Two At The Most » Tequila

Tequila Por Mi Amante

Stevi — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 01:00:09 +0000

Tequila por mi amante¹ is a wonderful combination of tequila and ripe strawberries.

There Will Be Deliciousness

This is my second year making tequila por mi amante, and this year’s result was far superior to last. I pretty slavishly followed Chuck Taggart’s recipe.

Tequila por mi amante

750 ml resposado tequila (Sauza Hornitos)
3 pints fresh ripe strawberries, hulled and quartered (my store sells ‘em by the pound, I used two)

Place tequila and strawberries in a sufficiently large container and put in fridge for three weeks, agitating whenever you think of it.

Now the fun part. Strain tequila and then wrap the berries in cheesecloth. Squeeze every last bit of tequila strawberry goodness out of those suckers that you can into the rest of th. Rest. Squeeze them some more. Strain the result as many times as you care to and either return to your freshly washed soaking jar or another slightly smaller one. Let rest for at least three more weeks.

You may want to strain once again. And then enjoy.

Tequila Por Mi Amante

This year’s product was a little less sweet than I’d hoped. That’s easily remedied by combining it with the single best flavor to come with tequila – creme de casis. I like to pour two to three ounces tequila por mi amante over ice into a rocks glass, float a teaspoon or so of creme de cassis, and sip happily.

I also have to join in the chorus praising the Paloma por mi Amante. The Paloma is one of my favorite tequila drinks, and with the strawberry flavor it’s that much better. Currently I’m making it using a new soda brand called Oogave, which uses agave syrup for sweetener. Their grapefruit flavor works fantastic in a Paloma.

Tequila por mi amante is very easy to make, and a great way to make the delicious flavor of ripe strawberries last. I can’t see a beautiful basket of berries without thinking about making some more.

What other fruit should I try infusing in tequila?

[1] I am told by real speakers of Spanish this should be Tequila para mi amante. Blame Charles H. Baker, Jr.

Tequila Ocho Plata and the Agavoni

Stevi — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 02:47:37 +0000

The makers of Tequlia Ocho are convinced the concept of terroir can apply to agave as much as grapes. So they are making three single estate tequilas, a silver, resposado, and añejo, to prove their point. I was lucky enough to receive a sample bottle of their 2008 Plata to give a try.

Naturally, as I have no other vintage to compare it to, I cannot speak to the importance of the labeled year. What I can say is this is an excellent silver tequila. Made from 100 percent agave, all the piñas were harvested from a single estate, in this case the Carriza. It is located at 1,978 meters (6,490 feet) above sea level. As a highland tequila, one should expect more fruit tastes, and Ocho Plata delivers.

Agavoni

On the nose, there is a clean agave sweetness. Tasting it, the dominant flavors include a sharp citrus and the peppery notes I associate with quality plata tequilas. Another flavor I find is a mild note of almond. This is the sort of tequila that I might even want to sip over the rocks from time to time.

This makes a great margarita, and I especially enjoyed it in my Sonora Sour. Unlike a more mild tequila like Inocente, the Ocho Plata creates a rich, tequila-forward margarita that shows how this spirit can be truly enjoyed for what it is instead of covered up by sour mixes.

Wanting to expand my tequila repetoire, I hit my cocktail books for additional ideas. In The Essential Bartender’s Guide I found the Agavoni. This variation on the Negroni replaces the gin with silver tequila and two dashes of orange bitters. It was created by Bastian Heuser for Mixology Magazine.

Agavoni

0.75 oz silver tequila (Tequila Ocho Plata)
0.75 oz Campari
0.75 oz sweet vermouth
2 dashes orange bitters (Angostura orange)

Build in rocks glass over ice. Stir to mix well. Sip on a sultry evening.

I was truly surprised how much I liked this take on the Negroni. The sweet robustness of the Tequila Ocho Plata makes an excellent pairing with the Campari and sweet vermouth. This is definitely being added to my list of favorite ways to enjoy tequila.

I’m really happy to have a bottle of Tequila Ocho Plata in my cabinet, especially since they only made 11,088 bottles in 2008 (my bottle is number 5045). I’m interested enough that I will probably make the effort to find a bottle of the 2009 vintage when it is available so I can see how it compares.

The Sonora Sour

Stevi — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 05:48:33 +0000

When I was young, we lived on the outskirts of Tucson, Arizona, surrounded by the beautiful Sonora desert. We kids would pick the fruit of the prickly pear cactus, braving the tiny spines that lodged in our fingers to peel and eat the fruit. My mother would make prickly pear jelly, although one year in our eagerness, we kept fussing with the jars, which never set, and we had pancakes with prickly pear syrup instead.

Prickly Pear Fruit

When I recently saw prickly pear fruit in the grocery store here in the Seattle area, I couldn’t resist. I knew there was no way that these supermarket specimens could be as ripe and delicious as the fruit I picked off the cactus in the backyard.

What they were was full of sneaky little barbs that found the tenderest part of my fingers despite my care in handling them. Be sure to keep your tweezers around when you use these fruit.¹

The first thing I did with the fruit was peel off the tough outer skin and last few straggling spines. The inside fruit was a beautiful deep red. The outermost layer was a bit soft, but the middle was firm and even a bit crisp. The flavor of the fruit is a bit like a rich, spicy concentrated watermelon.

Being a desert fruit, the natural liquor to start with was tequila. I chose to muddle the fruit with a little agave syrup. Then I added some lime juice and orange liqueur to balance the flavors.

Sonora Sour

Sonora Sour

1.5 oz blanco tequila (Tequila Ocho)
0.75 oz orange liqueur (Citronge)
0.5 oz lime juice
1/2 large prickly pear fruit, quartered
1 tsp agave syrup

Muddle prickly pear fruit in agave syrup in shaking tin. Add rest of ingredients and ice. Shake until good and cold. Double strain into cocktail glass. Garnish with slice of prickly pear fruit.

To be honest, the result is a flavored margarita. But the prickly pear brings an unexpected, new flavor that I really enjoyed. I gave Bryan a taste, and his immediate was response was this drink is something he’d be happy to order in a bar.

I did have to pick out a couple of stickers from my fingers in the process, but it was definitely worth the effort. A little taste of my childhood in a great tasting drink. What’s not to love?

[1] It’s still safer than running full tilt into a cholla cactus. Don’t do that. Trust me.

MxMo XXXV: Broaden Your Horizons — The Paquimé Cocktail

Stevi — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 04:46:01 +0000

Lo and behold, it’s another Mixology Monday! This 35th incarnation is being hosted by The Scribe at A Mixed Dram, and he bids us: Broaden Your Horizons. Try a new base spirit, a new technique, anything, just as long as it’s something new for you.

The Scribe is apparently precognitive, because the base spirit he gave as an example, tequila, is one that’s fairly foreign to me. Just last week I put up my first post that included tequila. In that post, I included a drink that was new to me, the Witch’s Kiss, but not an invention of my own. Because I’ve never tried to create a tequila cocktail.

Well, that’s not exactly true. I did once create a cocktail that included tequila. After trying the Piscadora, and reading that tequila went well with creme de cassis, I tried mixing tequila, lime juice, crème de cassis, and ginger beer. It was fantastic! I was so excited to share this new drink.

Luckily, I did a little research before posting about it, and turns out, I’d gone full circle. The Piscadora was probably inspired by the Diablo, a well-known drink.

Since then, I haven’t had the heart or incentive to experiment with tequila. Thanks to MxMo, now I do!

Paquimé Cocktail

At first, I thought I might try to work on what I knew went well with tequila. If orange liqueur mixed well for a margarita, maybe apricot liqueur would also work. I tried both Orchard Apricot and Marie Brizard’s Apry, and both were total duds. The apricot flavor and the tequila just didn’t blend well, and in fact turned rather unpleasant in my mouth.

I had promised myself I would not resort to crème de cassis, but I wanted something with a strong flavor to take on the tequila. That’s when I thought I might try Cherry Heering. Heering can quickly dominate a drink, but in small quantities, brings a lot of rich flavor. To add some depth, I added some Licor 43 (Quarenta y Tres). To make it a little drier and less potent, I added some dry vermouth. And finally added some Angostura orange bitters to add more balance and some brightness on the nose. I was very satisfied with the result.

Paquimé Cocktail

1.5 oz platinum tequila (Inocente)
0.5 oz Licor 43
0.5 oz dry vermouth
0.25 oz Cherry Heering
2 dashes Angostura orange bitters

Stir over ice and strain into cocktail glass. Garnish with brandied cherries.

The tequila is still present in this cocktail, but the Cherry Heering and Licor 43 bring a nice roundness and softness to it, which the vermouth keeps it from being too sweet.

As for the name, Paquimé is an archaeological zone in Chihuahua, Mexico. It’s also the name of a cooperative that is picking cherries that are being grown in Chihuahua. So in honor of them, I name the drink.

A big thanks to the Scribe for suggesting that we broaden our horizons. It’s always fun to be encourage to expand my repetoir, and this experiment taught me a lot about how to match flavors. Be sure to check out A Mixed Dram for the round-up post!

Inocente Platinum Tequila

Stevi — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 03:48:24 +0000

While to date I haven’t developed a real taste for tequila, I didn’t realize until now that I’ve never featured the spirit here at Two at the Most. Now that I have received a bottle of Inocente Platinum Tequila for review, I can remedy that situation.

Inocente is made from 100% plantation grown blue Weber agave. The agave piñas are baked in dry masonry kilns before being macerated and fermented in stainless steel tanks and then triple distilled. This is followed by micro-oxygenation, a process purported to remove additional impurities. The resulting platinum tequila is then poured into hand-blown and twisted bottles made from recyled glass.¹ I do have to note the corked stopper didn’t seem to quite seal my bottle, resulting in a slight amount of leakage during shipping.

On the nose, this has a fairly clean, tequila scent. In the glass, the most dominant flavor is pepper, with a thin body. I added some ice, but found it to be rather unpleasantly hot for sipping. This isn’t necessarily a mark against Inocente, since blanco/silver tequilas are usually used for mixing.

Next I made my standard margarita recipe, using a 3:2:1 tequila:orange liqueur:lime juice ratio.

Margarita

1.5 ounce blanco tequila (Inocente)
1 oz triple sec (Citronge)
0.5 oz lime juice

Shake and strain into cocktail glass.

The Inocente made an excellent margarita. It had enough body to stand up to the relatively sweet recipe I prefer. This is one of the best homemade margaritas I can remember making. Here the peppery notes blend well with the orange and lime, making for a very drinkable experience.

I’m never happy just making the standard drink for a spirit. The Jan/Feb. 2009 issue of Imbibe Magazine included a recipe from Jim Meehan of PDT that called for platinum tequila and Strega, which seemed like a great next choice.

Witch's Kiss

Witch’s Kiss

2 oz platino tequlia (Inocente)
0.75 oz lemon juice
0.5 oz Strega
1 barspoon apple butter

Shake well and strain into cocktail glass. Garnish with lemon twist.

I didn’t have any apple butter on hand, so I initially used 1 barspoon agave syrup in its place. The resulting drink was just a touch too sour for my taste, so I added a second barspoon of syrup, and achieved a nice balance. The Inocente is dominant in the drink. I can imagine the concentrated taste of the apple butter would have added an additional layer of flavor, one that would likely compliment the highly peppery taste. Next time I might up the Strega to increase its contribution to the drink.

Inocente is still in very limited distribution, mostly just in New York at this time.

Overall, I quite enjoy Inocente platinum tequila, especially in a margarita. It’s more spicy on the tongue than other 100% agave silver tequilas I’ve tried recently, but overall has a fresh, clean taste.

Do you like sipping blanco tequilas? What’s your favorite tequila-based drink?

[1] And the labels are all removable, so you can reuse the bottle at home once the tequila is done.