Building your Bar Cart + Favorite Cocktail Recipes
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Iām not high maintenanceā¦ Iām really not! I do, however, know what I like. Cocktails used to be scary for me to order, because a lot of the time I ended up not liking them. A drink sounded good, but once I received it I realized it was too sweet or not my flavor profile. It is totally okay to send something back, but I HATED to do this, so I rarely did. I was stuck sipping on a $12+ cocktail that I didnāt want to let go to waste, but also didnāt want to waste my calories on. #dilemma Though I usually lean towards wine, Iām not always interested in the wine on a list. I decided I wanted to have a signature cocktail that I could always order that would be relatively the same everywhere I went, so I set out on the quest to find my perfect beverage.
Everlane Wrap Dress (wearing a size 4 - TTS!) | Gold Bar Cart | Bear Painting (custom, similar here) | Absolut Elyx Copper Coupe (c/o) | Antique Rocks Glasses (similar here) | Thrifted Hand (similar here) | Shaker set (copper shaker set here)
Now Iām not saying order the same thing every time and never venture out! Iām just telling you to learn your own flavor profile. One of my favorite things to do is tell a bar tender what I like and set them loose to create a drink for me! Before we get into cocktails and easy recipes, it is important to know what you actually enjoy. No matter how easy or simple the recipe may be, if you end up not liking it, it is all for naught.
LEARN YOUR FLAVOR PROFILE
Consider what you already know. What do you already enjoy? Have you considered using that in a cocktail? Hot sauce your thing? Have grapefruit juice every morning? Love a good herby meal? All these things can either be used in a cocktail or used to figure out what you might enjoy in a cocktail.
Try raw ingredients. Nick is really good at doing this. Not only will it tell you what you like, but it will also help your sense of taste, bettering your wine and even coffee tasting skills! Chopping up an onion for dinner? Try it raw! Slicing up some fruit for a snack? Savor it and really think about the flavor. Growing some herbs? Taste each leaf carefully! Learn what you like and donāt like.
Consider add-ons. What are the mix-ins (mixers) that you know you like? Soda water? Fresh fruit? Get to thinking!
Learn your liquors. Try them straight! You might learn that you enjoy them neat (with no ice or mixers). By tasting them without anything else, you can also taste the quality of craft liquor vs āwellā liquor (the basic liquor used in house cocktails). You may not be able to outright taste the difference in a cocktail, but the subtle difference can go a long way! If your liquor tastes like rubbing alcohol, your drink will favor that. LOL. This is also a time to give different liquors another shot. I had a bad experience with gin once and didnāt touch it for years. Now it is my favorite liquor to use in my cocktails!
Trust a bar tender. If you can speak with a good bar tender, do it! Tell them what you like and donāt like, the flavors you prefer, etc. They can help you figure out a cocktail you will enjoy and that can be a spring board for other options if you want to keep exploring.
MY FLAVOR PROFILE: I love bright citrus flavors like lemon, lime, and grapefruit. It is harder to find in cocktails, but I LOVE passion fruit. I donāt enjoy excessively sweet drinks as they tend to give me a headache. I love to eat berries, but I donāt particularly enjoy berry drinks as often they are too sweet. If I do have a berry drink, I like to balance them out with herbs and spices! Think blueberry and basil or strawberry and serrano pepper. I love spicy drinks, but do not like smokey drinks. I also donāt like a strong taste of alcohol. My preferred liquors are gin and tequila, but I enjoy other things like rum. I donāt really like scotch or whiskey, but Iām coming around to it. My favorite craft gins are Zephyr, Amass, and The Botanist. I like gins that are more elderberry forward and less juniper forward. Think floral notes! The gin I had a bad experience with was not only super cheap (you get what you pay for), but was very juniper forward. The juniper notes often come across as dish soapy to my. Nothing like Bath and Body Works Juniper breeze ;) I try to order / make cocktails based on minimal ingredients with the least amount of āprocessedā food as possible. My go-to drinks are a beeās knees or a spicy margarita.
NICKāS FLAVOR PROFILE: Nick is similar to me in that he doesnāt prefer sweet drinks. However, he likes the taste of a good craft liquor and sweetness often covers this up. That being said, he really enjoys drinking things neat versus having them mixed. When he does have a cocktail, he loves classics like martinis, old fashions, margaritas, and manhattans. He doesnāt discriminate regarding most liquors, but enjoys a good smokey flavor whether it is mezcal or whiskey. Regarding add-ons, he likes herbs and complementary combinations that enhance rather than over power the liquorsā flavor.
BASICS WE ALWAYS HAVE ON HAND
Lemon Juice. I use lemon juice for SO MUCH. I sprinkle it on broccoli before baking, let my chicken soak in it, and of course use it for cocktails! I keep actual lemons on hand (I have hot lemon water every morning!), but love the ease of reaching for 100% lemon juice in my fridge. We typically buy jars of Lakewood Organics 100% lemon juice or Santa Cruz 100% lemon juice and love it! I pretty much use it as the base for all of my cocktails, so it is a MUST HAVE FOR ME.
Simple Syrup. This is something youāll need for most cocktails, but donāt be bamboozled into buying it. Yo can literally make it yourself and with whatever sugar you want! Just use equal parts water and equal parts sugar. We make it as we need it but keep a jar of honey simple syrup in the fridge. Thatās what I use for my beeās knees! Same recipe - equal parts honey and water. (i.e. 1 cup of honey and 1 cup of water). If you pre-make it, be sure to keep it in the fridge, because once you mix honey with water it will mold if left out.
Orange Liqueur. Since margaritas are something we make all the time, this is a must! We love to buy Cointreau.
Vermouth. Nick loves martinis, so this is a must. We buy Dolin brand dry vermouth.
Tajin. We love this spicy salt for our margaritas! it is also great on fruit or even meat.
JalapeƱos. I like these in my beeās knees and in my margaritas! I sometimes sub for serranos or cayenne pepper. I also like to use Scrappyās Firewater bitters too.
Olives. A Greek staple in this house, even though I donāt enjoy them. We use these all the time for Nickās martinis! He doesnāt do very dirty martinis (olive juice added), but he does use the olives themselves a lot!
Fresh fruit, herbs, spices. We always have lemons and limes. Occasionally we have oranges. Really whatever you have on hand is already your taste, so these items will come in handy! We have an herb garden with mint, basil, rosemary, and oregano, which are all wonderful in drinks too! It is really fun to include seasonal options in your current beverages.
Your preferred Liquor. We have a large assortment, but they are from things we have collected overtime. You really only need what you like. Sounds silly, but I just donāt want you to be overwhelmed by our bar cart! Our personal essentials are gin, tequila, mezcal, and whiskey. Our favorites are:
Zephyr Gin (made in Texas - hard to find elsewhere)
Amass Gin (made in California - hard to find elsewhere)
Absolut Elyx Vodka (craft version of Absolut Vodka)
Woodford Reserve Whiskey
Oban Scotch
I also really like The Botanist Gin, but have never purchased it for home. It is a craft gin that I can usually get at a restaurant, as it is a more widely distributed gin. If you are looking for āwellā options of gin, I always go with Hendricks! We also keep tequila and mezcal on hand, though we donāt have a brand we are married to. I prefer blanco tequila in my margaritas, but other than that, usually donāt have a preference. This is our second bottle of Dulce Vida Tequila and I like it! Nick makes mezcal margaritas, but again, doesnāt have a go-to brand. We also like to keep dark rum on hand for mojitos and for making bananas foster!
BAR-WARE TO HAVE ON HAND
Shaker - Must have! You donāt need anything fancy. It just needs to work! We prefer stainless steel. There are relatively cheap sets you can find too! Here is a stainless steel one and here is a copper set.
Jigger - Must have! You need this to measure out your cocktails. I prefer the recipes in āpartsā rather than ounces, but whatever floats your boat! The larger side is 1.5 parts and the smaller side is 1 part. Easy peasy! Note a standard jigger is 1.5 oz on the larger side and 1 oz on the smaller side, though they make all kinds of versions now. If youāre looking to save money/use something you already have, a shot glass is usually equivalent to the larger side of the jigger (1.5 oz).
Muddler - Not a necessity, but I use this when muddling jalapeƱos. We have also been making a lot of mojitos as of late, since wave have fresh mint in our garden!
Ice Cubes - We donāt have an ice maker and ice is a must for cocktails! You can get really cool shapes and such for show, but you just need regular ice for shaking. We end up using our cocktail ice cubes for shaking, since we donāt have much else. We have a silicone cube set and a silicone ball set. I love my BKR ice trays, but they arenāt the best for cocktails. We also have āchilling stonesā that Nick will occasionally put in whiskey. He never puts actual ice in it. We keep them in the freezer with the ice.
Glassware - To be honest, we are way more picky about our wine glasses than our cocktail glasses. These are the margarita glasses we have and these are the martini glasses we have. We also have some antique old fashioned glasses that are similar to these.
Now for the recipes! These are the most made drinks in our household. Nick will sometimes make an Old Fashioned, Manhattan, or a Whiskey Sour. More often than not if he is having whiskey though, heāll have it neat. His most made cocktail is definitely a martini. Mojitos are newer to our lineup and has 100% to do with our mini herb garden. Enjoy!
BEEāS KNEES
2 parts gin
1 part lemon juice
1 part honey simple syrup
Place martini glass in freezer. Mix all parts into a shaker along with some ice. Shake well and serve neat or over ice. I typically serve it neat, but it is good either way. Use a rocks glass if you prefer ice.
Optional: throw some spice in the shaker! I typically muddle jalapeƱos in it pre-shake. If Iām out of fresh produce, Iāll use Scrappyās Firewater Bitters or cayenne pepper. This is a spicy beeās knees, otherwise known as a āBee Stingā.
MARTINI
2 parts gin
1/2 part dry vermouth
Olives / juice to your liking
Yes, the original martinis were made with gin, not vodka! You can of course sub the gin for vodka if you please.
Place martini glass in freezer. Mix all parts in a shaker along with some ice. Shake. Serve neat and garnish with olives. If I make the martini with Zephyr or Amass gin, I donāt add olive juice at all - only olives. If it is made with more of a well gin like Hendricks, I add a splash of olive juice, but you can make it however dirty you want!
Note I typically make Nick a double, since it isnāt much liquid, but alcohol (nor caffeine) really have an effect on him, so keep that in mind!
MARGARITA
2 parts tequila (or mezcal!)
1 part lemon juice
1 part Cointreau
Optional: salt, Tajin, jalapeƱos, lime wedge
CORRECT, NO SIMPLE SYRUPā¦ (Unless you REALLY prefer your margaritas to be sweet)
Swipe a lime wedge alongside of your margarita glass, then roll the edge of your glass in Tajin (or salt). Mix all parts in a shaker along with some ice. Shake, then strain into the margarita glass with ice and garnish with a lime wedge!
Optional: If you want spicy marg, muddle the jalapeƱos in before shaking!
MOJITO
2 oz rum (we prefer dark rum, but you can use white rum too!)
club soda (we use Topo Chico)
8 mint leaves
1 TBS lime juice
2 tsp brown sugar
Gently muddle the mint with the lime juice + brown sugar in a tall glass (no shaker required here). Add ice + the rum, fill to the top of the glass with club soda.
Cocktails can be really intimidating, but are honestly pretty easy to make! They obviously make more of a mess than beer or wine, but they are so impressive, especially when people are over. If we have a large gathering, we like to pre-make a batch of our favorites and put them in a jug or pitcher for easy access! I hope this post helped you out and you feel confident making some fun beverages! If you still need some help, thereās an app called The Liquor Cabinet that gives great guidance!
FAVORITE BARS
If you donāt want to make your own, these are some of our favorite places!
1122 Paso Robles, CA.
Town Hearth Dallas, TX (restaurant, but we love to sit at the bar)
Pogos Dallas, TX (not a bar, but our favorite wine and spirits store in Dallas)
The Bitter Bar Boulder, CO
The Breakers (both HMF and The Seafood Bar) Palm Beach, FL
P.S. if you liked this post, youāll probably enjoy these:
Building a Coffee Corner + How to Up your Brew Game
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