Cocktails
658 recipes found
French 75
A fresh drink with lemon juice and gin, this concoction takes its nationality from a topping of Champagne.
Watermelon Sugar
Pearl of Puebla
Dirty Martini
A classic dirty martini can be made, depending on drinker’s preference, with all gin or all vodka, but using half gin, half vodka — with some vermouth and brine — results in a drink that leans a bit fresher and cleaner. (Should you prefer to stick with one spirit, use 2 1/2 ounces of either gin or vodka in this recipe.) Olive brine keeps the drink in the classics lane or swap in a less traditional brine, such as cornichon, pickled jalapeño, pickled tomato or preserved lemon and change up the garnish to match. Or simply stick with the olives, which are a perennial favorite for a reason.
Elderflower Martini
La Canadiense
The Classic Martini
Kingsley Amis and Churchill could hardly stand the stuff, but a little extra vermouth goes a long way.
Classic Philadelphia Fish House Punch
Rum and Cognac mix with a muddled sugar and lemon mixture, known as oleo-saccharum, and peach brandy in this classic punch, which dates back to the early 18th century. If you can’t find peach brandy (a dry, high-proof brandy distilled from peaches, not the saccharine peach-flavored liqueur) swap in a fruit eau de vie, such as apricot, plum, apple or pear. While this recipe is written to be served cold, it can also be served warm: Skip the ice block and gently warm the punch in a large saucepan or Dutch oven before ladling into small, heatproof mugs or tea cups. Hot or cold, finish each serving with a dusting of freshly grated nutmeg.
Single Village Fix
The Improved Dirty Martini
“Dirty martini” is a dirty word for many bartenders who find the drink — a martini with a salty slop of olive brine — unimaginative and unappetizing. Naren Young, a New York bartender, decided to create a better version, called Olives 7 Ways, with several bespoke ingredients. That cocktail, served at Saxon & Parole, is fairly complicated to make, so Mr. Young came up with yet another, easier variation for the home bartender.
Hot Rum Punch
Nothing warms a cold body up like a quaff of hot rum punch. This version, spiked with cognac and infused with citrus and nutmeg, is exactly what you want to serve at a party once the temperature drops outside. If you’re feeling flamboyant, you can flambé it, to the great amusement of your guests. Just make sure to use a fireproof bowl; silver or another metal is ideal, wood or even tempered glass is not. But even if you don’t set it on fire, it’s a rich, soothing and powerful libation. Serve it in small cups for the most civilized gathering.
Martini on the Rocks
A martini straight up will wilt on a hot day, but on the rocks it’s just right.
Rum Barrel
This is “one of Don the Beachcomber's baroque 1940s masterpieces,” Jeff Berry says, and he didn’t change a thing when he put it on the menu at Latitude 29. Yes, that’s quite a long list of ingredients, but they coalesce into a memorable drink and a classic, quintessential tiki experience.
Upside-Down Martini
This is a martini that’s about as wet as it gets, and it happened to be Julia Child’s favorite cocktail. It’s one part gin to five parts vermouth. “It’s a great, crisp summer drink,” said Ben Ward, the head bartender at Libation. It’s also much closer in spirit to the way dry vermouth is consumed in Europe — as a solo aperitif, rather than a meek cocktail modifier.
Blackberry Martinis
One of the most exquisite exploitations of the blackberry is accomplished by teaming it with a little booze and presenting it in a sugar-rimmed martini glass, making what might be called a blacktini. The original recipe, from ''The Berry Bible,'' suggests vodka, but I find the complexity of the drink enhanced by the gin's juniper-berry accent. I think vodka is dull, actually, but if you like it (most of America seems to), go with God.
Chairman’s Reserve
Jim Meehan of PDT in Manhattan uses an extractor to get cucumber juice for this punch. You can buy cucumber juice from your local juice store too.
Milk Punch
Original Chatham Artillery Punch
Rum and Tonic
What sort of rum and tonic you might like depends heavily on the kind of rum you prefer. And the world of rum is so wide and various, there are many directions you can go. The light-bodied Bacardi makes for an easy choice, and an easy, if simple, drink. The rhum agricoles made in Martinique will give you a much more complex cocktail, with grassy and vegetal notes. And Banks 5, a blend made up of rums from various places, brings sweet fruit notes like banana to the glass. Most rums, however, require a more aggressive tonic partner, like Schweppes.
Strawberry-Peach Sangria
Part sangria, part punch, this is a refreshing and lightly alcoholic way to quench the thirst of a large group. Danielle Wecksler, a cooking instructor in South Carolina, created it for an outdoor Lowcountry boil in Charleston. It highlights local peaches and berries, and was created to counter the stifling Southern heat. “Part of the rationale is that when it is so hot, partygoers are going to suck down whatever you give them to drink,” she said. “So if you go with something that is a little lighter on the alcohol content, it keeps everyone from getting too tipsy.” This recipe easily doubles to serve a crowd. If you can’t find orange Curaçao, use a Curaçao-style liqueur, such as Grand Marnier. Triple sec, another type of orange liqueur, is slightly less sweet but would also work.
Rum Julep
Rum and mint make a great pair, with plenty of crushed ice. If you don’t have an ice crusher, put ice cubes between two clean dish towels and bang on them with a hammer or meat tenderizer.
Texas Two-Step
Pineapple Express
With its understated, background fruit notes, Plantation Pineapple Rum Stiggins’ Fancy can easily be used in a wide variety of classic cocktail recipes without upsetting the drink’s balance. It makes a good old-fashioned, rum sour or El Presidente. The Pineapple Express, created by Freddie Sarkis of the Broken Shaker in Chicago, is simply a daiquiri with a split of pineapple rum and rhum agricole doing the work usually done by a white rum. The combination adds more richness and character to the drink, though you may not notice the pineapple until the second or third sip. That’s a testimony to the subtlety of the cocktail.
Large-Batch Rye Manhattan Cocktails
According to the cocktail historian David Wondrich, from whom this recipe is adapted, this is the manhattan as it was made from the 1890s until the 1960s, and again since the 2000s. The optional absinthe, which amounts to no more than a dash per drink, is a late-19th century addition that gives the drink a little herbal pizzazz; do not use more than suggested. This keeps for weeks at room temperature.