Travel may be a little tricky these days, but you can still traverse the globe with these delicious drink recipes to try at home.
Today's cocktail hails from Paris, France – Bloody Mary.
What is it?
With its feisty vodka kick, zing of lemon and spicy Tabasco, the Bloody Mary is guaranteed to give your senses a wake-up call: its reputation as a hangover cure is legendary.
Origins
The Bloody Mary was born in 1920s Paris at Harry’s New York Bar. Barman Fernand Petiot combined Russian vodka (distilled in Paris by immigrants who had fled the Russian Revolution) with canned tomato juice, newly imported from America. The drink was christened by one of its first samplers, American musician Roy Barton, after the Chicago nightclub Bucket of Blood and its waitress, Mary.
You’ll need (serves 1)
2fl oz (60ml ) vodka
4fl oz (120ml) tomato juice
1 tbs freshly squeezed lemon juice
pinch of salt
pinch of finely ground black pepper
1 tsp Tabasco sauce (or a pinch of finely ground cayenne pepper)
3 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 large ice cube
1 celery stick, to garnish
1 lemon wedge, to garnish
Method
Step 1: Place all of the ingredients except the garnishes in a cocktail shaker or a tightly sealed screw-top jar. Shake vigorously for 10–15 seconds.
Step 2: Strain into an 8fl oz (240ml) highball glass.
Step 3: Garnish with the celery stick and lemon wedge.
Step 4: Enjoy!
Tasting notes
Sharp, piquant and refreshingly savory, a Bloody Mary is ideal at any time of year, with the spicy heat balanced by the cooling tomato juice. It is often described as “the world’s most complex cocktail” and crimes witnessed in bars around the world include the quantity of Worcestershire sauce outweighing the amount of tomato juice in the glass, and the unforgivable sin of substituting tomato juice for dry, powdered tomato soup mix. Much more successful variations involve swapping vodka for gin, adding horseradish, or garnishing with olives.
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This article was originally published in April 2020 and updated in October 2020.