Happy Valentine’s Day!

The brands have been busy creating new cocktails you can share with your sweetie.

Tongue Tied

1 1/2 oz. X-Rated Fusion Liqueur
1 1/2 oz. SKYY Infusions Cherry
Splash of Grenadine

Shake X-Rated and SKYY Infusions Cherry over ice. Strain into a martini glass. Slowly add a dash of Grenadine so that it sinks to the bottom.
Garnish with a cherry with a knotted stem.

Hopeless RomantiX

1 1/2 oz. X-Rated Fusion Liqueur
2 oz. Prosecco or Champagne
1/4 oz. Lemon Juice
1/4 oz. Orange (1 wedge)
1/4 oz. Pineapple (a few chunks)

Muddle pineapple, orange and lemon. Add prosecco and X-Rated Fusion
Liqueur. Strain and serve in a highball glass and garnish with a lemon twist.

X-Rated Passion

2 oz. X-Rated Fusion Liqueur
2 oz. SKYY Infusions Passion Fruit
Splash of Club Soda

Serve on the rocks and garnish with a lime.

(more…)

I usually don’t recycle our Drink of the Week, but we figured once every 4 years is acceptable for honoring the opening of the Olympic Games. What can I say, this cocktail, aptly named “The Olympic” wins a gold medal every time!

Olympic

1 oz. Brandy
1 oz. Triple Sec
1 oz. Orange Juice
Orange Peel

Combine ingredients in a shaker filled with ice, shake and strain into a chilled martini or cocktail glass. Garnish with the orange peel.

more Olympic Cocktails
past Drink of the Week Cocktails

Every Super Bowl party needs a signature cocktail! Here’s one for the Who Dat Nation. This gold highball is a twist on a classic New Orleans cocktail, The Roffignac. Go Saints!

Unlike many New Orleans cocktails, it’s easy to make in batches for a crowd. Just keep a mix of the cognac and syrup base in the fridge, and guests can pour themselves a drink and just top off with club soda.

Who Dat Highball

2 oz. cognac
1 oz. apple-lemon syrup
club soda

Fill highball glass with ice. Pour in cognac and syrup. Top off with club soda and garnish with a lemon wheel.

*Apple-Lemon Syrup
(enough for 10 cocktails)

1 1/2 cups water
1 apple–cored, peeled and cut into pieces
zest of half a lemon (just the peel, no white pith)
1 cup sugar

Combine all ingredients in a saucepan and boil. Strain out solids and pour the syrup into a container. Cool syrup and refrigerate. To make syrup last longer, add a 1/2 oz. of vodka.

Super Bowl Party food recipes

New Orleans drink recipes

How to Batch Drinks For Parties

I was mulling over different ideas for a end of year post and landed on this fun list while looking at the years site activity. This list is as democratic as they come, it basically the top cocktails determined by views. The biggest surprise? The sidecar at #1, glad to see. It was always Rachel’s favorite. It knocked the much derided Appletini from the top spot (it’s #2 this year), a spot it had held for several years.

So here it is with out further ado - the top 10 cocktails Drink of the Week readers looked at most in 2009.

1. Sidecar
2. Appletini
3. Bahama Mama
4. Tom & Jerry
5. Witches Brew Punch
6. Mai Tai
7. Manhattan
8. Margarita
9. Flirtini
10. Long Island Iced Tea

Finally! Season 3 of “Mad Men” premieres August 16. And it’s just not “Mad Men” without booze.

Who can forget when Sally Draper mixed a Tom Collins for the grown-ups? Or when Don Draper wooed Rachel Menken with one of the prettiest Mai Tais I’ve ever seen? And of course there was Freddy Rumson’s … incident in the office after one Screwdriver too many.

So what better way to celebrate the start of this new season than with a 1960s Mad Men cocktail party!

Here are a few cocktails we’ve seen characters order, plus some additional suggestions appropriate for the era.

Old Fashioned (Don Draper)

1 sugar cube
1 dash bitters
1 tsp. water
2 oz. rye whiskey

Muddle the sugar cube, bitters and water in an old-fashioned glass. Add rye and stir. Add ice plus a twist of lemon peel. (Don’t leave the peel in the glass) Garnish with an orange slice.

Vodka Gimlet (Betty Draper)

1 oz. lime juice
1 tsp. simple syrup
1.5 oz. vodka

Shake with ice then strain into a cocktail glass.

Gibson (Roger Sterling)

2.5 oz. gin
1/2 oz. dry vermouth

Stir with ice, then strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a cocktail onion.

Brandy Alexander (Peggy Olson)

1/2 oz. Creme de Cacao
1/2 oz. brandy
1/2 oz. heavy cream

Shake with ice and strain into cocktail glass.

Other 1960s cocktails:

Greyhound
Moscow Mule
Bloody Mary
Negroni

Related articles by Zemanta

• Mad Men and Drinking, Season Two, Part I (offthepresses.blogspot.com)
• 12 of My Favorite Mad Men Quotes (slideshare.net)
• countdown to season 3: mad men (popbytes.com)

Sangria is designed for hot summer weather.

The Spanish wine punch is designed to cool and refresh. Just the word sangria makes me feel happy and relaxed.

But in addition to being delicious, it can also be quite cheap. It’s a great way to enjoy fresh fruit that’s a little past its prime but still good.

Savvy Housekeeping has a white wine sangria recipe that allows you to enjoy a summer cocktail treat while keeping an eye on expenses:

I punched the numbers this morning and discovered that this sangria only cost me $3.70 a pitcher, or $.62 a glass. Compare that to a bottle of white wine ($11 or so, or $2.20 a glass) or a margarita (roughly $4.50 a glass using decent tequila, I’m guessing).

A Frugal Cocktail (White Wine Sangria recipe @ Savvy Housekeeping)
Photo credit: Savvy Housekeeping

more cocktails…

• Paloma (drinkoftheweek.com)
• 4th of July Watermelon Cocktail (drinkoftheweek.com)
• The Bee’s Teas Gin Cocktail (drinkoftheweek.com)

Luxe Coterie, a high-end jewelry and spirits company, will hide a sticker in New York City on August 21. Whoever finds that sticker can redeem it for a rare bottle of Mendis Coconut Brandy worth $100,000. This particular bottle is signed by the founder and sealed in gold leaf.

The company will provide clues to the sticker’s whereabouts via Twitter. Hunters will have from 9 a.m. to 11:59 p.m. on August 21 to find the Luxe Hunt sticker.

Mendis Coconut Brandy is a 100% all-natural clear Brandy distilled from coconut essence. It is matured for a minimum of two years in Halmilla wood casks.

Is this brandy really worth $100,000? I don’t know, but I’d be willing to taste some to find out. So if you find the sticker, be sure to share.

Luxe Hunt

Mendis Coconut Brandy