"Happy Hour" news and stories

I don't think of bourbon as a summer drink ingredient. Summer drinks to me are ones that are fruity and light and crisp and maybe have an umbrella in them. I mean, they don't have to have an umbrella in them, but fruity and light are what I think of when I think of summer drinks. Bourbon is a harder potion to me, made for fall and winter nights.

But this recipe over at MarthaStewart.com for Eli's Elixir (created by Allen Katz) sounds promising, because it does have that fruit element in it (apple juice, apples) along with 2 oz of bourbon. You also use a Homemade Ginger Cordial in the recipe too.

I have no idea what makes this a "space" cocktail. It has gin, frangelico, and lemon juice, but I don't really see anything space age or astronomical or sky-oriented about it. Maybe it tastes like space? Well, if something tastes like space to you maybe you're taking something a little stronger than frangelico.

The recipe is from 1001 Cocktails, and it's pretty straightforward.

I saw a recipe in my Williams-Sonoma Entertaining Cookbook for a Blended Mojito and thought it would be a fantastic way to say "Hasta luego!" to the summer (or "Bienvenidos!" to an Indian Summer). Blended with ice, it works as a refresher. However, it's a mojito.

For as long as I could, I tried to stay away from the mojito craze that swept bars and cocktail parties across the country for the last few years. Part of the reason is that I consider myself "allergic" to anything too trendy, and if you weren't drinking a mojito, who are you? Well, you should all know by now that mojitos are soooo 2006. In fact, if you're caught drinking a mojito, you'll be ridiculed for having been living under an overturned martini glass for the last two years. With the popularity of mojitos gone, I am now starting to enjoy the drink.

Wow. Is it late August already? No matter how much we pout, the Summer is coming to a close. The days get shorter, the temperature gets cooler (in most normal parts of the country - here in LA, it still gets into the 90s), and we move our "entertaining" indoors. Right?

No! I refuse, my friends, refuse! I am a clingy girl, and I am going to hang onto the last rays of the summer sun if it burns the skin on my shoulders to a bacon-y crisp.

thebar.com makes it easy with a few cocktails, Pineapple Orange Margarita and Rangpur Madras, that will keep that summer vibe going, even if it's me standing by myself in my living room in a pair of sunglasses and a straw hat sipping on these cocktails (I am not a fan of tequila nor of gin, but look at how pretty the cocktails are!)
Recipes after the jump.

When I was a waiter at a pizza place about 20 years ago, I'd often have customers come in and order a strawberry dikery. Yeah, that's how they pronounced it. I wanted to punch them in the face, but it was usually a woman who said it and my mom raised me to be nicer than that.

Today is National Daiquiri Day, so I thought I'd take this Thursday Happy Hour post to point you to some recipes around the web. Like this one over at Recipezaar. Or maybe this one for a Lime Daiquiri at AllRecipes. And, of course, a recipe for a Strawberry Daiquiri at Vegetarian Fun. A few recipes, actually.