Add a little spice to your life—or at least your drink—with this collection of fun and fiery recipes.
Bulleit Lumin-ade
Ingredients:
1 ounce Bulleit Bourbon 10 Year Old
1 ounce Italian aperitif wine
½ ounce yellow pepper purée
½ ounce lemon juice
½ ounce simple syrup
Pinch of salt
1. Combine all ingredients and serve.
(pictured above)
Altos Plata Spicy
Ingredients:
1½ ounces Olmeca Altos Plata tequilla
1 ounce fresh lime
½ ounce agave nectar
2 cucumber wheels
1 slice jalapeño
1. Muddle cucumber and jalapeño with agave nectar. Add remaining ingredients and ice. Shake, strain over fresh ice into a rocks glass.
2. Garnish with cucumber wheel.
Hot Strawberry Lemonade
For Strawberry Syrup:
1 cup granulated sugar
½ cup water
1 cup quartered fresh strawberries
1. In a small pot, combine all ingredients. Bring to a boil over medium heat, then let simmer, stirring occasionally until strawberries break down.
2. Strain mixture through a sieve into a bowl, pressing on the strawberries. Discard the solids and set aside the syrup.
For Cocktail:
2 ounces Hot Dickel (George Dickel Tabasco brand barrel finish whiskey)
½ ounce lemon juice
½ ounce strawberry syrup
3 ounces club soda
Basil, for garnish
1. Combine all ingredients in a shaker and shake with ice.
2. Strain over ice in a Collins glass; garnish with a few basil leaves.
Fire Farm
Ingredients:
1½ ounces WhistlePig 10-year rye
1½ ounces fresh pineapple juice
1 ounce lemon juice
2 slices of jalapeño
1. Add jalapeños to shaker and muddle. Add remaining ingredients and ice. Shake until chilled. Double strain into rocks glass with new ice.
2. Garnish with skewed pineapple and jalapeño.
(Courtesy of mixologist Matt Bostick)
Tito’s American Mule
For lemon and jalapeño infusion:
1 750 milliliter bottle Tito’s Handmade Vodka
1 lemon
1 jalapeño
1. Peel lemon rind without removing the pith (white inner layer) and add to a jar of Tito’s. Let lemon rind infuse for 3 to 5 days.
2. Remove the lemon rinds. Add jalapeño for 12 hours to a day.
For Cocktail:
1½ ounces Tito’s lemon and jalapeño infusion vodka
3 ounces ginger beer
½ ounce fresh lime juice
1 lime slice, for garnish
1. Add all ingredients to a Tito’s copper mug with ice.
2. Stir and garnish with a lime slice.
Woodford Malt Sour
Ingredients:
2 ounces Woodford Reserve Malt
¾ ounce lemon juice
¾ ounce ginger honey syrup
For ginger syrup:
1. Combine equal parts, by volume, rough-chopped ginger (no need to peel), boiling water and honey in a blender. One cup of each is a good place to start.
2. Purée ingredients until mixture is smooth, then strain through a fine strainer or cheesecloth.
3. Bottle and refrigerate until ready to use. It will keep in the refrigerator for about a week.
For cocktail:
1. Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice. Shake vigorously and strain over ice in an old-fashioned glass.
2. Garnish with a candied ginger or a lemon peel.
The Spicy Cool Slush
Ingredients:
½ cup chopped cucumbers, plus a few sliced for garnish
5 cilantro leaves, plus a few for garnish
1½ ounce jalapeño-infused Smirnoff No. 21 Vodka
1 large lime, juiced
¾ ounce simple syrup
1 ounce club soda
¼ cup Clamato juice
Cherry tomatoes, for garnish
Sliced jalapeno, for garnish
Skewer
1. A few hours before or overnight, add one jalapeño to the amount of vodka you will need for your guests and let sit. Muddle chopped cucumbers and cilantro in a shaker. Add the vodka, lime juice and simple syrup. Shake to combine flavors. Double strain.
2. Add about a cup of ice to a blender. Then add the cocktail, club soda and Clamato juice. Blend until smooth. Add ice to make slushier.
3. Garnish as shown.
(Courtesy of Taylor Bradford, Pink Heels Pink Truck)
Spicy Beginnings
If you’re just venturing into the world of spicy cocktails,
it can be a bit intimidating. Here’s one idea: Try Tabasco sauce.
Celebrating its 150th anniversary this year, the sauce can be a
way to introduce spice to your cocktails. “Tabasco is consistent
and thereby easy to use,” says Aaron Polsky, the bar manager
of Harvard & Stone in Los Angeles, CA. Still not sure? Polsky offers
a few tips for incorporating heat in your drinks:
Stick with a reliable recipe.“Spice is a very apparent flavor and sensation, so if your drink is already too sweet or sour or boozy and then you add spice,you’re going to make a bad drink worse,” says Polsky. When you’re ready to add some spice, be sure to pick a balanced drink made from a reliable recipe you like.
Look for natural pairings.
“Think about where you would normally like spice in food
and incorporate it,” he says. For example, for breakfast you
might have eggs with Tabasco sauce and coffee. So, you could try incorporating Tabasco into a coffee drink, like a Black Russian.
Use fresh ingredients.
Ditch the store-bought lemon and lime juice. “You want to squeeze
your lemons and limes right then,” says Polsky. Entertaining? Doing
it a couple hours ahead of time is okay, too.
Experiment with different flavors.
Once you’ve gotten the taste for spice you can always move to
other flavors, like the company’s super spicy Habanero sauce,
which is a combination of mango, banana and tamarind, among
other ingredients.
