Freshen Up

courtesy of the bloodyblogger

A friend recently left town and the night before her afternoon going away party I inquired as to what I could bring to the party. After some contemplation she said she wanted 'a good Bloody Mary' before leaving New Orleans. She scoffed when I mentioned that I knew a great mix. So it was on. A challenge to make a tasty from scratch Bloody Mary.

So I did a little research...

The Bloody Mary's true roots seem to be all hearsay at this point. Even the name's origins are muddled. I had thought the Bloody Mary was a New Orleans cocktail. This is not the case. New Orleans played no part in the development of the drink but the Bloody Mary plays right into New Orleans drinking culture and is a hair-of-the-dog staple at any Jazz Brunch.

Further research also showed that a lot of these 'over the counter' mixes not only contain a lot of sodium & preservatives but high fructose corn syrup as well. Zing Zang seemed to be the most 'natural' and it probably is my favorite mix after finding that Whiskey Willies uses high fructose corn syrup. Zing Zang however has 25% of the recommended daily allowance of sodium in just one cocktail.

Anyways I go to the market and picked up fresh veggies for my base. Which I made up of carrot, celery, tomato, garlic, lemon, and lime in the JuiceMaster (retro hand-me-down edition). You could really add any veggie to it, but I wanted to keep the color red. Then I added a little low-sodium V8 to thicken it just a bit. Then I just mixed the individual cocktails from there. Mine include a handful of ice dusted with cayenne pepper, 3-5 jiggers of vodka, a shot of Guinness (same concept as worcestershire but a bit more velvety & it's more booze), fill the rest with the base, crack some salt-n-pepper and Pirates's Bite spice blend, drop in a celery stalk and skewer up a big salad (the more pickled treats the better ie: olives, pepperoncinis, pickled green beans, pickled cocktail onions, pickled caper berries, pickled garlic, pickled okra, pickles). Anyways the fresh Blood Mary's were a hit and I think I completed the task well.

Truth is: the perfect Bloody Mary is probably as hard to find as its true history. But this quest raised the bar for me.

Cheers!