Five Awful Cocktails to Make As You Run Out of Everything While the Goddam World Burns Down
Quarantine is tough on everybody but it’s especially tough on those of us who like a nice solid martini at the end of the day. By now, we drinkers are running out of the essentials. Our bar has dried up to just a handful of odd mixers, weird spirits, and strange liqueurs. And not just our bar–we’re reaching the bottom of our freezers and the far dark recesses of our kitchen cabinets. How’s a guy supposed to mix a drink amid such devastation?
Fear not. Here are five recipes–tested in my own kitchen–you can make with whatever you have on hand. Check them out.
A Dirty Smartini
Ingredients:
- An old jar of olives with barely a teaspoon of brine left in the jar and one of the olives looks weird
- An airport sized bottle of Tito’s vodka
- Half a bottle of smart water you found behind some ancient take-out on the bottom shelf.
- Dry vermouth
Method:
Rinse out the olive jar with the smart water. Pour in two jiggers of Jennifer Anniston’s favorite shill, put the lid on, shake it like you mean it.
Add ice to your shaker, add the olive flavored smart water, add a dash of the vermouth. Cap. Shake until ice crystals form on the outside of the metal container and your fingers are frozen to the steel. Strain into a chilled glass, garnish with that weird-ass olive.
Slow Death in Tokyo
Ingredients:
- 1/2 oz Sloe gin you dug out from the bottom shelf where you keep the pans
- 2 oz Old saki you were gonna use one time because “dude, I can totally cook sushi”
- Dash Reduced Sodium soy sauce from a packet you dug out of the junk drawer
- Garnish with Ramen noodles
Method:
Pour liquids over ice and stir until frigid. Strain into a rocks glass over ice. Garnish with the broken corner of the dried noodle block.
Matt Damon
Ingredients:
- 1/2 oz Apple cider vinegar from under the sink
- 3 oz Tillamore Dew from that green and white jug you inherited from your grandpa
- 1 Potato chip
Method:
Pour liquid ingredients into a shaker over ice. Stir gently until cold. Strain into a Red Cup. Float potato chip for the garnish. Toss it back and yell “How do you like them apples!?” Explain to everyone that the potato chip is because of The Martian. Realize you’re home alone. Choke a little.
Ice Fishing in Canada
Ingredients:
- Probably maple syrup
- 2 oz Cutty Sark
- Can of Moosehead from college
- 2 Swedish fish
Method:
Fill a Nick and Nora with ice and Moosehead. Set aside to chill. Combine Cutty Sark and a dash of what you truly believe is maple syrup in a shaker with ice. Shake until well chilled. Drink the Moosehead. Pour the whiskey into the glass. Drop in the Swedish fish because Swedish fish are made in Goddam Canada.
Clam Chowdah
Ingredients:
- Can clam chowder soup, room temp
- That bottle of grappa with the twig in it you’ve been meaning to open
- Shame to garnish
Method:
Open the soup. Eat part of it to make room. Pour in the grappa. Stir. Look at it. Look out your kitchen window into the empty streets. When will it end? Nobody knows. Gather your resolve. Slam the chowder like a Goddam savage. Throw the can mercilessly into the trash. Drink a quart of water. Try to forget.
You’ll never forget.
