Spice up spring cocktails
How do you know the spirits world is against you? Well, Cinco de Mayo, the Kentucky Derby and Mother's Day this year all fell on one week, right in between my biweekly Zest column. Each event is steeped in both tradition and cocktails, but a week later or earlier and one can seem hopelessly out of touch. No matter, because with tradition out of the way, we can throw traditional cocktails to the wayside — figuratively speaking, of course.
Spring is the best season for most fresh fruits and fresh chiles. Technically speaking, chiles are really fruits, but I dare you to put whipped cream on a habanero. In fact, I double dare you. But if mango salsa or even tomato salsa don't demonstrate that both nontraditional fruits and regular fruits go well together — at least outside of the dessert context — than I don't know what does.
So, it's in that nontraditional spicy spirit that I offer up three spiced-up fruit cocktails for spring, none of which are a margarita, mint julep or bloody Mary. And all are, of course, localized for your consumption.
Jeff Burkhart is the author of “Twenty Years Behind Bars:
The Spirited Adventures of a Real Bartender, Vol. I and II,” the host of the Barfly Podcast on iTunes and an award-winning bartender at a local restaurant. Follow him at jeffburkhart.net and contact him at jeffbarflyIJ@outlook.com