Mediterranean Gimlet

I'm quite excited that Nautical Gin asked me to be part of their Gimlet recipe contest! They've asked several bloggers from across the northeast to use Nautical Gin in an original Gimlet recipe. I'm always thrilled to try new spirits - particularly gin! - and experimenting with new cocktails is pretty much my favorite thing.

Nautical gin is a brand-new American gin made in Nashua, New Hampshire. It's made with some really unique botanicals, including Pacific kombu, a seaweed that gives it subtle flavors of sea salt and minerals - thus the name. The resulting gin is smooth, aromatic, and really great in cocktails. The gin is sold in a lovely seaglass-blue bottle with the motto "Inspired by Exploration."

Nautical challenged us to come up with a spin on the Gimlet. This is definitely one of my favorite classic cocktails. In its original form, it's incredibly simple - just gin and sweetened lime juice.*  It's a perfect cocktail for showcasing the unique qualities of a gin, and it's also simple enough that it's fun and easy to experiment with.

I've made one riff on a gimlet in the past, a Cucumber Basil Gimlet, which was pretty great - cucumber is perfection with gin and lime. So I decided to do a different cucumber-based spin this time, muddling in some fresh cilantro to bring out the coriander flavors and topping the cocktail with a bit of black pepper to enhance the flavor and compliment the pepper notes in the gin. If this sounds a bizarre to you, don't knock it till you've tried it - it's a great flavor enhancer and really gives this cocktail a little something special.

Keeping with the nautical theme, I call this a Mediterranean Gimlet. I think it tastes like something you'd sip on the shores of a Greek isle. But Cape Cod or Boston Harbor will work in a pinch!

If you like this recipe, please give it some love on the Nautical Gin Instagram and Facebook pages when it appears! And keep an eye on their feeds to see more Gimlet recipes crafted for the contest by other local bloggers. Cheers!

*Technically the original Gimlet was made with Rose's Lime Cordial, but if you've ever had Rose's you know that it's basically high-fructose corn syrup dyed green. Luckily some brands are now coming out with real lime cordials, like this one from El Guapo. A lime cordial is usually made by allowing sugar, lime juice, and lime peels to sit overnight or for several days. The peels introduce lots of additional oils and flavor. I've always been perfectly happy just using lime juice and simple syrup instead, but if you want to get technical, it's the cordial that makes a Gimlet - otherwise you're just making a gin sour.

But we don't want to get technical. Let's have a drink.

Mediterranean Gimlet

2 oz. gin (Nautical recommended)
3/4 oz. lime juice
3/4 oz. simple syrup
4 slices cucumber
Handful of cilantro leaves
2 grinds of black pepper

Combine cucumber, cilantro and simple syrup in the bottom of a shaker and muddle well, until cilantro is bruised and cucumbers have released their juices. Add gin and lime juice. Fill shaker with ice and shake until well-chilled. Fine-strain into a coupe glass. Garnish with a cucumber slice and a couple of grinds of black pepper.

Thai Bloody Mary

My husband has become obsessed with grilling. It started last summer, when we bought a tiny Weber charcoal grill to use on our balcony. Suddenly the man who never cooked anything other than scrambled eggs was smoking brisket and developing his own secret recipe for ribs that requires two days of work. As a pescatarian, I haven't exactly been reaping all of the benefits of this culinary renaissance, but he does make a mean veggie kabob, and we've been experimenting with more and more seafood (grilled octopus = YUM). Most recently, we got our hands on a whole fish and decided to try and grill it in the same style as the fish we often had in Thailand when we were there several years ago. I made a sauce for it by mashing together various recipes I found online, using lots of lime, peppers, lemongrass, cilantro, and fish sauce.

I was skeptical about the fish sauce, and if you're at all familiar with this product, you probably know why. Fish sauce is not named because it's meant to be used on fish, but rather because it's made from fish. Fish that is mixed with salt and allowed to ferment, then squeezed to extract all of the liquid that the salt leeches out of it. Fish sauce is basically rotted fish juice. And that's kind of what it tastes and smells like.

After this lovely description, you might be thinking you would rather pass on the fish sauce, but you've probably already had it and liked it - it's a major ingredient in the sauce that goes on Pad Thai, which is why we had a bottle to begin with. And for something that would probably make you gag if you tried it on its own, fish sauce can be a surprisingly delicious addition to a recipe. When the intense taste is mixed with other ingredients, it provides a delicious savory flavor. It was fantastic in the sauce I made that night, and it suddenly hit me that it would be awesome in a Bloody Mary.

Thus the Thai Bloody Mary was born. Taking inspiration from the sauce I made for our fish, I flavored the tomato juice with cilantro, serrano pepper, lime juice, and fish sauce. It's savory, tangy, and absolutely delicious. I'm not a huge Bloody Mary fan - I kind of need to be in the mood for one - but I could guzzle these. Without the vodka, that would probably be pretty healthy, actually. (But much less fun.)

And of course the best part about a Bloody Mary is the garnish. I finished these with cilantro, pickled bean sprouts, shrimp, and a brush of Cajun seasoning (an alternative to using it around the rim that is much more photogenic but much less practical). The bean sprouts in particular are pretty fabulous, and the shrimp taste amazing dipped in the cocktail. All in all I'm quite proud of this one, and I hope you give it a try!

Thai Bloody Mary

1 1/2 oz. vodka
6 oz. tomato juice
1/2 oz. lime juice
1/2 oz. fish sauce
1/4 cup fresh cilantro leaves
1/2 inch section of serrano pepper, sliced
For garnish: fresh cilantro, pickled bean sprouts*, shrimp**, Cajun seasoning

Combine tomato juice, lime juice, fish sauce, cilantro, and serrano pepper in a food processor and blend until the cilantro and pepper are pureed into tiny pieces. The mixture may foam a bit; let it settle and then stir it gently to recombine the ingredients.

To prepare the glass, take a pastry brush and dip it lightly in lime juice or water. Shaking off the excess, wipe it across the side of a rocks glass and over the rim. Then roll the glass in Cajun seasoning (I used Tony Chachere's). Fill the glass with ice and add the vodka. Pour in the tomato mixture and stir gently. Garnish with fresh cilantro, pickled bean sprouts, and shrimp.

*For the bean sprouts, I adapted this recipe for Dua Gia from Girl Cooks World. Combine 1/2 cup white vinegar, 1/2 cup water, 1/4 cup sugar, and 3/4 tsp. salt in a saucepan and simmer until the sugar and salt are dissolved. Let cool completely, then pour over bean sprouts and stir. Let sit for at least an hour.

**For the shrimp, I briefly sauteed them in some olive oil with a dash of Tony Chachere's. This can be done in the shells or peeled.

Pepino's Vengeance

I used to subscribe to Bon Appetit Magazine, and on the last page of each issue they'd usually have a celebrity sketch something out on a napkin (like this one by Aziz Ansari). At some point, Justin Timberlake shared the recipe for his favorite cocktail, the Pepino (Spanish for "cucumber"). It's a mix of tequila, Cointreau, basil, pineapple juice, agave, and cucumber that was cooked up by a New York mixologist named Junior Merino. It's a good cocktail, and one I should definitely make for the blog at some point. But I don't often have pineapple juice on hand, which is how I came across this recipe for the simpler Pepino's Revenge. It was created by Lee Hefter, an executive chef at Wolfgang Puck. It omits the pineapple juice and the Cointreau, giving top billing to tequila and the fresh flavors of cucumber and basil.

One evening, my husband (henceforth "GarnishGuy") asked if I could make him a Pepino's Revenge, but I was out of basil. So I subbed in cilantro, which I thought would go even better with the lime and tequila. (I mean, is cilantro bad in anything? I'd probably eat cilantro ice cream.) We both really liked the result, which I have christened Pepino's Vengeance to distinguish it from the original version. It's citrusy and refreshing, but still very spirit-forward. A great alternative to a Margarita.

Pepino's Vengeance

4 half-inch thick slices of cucumber
Handful of cilantro
2 oz. silver tequila
1/2 oz. lime juice
1/2 oz. simple syrup

Muddle cucumber and cilantro in a shaker. Add remaining ingredients and ice. Shake until well chilled. Double strain into a rocks glass filled with ice. Garnish with a cucumber slice and cilantro leaves.

Recipe adapted from Food & Wine.

Tito's Cucumber Martini

Just about everybody is going to be talking about tequila cocktails today, but I've got an alternative that still tastes appropriate for your Cinco de Mayo festivities, made with vodka.

I'm generally not really a big fan of vodka. I find it an underwhelming spirit that doesn't add much but alcohol content to cocktails. But every now and then you get a cocktail with so many great flavors in it that you almost don't want to corrupt it too much with anything but a clean, smooth vodka. I think that's what Tito's had in mind when they developed this cocktail.

Most vodka drinkers I know agree that Tito's Vodka is a spectacular quality for the price, so I happily made it my vodka of choice. This recipe is right off their website, and it's a favorite of mine. Calling it a "cucumber martini" isn't inaccurate, but it kind of misses the best things about this drink. While the cucumber in this recipe is great, it's the cilantro and the green Tabasco that really make it. You could serve a perfectly good cucumber martini with just the vodka, lemon juice, simple syrup, and muddled cucumber, but the cilantro adds depth and the Tabasco sauce this hint of savor and spice that move this concoction out of the realm of "perfectly good" and into surprisingly sophisticated territory.

One instruction that is important in this cocktail and in most others that involve muddling anything: double-strain. You're still going to get lots of little pieces of cucumber and cilantro through the shaker, and you don't want those floating around in the finished product. You should also double strain if, like me, you tend to get citrus pulp in your lime and lemon juice.

Speaking of lemon juice, the original recipe for this cocktail violated GarnishGirl's First Rule of Mixology (never have more simple syrup than citrus juice in a cocktail), so I reduced the sweetener to make it more to my taste.

Tito's Cucumber Martini

2 oz. Tito's vodka

3/4 oz. lemon juice

3/4 oz. simple syrup

3 slices cucumber (plus one for garnish)

Handful of fresh cilantro

3 drops green Tabasco sauce

Muddle cucumber and cilantro in a shaker. Add vodka, lemon juice, simple syrup, and ice. Shake until well chilled. Double-strain into a cocktail glass. Add three drops of Tabasco on top.

Recipe adapted from Tito's Handmade Vodka.