Ginger Mojitos for a Crowd

These days the cooking posts seem to be few and far between on this old blog... as I said before, our situation in Bangkok (awesome and cheap food abounds... plus our kitchen is a bit small and stuffy) is not conducive to lots of cooking.  But refreshing cocktails? Yes, please.  Happy Friday!

We had some folks over last night as part of a mini progressive cocktail party in our apartment building. We were stop #2 for the roaming party, so I needed a make-ahead cocktail for a crowd so I wouldn't have people tapping their feet while we mixed individual drinks.  After some Googling (good resources on big batch cocktails here and here) I landed on this ginger mojito recipe because it sounded tasty and easy, but also because I knew I could find all of the ingredients here in Bangkok.

Tasty and easy it is!  You basically make a ginger mint simple syrup and then mix it with lime juice and rum and top it off with soda water.  For the party I put the simple syrup/rum/lime juice mixture in my punch bowl (love any opportunity to use the punch bowl!) and instructed people to pour a ladleful of mix into their glass, then add as much or as little soda water as they wanted and garnish with a sprig of mint and a lime slice.

Everybody seemed to like the mojitos! The flavor is a little bit more subtle than a traditional mojito, probably because the muddled mint leaves are not hanging around in the bottom of your glass.  And the drink is not overly ginger-y, but has just a nice hint of ginger.  Really refreshing and perfect for a small party!

Cucumber Mint Martini

Cucumber, mint, gin, lime juice, simple syrup.. mmm.  Tim made this martini, AKA "The Ellison," minus the bitters (because we didn't have any), last week.  Fresh and tasty!

Tarragon Infused Vodka Cocktails

Tons of Tarragon...

Infused some vodka with tarragon from the garden for 3-4 days.  Very nice bouquet.

Strained into a bottle for keeping.

Muddled fresh tarragon and mint, freshly squeezed lemon juice, a tiny amount of agave syrup, plus the infused vodka - shake over ice.  Add champagne topper (of course) and garnish with fresh tarragon and lemon rind.  Very refreshing.

Pineapple Vodka Cocktail

I promised you (and Tim) a pineapple cocktail, and here it is!

I think we may turn this spate of elaborate cocktails into a weekly thing, inspired by some colleagues of Tim's who live in Bangkok and have new cocktail Friday each week.  Anyone want to join in?

Dubbed "Teenage Dream" by its creator, this fresh pineapple juice cocktail is a relative of the mojito, but made with vodka instead of rum.  Lime and mint are muddled with sugar, pineapple juice and vodka are stirred in, and then the whole thing is poured over ice, topped with a spritz of soda water and enjoyed.

We liked this, but blending and straining the fresh pineapple may have taken this cocktail into the category of too much work (or at least too many dishes for us, as we are dishwasher-less).  In the flavor category, it's a winner, though!

Mango Cocktail

Tim was musing the other day that we should make a pineapple and vodka cocktail of some sort since the pineapple is so sweet and easy to get here (you can pick one out and have them peel it for you at the store...so easy).  My mouth started watering at the thought, but we didn't have a pineapple at that exact moment.  We did have a ripe mango, though, not yet earmarked for another purpose, so I looked up some mango cocktail recipes and immediately had at it, with delicious (albeit not very photogenic) results:

I ended up using this recipe from The Kitchn... mango puree, lemon juice, vodka, a little simple syrup and soda water.  So good.  Not too sweet, not too thick, extremely refreshing.  An exciting break from our usual, the gin rickey.

For a party I think you could make a big pitcher of the mango/lemon/vodka mix and then have people pour it in the glass and top off with soda water.  Also, I think a flavored simple syrup would do well here- ginger, lemongrass or vanilla, or maybe chili for some spice.  I guess you could do flavored vodka, too, if you wanted. 

Pineapple vodka cocktail recipe coming soon...

Rhubarb Syrup for Cocktails and Other Tasty Beverages

I had a couple extra stalks of rhubarbs left over from my coffee cake... not enough to make anything particularly substantial, but just enough to try out this rhubarb simple syrup.
The syrup is super easy, can be used for both boozy (rhubarb cosmopolitans, see below, but be warned that the lemon/lime in this recipe overwhelms the rhubarb flavor a bit) and non-boozy (rhubarb soda) drinks, and is a fun pink color.
Also, the leftover rhubarb bits form a kind of jelly/jam substance that's pretty tasty in and of itself. It's definitely not a pretty or fun pink color, though... it's more of a sad army green once the pink has been sucked out and applied to the simple syrup.

Dark and Stormy Cocktail

Heather brought the makings for Dark and Stormy cocktails to Thanksgiving dinner, but we never got around to drinking them- we stuck to wine and champagne. So we gave the cocktail a try tonight... really good! Ginger beer, lime and dark rum. Esquire had advice on the ratios.