PERFECT SERVE

SERVE PERFECT

MARGARITA: 35 ml Tequila 20 ml Cointreau or Triple Sec or orange liqueur 15ml fresh lime juice

Pour all ingredients into shaker with ice. Shake well and strain into a cocktail glass rimmed with salt.

VARIATIONS: The orange liqueur is central to a good margarita, adding its sweetness to counter the spirit of the Tequila and the tang of the lime juice. Generally either Triple Sec or Cointreau are used but Grand Marnier is also an option. Blackberry-flavoured liqueur is another alternative. Frozen margaritas are essentially a melted alcoholic granita! The ingredients can either be poured over crushed ice or whizzed up in a blender with a few ice blocks.

MARGARITAVILLE ...

IF THERE’S A SPIKE IN TEQUILA SALES WORLDWIDE IN FEBRUARY, IT’S BECAUSE THE 22ND IS INTERNATIONAL MARGARITA DAY ... AND IT’S A SATURDAY!

The margarita has been America’s favourite cocktail for decades. Some experts believe the reason for this is that the ostensibly simple cocktail hits a trifecta of flavour combinations. Cocktails are frequently sweet – too sweet for some – but then you get those which are both sweet and sour. Introducing the tangy note to a mixed drink balances the sweetness. What the margarita does is take the cocktail into a different dimension by adding a salty element which in turn keeps the consumer coming back for another sip ... and another ...

Whether that’s by design or accident is anyone’s guess. In fact, the origins of the margarita are somewhat opaque with no-one being able to say with any great certainty that it was developed by one person on a specific date. There are many theories ...

For anyone who doesn’t know what a margarita is, Wikipedia defines it as follows: “A margarita is a cocktail consisting of tequila, orange liqueur and lime juice often served with salt on the rim of the glass. The drink is served shaken with ice (on the rocks), blended with ice (frozen margarita), or without ice (straight up). Although it has become acceptable to serve a margarita in a wide variety of glass types, ranging from cocktail and wine glasses to pint glasses and even large glasses, the drink is traditionally served in the eponymous margarita glass, a stepped-diameter variant of a cocktail glass or Champagne coupe.

Cocktail historian David Wondrich, author of Imbibe!, wrote that the margarita is the same drink as the daisy, a cocktail

popular during Prohibition – but with Tequila substituted for brandy. (Margarita is also Spanish for “daisy”.)

As Wikipedia states: “There is an account from 1936 of Iowa newspaper editor James Graham finding such a cocktail in Tijuana, years before any of the other margarita creation myths.”

So what’s the mystery about the drink’s origins?

The origins of the margarita are somewhat opaque with no-one being able to say with any great certainty that it was developed by one person on a specific date. There are many theories ...

In the 1937 Cafe Royal Cocktail Book, there is a drink detailed which has the same ingredients in the same proportions as the margarita – but it appears under the title of The Picador. The most popular story of its origin is linked to Carlos “Danny” Herrera who claimed to have invented it at his Rancho La Gloria restaurant in 1938. The tale is told that a patron – Marjorie King, a Ziegfield dancer – claimed to be allergic to many spirits but not Tequila. Yet she didn’t want to drink the Tequila neat – so he added some orange liqueur and freshly squeezed lime juice. Hey presto! The margarita.

Others who claimed to have mixed up the first of America’s favourite cocktails include Francisco “Pancho” Morales, allegedly at Tommy’s Place bar in Juarez, Mexico, in July 1942. And then there was the Dallas socialite Margarita Sames who claimed to have concocted the drink for guests at her Acapulco holiday home in 1948. Hotelier Tommy Hilton was apparently in attendance and “liberated” the idea for his Hilton hotels. But this was disputed because Tequila brand José Cuervo ran an ad campaign for their spirit in 1945 – and used the tagline, “Margarita: It’s more than a girl’s name.”

Ultimately, the best guess is that the margarita evolved from the popular daisy drinks from the 1930s which were a mix of alcohol, citrus juice and grenadine served over shaved ice. There were whiskey daisies, brandy daisies and gin daises – so it’s not too much of a stretch of the imagination to believe that there must have been a Tequila daisy at some point. Also not too hard to appreciate that the Spanish title for this Mexican-styled daisy drink would be margarita. Vinepair.com reports that it’s the most popular cocktail in America with something like 18% of all mixed drink sales being margaritas. They have also spawned a host of flavour variants too – from strawberry and raspberry to pineapple, mango, cucumber and mint and even green tea or pomegranate.

But always with the mandatory salted rim, of course.

IN THE PINK PINK IS THE COLOUR OF CANDYFLOSS, MARSHMALLOWS, CHUBBY LITTLE BABY FEET AND OFTEN STEREOTYPICALLY ASSOCIATED WITH GIRLS. AND IN FEBRUARY, WITH VALENTINE’S DAY BEING RUTHLESSLY MARKETED EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK AND SHOP, IT’S THE COLOUR OF ROMANCE.

Useless and archaic information can be utterly fascinating – if you have a curious mind, that is. There are many expressions we use daily that have interesting origins. Like minding your p’s and q’s which is a way of telling someone to mind their manners or the way they behave. And that came from the days when people in pubs in the United Kingdom would drink on the honour system, not paying after each drink as we generally do nowadays. They’d have to keep track of how many pints and quarts of beer consumed – or p’s and q’s for short ...

So what about being “in the pink”? (Not to be confused as something on a spectrum between being in the black or in the red... which many folks are after the recent festive season’s indulgence!)

Well, the website grammarist.com has an interesting take. Being “in the pink” is an English expression which means to be in good health – at the peak of form and in great condition. It apparently dates back to the 1500s when pink referred to a particular flower, the dianthus, rather than the colour pink. In fact, pink was only attached to the colour we associate the word with at the end of the 1700s and early 1800s!

Pinks, the flowers, were thought to be the absolute epitome of great floral design at the time – and consequently, the word or expression was taken to mean the height of excellence, the best it could be.

But pink – the colour – and Valentine’s Day have become inextricably linked and this commercial event celebrates it from hearts and flowers to chocolates and fancy drinks. If you’d like to impress the love of your life with your cocktail skills here are a few suggestions of fun pink drinks. And if you make them using Beefeater’s Pink Gin, you’re already half way to a winning recipe!

STRAWBERRIES AND COCONUT CREAM

35 ml Beefeater Pink Gin 2 scoops of coconut ice cream 45 ml coconut water 35 ml strawberry puree Top with rosé bubbly

TO ASSEMBLE: Add strawberry puree to a highball glass. Blend Beefeater Pink, coconut ice cream, coconut water until just smooth. Pour into the glass over the puree. Top with bubbly.

Take it to the next level by garnishing with dried coconut flakes and/or dehydrated strawberries.

Since February in South Africa is likely to be hot, the Pink Refresher might be an option. It’s a low calorie take on a Collins.

PINK REFRESHER

35 ml Beefeater Pink Gin 25 ml pomegranate juice

20 ml honey syrup (mix honey and water in the ratio 1:1) 15 ml fresh lime juice Topped with sparkling water

TO ASSEMBLE: Add Beefeater Pink, pomegranate juice, honey syrup and fresh lime to a cocktail shaker. Shake and strain into a high ball glass. Add ice and top with sparkling water. If you’d like to garnish it, add a twist of lime zest and a few pomegranate seeds.