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Ladies Cocktails
Cocktail Parties
Cocktailing
If you have a fully stocked bar, great. But you don't really need one to throw a terrific cocktail party. A more practical and inexpensive approach is simply to offer one or two signature cocktails, along with beer, wine, and some non-alcoholic choices.
Standard cocktails use 1.5 fluid ounces of spirits per drink, so plan on getting 16 cocktails from each bottle. Figuring one cocktail per guest per hour, plus beer and wine, the beverage shopping list for a 4-hour party featuring martinis and Manhattans for 20 guests might look like this:
- 4 750-ml bottles of gin (and/or vodka)
- 3 750-ml bourbon
- One bottle (750 ml) dry vermouth
- Two bottles (750 ml) sweet vermouth
- Bitters
- Pimento-stuffed cocktail olives
- Maraschino cherries
- Cocktail napkins and picks
- 6 bottles of white wine
- 4 bottles red wine
- 24 12-oz bottles of beer--a mixture of light and dark beers
- Water, still and sparkling
- A variety of soft drinks
- Ice, at least half a pound per person
Tippler's Tip: Clear alcohol (such as vodka) tends to go faster than brown (such as whiskey), and white wine is more popular in party settings than red.
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Cocktail Party Know-How
Tip #1: Never skimp on the ice. A good rule of thumb is half a pound per person in a cool climate, and two pounds per person in warm weather.
Tip#2: Print out your drink menu, including the featured cocktails, wines, and beers you'll be serving.
Tip #3: Use your space creatively. Put the drink and food stations away from each other to encourage your guests to spread out.
Tip #4: Consider hiring a bartender if your guest list exceeds 20. It will free you up to enjoy your guests, and minimizes post-party clean-up.
Tip#5: Rent glassware. Choose styles that suit the drinks you'll be serving and plan on providing wine and beer glasses for the other drinks. Rent a total of four glasses per guest, and have plastic glasses on hand as back up.
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Don’t Forget the Ice!
The best tasting cocktails are made using fresh ice from pure, filtered water. "Fresh" means the cubes haven't been lounging around for weeks in the freezer soaking up the stale essences of long-lingering foods. Bring the water to a quick boil for best results. Make it the morning of the day you plan to mix your cocktails, and you’ll enjoy the freshest, most delicious cocktails.
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Bubbly blood orange campari cocktail
I wanted to make a special valentine’s day cocktail that had the same color as a red rose and when I saw the blood oranges I knew they would be just perfect, I also knew that there should be champagne/prosecco or some type of sparkling wine in the cocktail – I love bubbly cocktails – , and while both of those ingredients would have made a great drink I wanted to add something else that would make leave your taste buds a little bit intrigued, so I added a dash of Campari. Campari is an Italian spirit that has a very distinct red color and a bitter taste; the exact ingredients are kept secret, but are supposed to include a variety of bitter herbs and spices.
The quantities below are for 2 drinks, you can adjust based on the number of drinks you want to make, one thing I noticed with blood oranges is that they are very pulpy and are not as juicy are regular oranges. Also, if you are just making this drink for two people you can use a mini-bottle of sparkling wine, unless of course you want more than one drink each.
Cheers and happy Valentine’s Day!
Ingredients:
2-3 large blood oranges, juiced, about 1/3 cup juice
1 oz campari
Chilled sparkling wine – choose from prosecco, champagne, cava, brut, etc
Optional garnish – blood orange peel or blood orange slice
Preparation:
- Pour 1 ½ oz of blood orange juice in each champagne flute.
- Add ½ oz of campari.
- Top off each drink with sparkling wine, garnish with a slice of blood orange and enjoy.
Samantha’s Punch
1.5 oz Sauvignon Blanc
1.5 oz Stirrings White Sangria Mixer
Splash of peach juice
Garnish with cantaloupe, fresh watermelon, and raspberries
Carrie’s Cosmotini
1.5 oz Vodka
.5 Stirrings Lemon Drop Mixer
.5 oz Stirrings Cosmopolitan Mixer
Garnish with a Gerber daisy, orange peel and a fresh lime wedge
The Charlotte
1 oz. Stirrings Pear Mixer
Fill glass with dry champagne
Serve in a Champagne flute with a few edible candy pearls in the bottom of the glass
Miranda’s Power Martini
1.5 oz Stirrings Bloody Mary Mixer
1 oz. Vodka
1.5 oz Red Bull
Squeeze of fresh lemon
Five Cool & Fruity Cocktails You Can Make At Home
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Russ_Moore]Russ Moore
Whether you are entertaining friends and family
or you are simply chillin' by the pool, with the TV,
or curled up with a book, a good drink can almost
always make it a more enjoyable experience.
Take it from a trained and practiced intoxicologist,
the true personality steps out from behind the mask
and life comes in as though you were looking through
different eyes.
Before I go on let me say that I do not encourage
alcoholism. I do encourage that everyone drink in
moderation - and NEVER before driving.
That said, let's learn five very easy and delicious
drinks you can make and enjoy in the comfort of your
own home with minimal bar stock and/or equipment.
All of these drinks use vodka as the kicker so you
won't have to spend much time or money at the liquor
store stocking up on a wide variety of ingredients.
Now - let's get started.
Apple Martini - Tasty and refreshing
Ingredients:
1oz Apple Schnapps
1oz Vodka
1oz Apple Juice
Directions:
Pour all ingredients over ice into a mixing glass or
shaker - stir or shake until mixed and cold - strain
into a stemmed cocktail glass.
Kiwi Martini - Delicious and nutritious
Ingredients:
1 kiwi (peeled and sliced)
1/2 teaspoon of sugar
2oz Vodka
Directions:
Put sliced kiwi (save one slice to garnish) and sugar
into the bottom of your mixing glass or shaker and
crush to pulp with a muddler or back of a spoon. Add
ice. Add vodka. Stir or shake until well mixed - strain
into stemmed cocktail glass. Garnish - slice of kiwi.
Strawberry Martini (same as above - replace kiwi
with 3-5 strawberries and mix exactly the same way)
The last two drinks are great for those who do NOT
like the taste of alcohol, as the juices completely
mask it's taste.
Sea Breeze
Ingredients:
2oz Vodka
Cranberry Juice
Grapefruit Juice
Directions:
Fill a highball glass with ice. Pour vodka. Fill 2/3
with cranberry juice. Fill with grapefruit juice.
Garnish with lime. Enjoy.
Madras
Ingredients:
2oz Vodka
Cranberry Juice
Orange Juice
Directions:
Fill a highball glass with ice. Pour vodka. Fill with
equal parts cranberry and orange juice. Garnish with
an orange slice. Yummy.
There you go. Five cool & fruity cocktails you can
make at home. Make a quick stop for supplies then mix
and enjoy them anytime you wish.
Russ Moore: Part-Time Marketer, Part-Time Writer,
Part-Time Bartender and Full-Time Crazy. He's an
information junkie and "jack of all trades" who
shares knowledge with his twisted, loyal readers.
Russ recommends http://www.FeedYourHungryWallet.ws
Article Source: [http://EzineArticles.com/?Five-Cool-and-Fruity-Cocktails-You-Can-Make-At-Home&id=300119] Five Cool & Fruity Cocktails You Can Make At Home
High Calorie Alcoholic Cocktails - Diet Busting Drinks to Avoid
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Shane_Dayton]Shane Dayton
If you enjoy your mixed drinks but are on a diet, finding a tasty low calorie alcoholic drink can be difficult. Many of the most popular mixed drink recipes are high calorie recipes, and it doesn't take many to bust a diet wide open. Many mixed cocktails are high in both calories and sugar, making them a poor choice for anybody who is watching the waistline.
Losing that weight might be important, but plenty of people want to have the diet and still enjoy a couple of great drinks to reward themselves on the weekend. Keeping alcohol and the diet is as much about avoiding the unhealthy high calorie mixed drinks as it is about finding the proper low calorie substitutes.
There are many unhealthy mixed cocktails, but there are several that are the worst offenders. The thing to look for is both calories and sugars. While there is no unbreakable rule of thumb as far as determining the good drinks from the not so good, there are several things to look out for.
What to Watch for:
1. Drinks heavy in sugary colas or sugary juice. These pack on the sugars and the calories.
2. Any frozen/creamy mixed drinks (all of these tend to be extremely heavy in both calories and sugars)
3. Drinks with high calorie mixers (think anything mixed with eggnog)
4. Alcohol high in calories and sugar (anything with Creme de Menthe, for example, is going to be packed)
Each drink needs to be considered separately, as it's not uncommon to have two related drinks with vastly different calorie counts. For example, in the "martini" family you have the appletini, which is a very popular choice for a lower calorie alcoholic mixed drink, but a chocolatini is actually one of the absolute worst drinks out there as far as calories and sugars. Some versions of the chocolatini are bursting at the seams around the 500 calorie mark for just one.
A Long Island Iced Tea is loaded in the same way because of the sheer amount of higher calorie shots mixed into the drink. For large drinks like that, the alcohol calories really add up. Anything added to eggnog, like the holiday favorite of rum & eggnog, is a diet buster, as are tropical drinks like the famous pina coladas.
There are plenty of options for people who want a tasty alcoholic cocktail without busting a diet wide open, but the listed drinks from the articles are some of the mixed drinks that you will want to avoid.
If you would like to learn more about low and high calorie mixed drinks, please feel free to visit my website on [http://hubpages.com/hub/Low-Calorie-Alcoholic-Drinks]low calorie alcohol drinks
Article Source: [http://EzineArticles.com/?High-Calorie-Alcoholic-Cocktails---Diet-Busting-Drinks-to-Avoid&id=1445552] High Calorie Alcoholic Cocktails - Diet Busting Drinks to Avoid
Strange Cocktail Combinations
By [http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Shauna_Hanus]Shauna Hanus
Mixed drinks or cocktails have taken a strange turn in recent years. In the past it was the worm in the bottom of the tequila bottle today it’s combinations that include everything from bubblegum to pickled octopus. If you are adventurous and want to veer from the ordinary here are some combinations to get your evening started.
Liquor Drinks
• Irish Liquor, Amaretto, cream and mint.
• Grand Marnier with horseradish infused vodka with a rare slice of beef tenderloin garnish.
• Frangelico, crème de cocoa blended with peanut butter served over ice.
Rum Drinks
• Dark rum blended with peeled and seeded avocado, cream, lime juice and sugar.
Sake Drinks
• Sake, brown sugar, club soda, pineapple juice and celery garnish.
Vodka Drinks
• Potato vodka with garlic stuffed green olives.
• Vanilla vodka, bourbon, vanilla bean paste and lime juice garnished with fresh rhubarb studded with peppercorns.
Martinis
• Gin martini garnished with a pickled octopus.
• Vodka martini blended with frozen espresso.
• Pepper vodka with a dash of hot pepper sauce and garnished with fresh vegetables.
• Vodka martini that has been infused with bubblegum.
With these cocktail combinations in mind, head out for your evening on the town and venture into the new cocktails of the twenty first century. But if by chance these new cocktail combinations are not in the cards for you remember you can always order a time tested pilsner.
Shauna Hanus is a gourmet cook who specializes in creating gourmet meal plans. She has extensive experience cooking with easy to find grocery items to create delightful gourmet meals. She is also the publisher of a no cost bi-monthly gourmet newsletter. Her newsletter is always fun and informational packed with tips and trivia you can use everyday. http://www.gourmayeats.com
Article Source: [http://EzineArticles.com/?Strange-Cocktail-Combinations&id=82612] Strange Cocktail Combinations