at the bottom of all your drinks. Instead you want it to float on the bottom like a cloud.

You will notice that homemade grenadine is dark purple in color. It isn’t red like the junk in the bottle. It also tastes amazing!

Oh, and the other great way to improve your Tequila Sunrise is to squeeze your own orange and lemon juices. Simply outstanding.

There are over 9,000 Mixed Drinks and Cocktail Recipes at the Drunk Man’s Guide

Friday 5 o’Clock Cocktail – Miami Cocktail

You’re going to need a bottle of Light Rum, a small pile of lemons and some Creme de Menthe. That’s because this week’s Friday 5 o’Clock Cocktail is the Miami Cocktail. A delicious drink that goes well with Spring.

Here’s how to make a Miami Cocktail:

• 1 1/2 oz Light Rum
• 1/2 oz Creme de Menthe
• 1 dash Lemon Juice

Directions: Making this drink is easy. Just put all the ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice. Shake it, strain it, and serve it in a cocktail glass. Fresh Lemon Juice is always best, but we’re drunks so we use whatever we have available.

More Drink Recipes available at the Drunk Man’s Guide.

Canned Beer Vs. Bottled Beer – Is there a difference?

There has been a lot of debate on the beer boards about whether beer is negatively affected if it is packaged in a can. The truth is, despite what some know-it-alls say, once you pour it into a glass you can’t tell the difference.

In fact, if anything cans are better than bottles for three reasons. First, cans are less prone to breakage. Secondly, they are lighter – so it costs less to move them around. Thirdly, cans protect beer from harmful UV rays better than glass. And fourthly … well, cans are just better ok?!

Ok, ok, so in the name of science I got a six-pack of bottled Pilsner Urquell and a four-pack of canned Pilsner Urquell. I poured them into glasses and tasted them both.

The result? They taste the same. I drank one, then the other. Then I tried it again. And again. And then one more time, just to be really sure.

My wife was walking by while I was doing this, and asked me what on Earth I was doing. I explained it to her, and she graciously volunteered to help taste. She drank my beer until it was gone and confidently announced there was no difference.

A part of me suspects she was just thirsty and wasn’t really all that interested in my little experiment. Sometimes she doesn’t share my zeal for this stuff.

Of course, there is another side to this. Glass is more enjoyable to drink out of than metal. Since many people drink out of whatever the beer is packaged in, this might also explain why many beer snobs prefer bottles to cans.

Not us. We’re civilized Drunks, so we pour our beer into a glass the way we’re supposed to.

Friday 5 o’Clock Cocktail – Mint Daiquiri

Minty and sweet – that’s what we’re looking forward to this evening. The perfect drink to sip as you gaze out at your yard and think about all that mowing you are going to be doing tomorrow morning. Yeah, it’s spring alright. The yard work, the pollen, the Rum drinks!

Here’s how to make a Mint Daiquiri:

• 2 oz of Light Rum
• 1/4 oz of Triple Sec (or another kind of Orange Liquour)
• 4 Mint Leaves
• 1/2 oz Lime Juice
• 1 tsp Powdered Sugar
• 1 cup of ice

Add all ingredients into a blender and blend it until it’s smooth. Keep in mind a couple of tips:

1. Try and get as much of the stems off the mint leaves as possible. They can make the drink a little bitter. It doesn’t hurt to use a knife to cut the spines out of the leaves.
2. Make sure you blend it enough to really pulverize those mint leaves down so that they are just specks of green in the drink. If you don’t blend them enough they will get little green flakes caught in your teeth, and that isn’t cute.

More Mixed Drinks and Cocktail Recipes at the Drunk Man’s Guide

Canadian Club Review

So far, all of our reviews have been about beers. Now we’re going to start mixing it up a bit with liquor. This week we reviewed Canadian Club. A great value for the quality you’ll get.

Now, if you’ve tried the single malt whiskies and scotches then you know how wide the range of taste can be for whiskey (or, in this case whisky). The Canadians are smooth and drinkable, and for our money much better for mixing cocktails than most other types of whiskey.

Read our review of Canadian Club Whisky.

Friday 5 o’clock Cocktail – The Tequini

Our friend the Cigar Smoking Man suggested a drink this week that deserves a Friday in the spotlight: The Tequini.

As the name suggests, this is a Martini that is made with Tequila. With Martinis, the supporting ingredients are there to bring out the taste of the primary liquor more than they are to make an impression of themselves.

The Cigar Smoking Man points out on his blog the importance of using bitters (sparingly) in this drink. He also makes a good point about bitters – that bitters are to cocktails as salt is to food.

True enough. Bitters do bring out an extra element in many drinks. Like salt, a little goes a long way. If you’ve put enough in your drink to be able to taste it, then you’ve probably used too much.

Here’s how to make a Tequini:

• 1 ½ oz of Tequila
• ½ oz of Dry Vermouth
• 1 Dash of Bitters (I used Angostura)

Directions: As with all martinis, the method of mixing is to STIR the ingredients gently with ice so you don’t bruise the liquor. Then strain the clear drink into a cocktail glass and garnish with lemon peel.

Also, when you get a chance, you should visit the Cigar Smoking Man’s blog. It’s a great read, even for non-smokers like me.