Inspired by Pasco Kitchen and Lounge in Tucson, which serves truly inspired cocktails, we created our own summer drink from some ingredients on hand.
We called it the Rattlesnake, for its bite and for the lovely diamondback rattlesnake that was snoozing on our porch when we got home on Wednesday this week.
The Rattlesnake
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Ingredients:
1 ounce vodka, chile-infused
3-4 ounces watermelon juice
1 ounce sweet-and-sour
simple syrup, to taste
cilantro, about a tablespoon, muddled with simple syrup
Directions:
1. Muddle the cilantro with a dash of simple syrup in the bottom of a Mason jar (muddling is just mashing the herb with sugar, using a wooden spoon or if you're a mixologist, a special "muddling pestle").
2. Add sweet-and-sour, watermelon, and vodka. Taste, add more simple syrup if needed.
3. Add ice, stir, serve, preferably with a slice of watermelon as garnish.
Depending on the strength of your chile-vodka, this can have a great bite!
Notes:
We make our own chile vodka by simply steeping good vodka (Skyy) with a handful of hot chiles (jalapeños, birds-eye, chiltepine, or Thai) in a cool place for a few weeks. Pasco makes a chile gin by using roasted chiles.
We also make our own simple syrup with organic cane sugar (bring to boil sugar and water in a 1:1 ratio), and our own sweet-and-sour (3:2:1 fresh lime juice, fresh lemon juice, simple syrup; we often use jarred organic lime and lemon juice from our local Sunflower market).
We called it the Rattlesnake, for its bite and for the lovely diamondback rattlesnake that was snoozing on our porch when we got home on Wednesday this week.
The Rattlesnake
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ingredients:
1 ounce vodka, chile-infused
3-4 ounces watermelon juice
1 ounce sweet-and-sour
simple syrup, to taste
cilantro, about a tablespoon, muddled with simple syrup
Directions:
1. Muddle the cilantro with a dash of simple syrup in the bottom of a Mason jar (muddling is just mashing the herb with sugar, using a wooden spoon or if you're a mixologist, a special "muddling pestle").
2. Add sweet-and-sour, watermelon, and vodka. Taste, add more simple syrup if needed.
3. Add ice, stir, serve, preferably with a slice of watermelon as garnish.
Depending on the strength of your chile-vodka, this can have a great bite!
Notes:
We make our own chile vodka by simply steeping good vodka (Skyy) with a handful of hot chiles (jalapeños, birds-eye, chiltepine, or Thai) in a cool place for a few weeks. Pasco makes a chile gin by using roasted chiles.
We also make our own simple syrup with organic cane sugar (bring to boil sugar and water in a 1:1 ratio), and our own sweet-and-sour (3:2:1 fresh lime juice, fresh lemon juice, simple syrup; we often use jarred organic lime and lemon juice from our local Sunflower market).