It's Cocktails Time, Folks!

It's nearly 5 pm... Time for a selection of TGIF cocktails. Get creative with vodka, gin and tequila.

You don't have to be a seasoned bartender to pull off a flamboyant cocktail hour for friends and family.

A Sunday Kind of Love

Serves: 1

Ingredients

• 50 ml gin
• 20 ml jackfruit crush, available online (or substitute with guava or mango cordial)
• 10 ml lime juice
• Coconut water soda, to top up (please see the note below)
• Highball glass
• Long block of ice or ice cubes
• Pink candy floss, optional, available online

Method

• Pour the jackfruit cordial, lime juice, gin into the highball glass. 
  Add a long block of ice or ice cubes.
  Give it a light stir.
  Top it up with coconut water soda.
  Garnish with some pink candy floss and serve.

Editor's Note: For the coconut water soda, blend till smooth the tender malai and water of 1 fresh coconut in a mixer/blender along with 1 to 2 tbsp sugar and few ice cubes. Transfer into a bowl. Mix in 1 cup soda water. Add more soda if needed.

Picante el Mango

Serves: 2

Ingredients

• 45 ml tequila
• 45 ml mango salsa mix (please see the recipe below)
• 20 ml lime juice
• 15 ml agave syrup, available online
• 1 cucumber, peeled, chopped into tiny cubes
• 6 pickled whole jalapenos (jalapenos are very spicy, reduce per taste)
• Cocktail shaker
• Ice
• 2 old-fashioned glasses
• Pinch salt for the rim of the glass
• Slice of mango, to garnish

Mango salsa mix

• Handful fresh green dhania or coriander or cilantro leaves, washed and cleaned
• Handful fresh pudina or mint leaves, washed and cleaned
• 60 ml fresh neebu or lime juice
• 1 tsp red chilly powder
• 250 ml mango juice, canned or fresh

Method

For the mango salsa mix

• Blend all the ingredients together in a blender or mixer and strain.
  Keep aside. 

For the cocktail

• Add the mango salsa paste and all the cocktail ingredients, except the cucumbers and the jalapenos, into a shaker.
  Add some ice and shake well. 
  Strain into 2 old-fashioned glasses full of ice and rimmed with the salt.
  Garnish with a slice of fresh mango and serve.

Filter Coffee Martini

Serves: 1

Ingredients

• 45 ml vodka
• 15 ml coffee liqueur
• 30 ml filter coffee reduction
• 10 ml vanilla syrup
• Pinch salt
• Cocktail shaker
• Ice
• Martini glass or coupe glass (like a martini glass, with a wider bowl)
• Coffee beans

Method

• Add all the ingredients into a cocktail shaker.
  Add some ice and shake well to combine.
  Pour into a chilled martini or coupe glass.
  Garnish with coffee beans and serve.

Recipes courtesy: Grey Goose, Bombay Sapphire and Patron. 

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