mojitos and you.
So krizsa asked about mojitos Friday, and I thought I'd dig up my recipe for her.
Alas, I couldn't find it and my buddy who spent all of last summer perfecting it with me wasn't around. So I grabbed all the ingredients and threw together several test batches. Here's what I ended up with. Now after all the mojitos I drank yesterday, I couldn't certify the result, but I just tried it today and it's perfect. So to keep your summer going, click below.
Mojitos
Serves one.
Ingredients:
2 1/2 oz white rum [1]
15 spearmint leaves, washed
1 whole fresh lime, rolled, cut into eighths
ice, crushed or cracked
2 tbl. simple syrup [2]
8 oz club soda (I prefer Schweppes; it has bigger bubbles)
Tools:
knife
pint or highball glass
muddler [3] (use a wooden spoon if you don't have one)
Sidenote: I store my club soda and simple syrup in the fridge, and my rum in the freezer, because I'm a twit that likes his drinks proper cold.
Directions:
1. Pull the mint leaves from the stalks. Leave the tops on the sprigs for garnishes if you'd like.
2. Throw mint leaves in the pint glass with lime chunks.
3. Add simple syrup in the glass and muddle.
4. Add rum.
Note: Now here's where a lot of recipes differ. Some say add ice and then top with club soda. "Bartender's rules" state that ice is always the first thing in a glass. However, I like a completely blended drink, so I'm not drinking all rum or all club soda at one end of the glass. So I add the club soda before the ice.
5. Add club soda, and fill remainder of glass with crushed ice, give a stir, and then garnish with lime wedge and mint sprig.
6. Enjoy.
[1] Please try to use a higher end white rum. Anything but Bacardi; it's McRum, and isn't worth its price. For a dollar or two more a bottle, get something like Myers, Appleton, or Mount Gay. You'll probably be pleasantly surprised at how much better it tastes.
[2] I prefer a 2 cup to 1 cup sugar-to-water ratio, but make sure you're using at least a 3:2 ratio. Most recipes you'll see call for a 1:1 ratio. I didn't find that suitable at all as you're using the syrup for sugar's sake, not for the addition of liquid. Be sure to store it in a sealed glass bottle in the fridge if you have some left over. And don't bother buying superfine sugar when you make it, regular C&H is fine. And if you want to know how to make simple syrup, just look it up on google, or ask me. :)
[3] I passively searched for months before I found the perfect muddler. I looked in cooking stores (Kitchen Kaboodle), specialty stores (Sur La Table), industrial kitchen stores, etc. None of them had muddlers that made sense. Either they were varnished (yuck!), the handle was too small or awkward, or the business end was too big, a goofy shape, or something equally unusable. I found what I was looking for at a Tommy Bahama store of all places. It's unvarnished wood, with a nice simple handle and it's thin so it works well in a highball glass. Remember if you get a wood muddler, never put it in the dishwasher! It will crack and be ruined.
Alas, I couldn't find it and my buddy who spent all of last summer perfecting it with me wasn't around. So I grabbed all the ingredients and threw together several test batches. Here's what I ended up with. Now after all the mojitos I drank yesterday, I couldn't certify the result, but I just tried it today and it's perfect. So to keep your summer going, click below.
Mojitos
Serves one.
Ingredients:
2 1/2 oz white rum [1]
15 spearmint leaves, washed
1 whole fresh lime, rolled, cut into eighths
ice, crushed or cracked
2 tbl. simple syrup [2]
8 oz club soda (I prefer Schweppes; it has bigger bubbles)
Tools:
knife
pint or highball glass
muddler [3] (use a wooden spoon if you don't have one)
Sidenote: I store my club soda and simple syrup in the fridge, and my rum in the freezer, because I'm a twit that likes his drinks proper cold.
Directions:
1. Pull the mint leaves from the stalks. Leave the tops on the sprigs for garnishes if you'd like.
2. Throw mint leaves in the pint glass with lime chunks.
3. Add simple syrup in the glass and muddle.
4. Add rum.
Note: Now here's where a lot of recipes differ. Some say add ice and then top with club soda. "Bartender's rules" state that ice is always the first thing in a glass. However, I like a completely blended drink, so I'm not drinking all rum or all club soda at one end of the glass. So I add the club soda before the ice.
5. Add club soda, and fill remainder of glass with crushed ice, give a stir, and then garnish with lime wedge and mint sprig.
6. Enjoy.
[1] Please try to use a higher end white rum. Anything but Bacardi; it's McRum, and isn't worth its price. For a dollar or two more a bottle, get something like Myers, Appleton, or Mount Gay. You'll probably be pleasantly surprised at how much better it tastes.
[2] I prefer a 2 cup to 1 cup sugar-to-water ratio, but make sure you're using at least a 3:2 ratio. Most recipes you'll see call for a 1:1 ratio. I didn't find that suitable at all as you're using the syrup for sugar's sake, not for the addition of liquid. Be sure to store it in a sealed glass bottle in the fridge if you have some left over. And don't bother buying superfine sugar when you make it, regular C&H is fine. And if you want to know how to make simple syrup, just look it up on google, or ask me. :)
[3] I passively searched for months before I found the perfect muddler. I looked in cooking stores (Kitchen Kaboodle), specialty stores (Sur La Table), industrial kitchen stores, etc. None of them had muddlers that made sense. Either they were varnished (yuck!), the handle was too small or awkward, or the business end was too big, a goofy shape, or something equally unusable. I found what I was looking for at a Tommy Bahama store of all places. It's unvarnished wood, with a nice simple handle and it's thin so it works well in a highball glass. Remember if you get a wood muddler, never put it in the dishwasher! It will crack and be ruined.