December 4, 2015 Advent with SusieJ

Margarita

Sometime in the previous century, my husband, Jorj, and I vacationed in Santa Fe and Taos, New Mexico. Our first evening, we had margaritas on the roof of the hotel, then had dinner in the hotel restaurant, ordering the guacamole prepared tableside. Now, guacamole prepared at the table was a very touristy thing, but we quickly learned how easy it is to make guacamole: halve, pit, and scoop one or more ripe avocados into a bowl. Per avocado, add: one small glove garlic, crushed; juice of half a lime; pinch or two of salt; a tablespoon or two of minced green onion or sweet onion; chopped tomatoes; cumin; chopped fresh cilantro. Add or omit what you want (except the avocado). Mix quickly after adding each ingredient; by the end the guacamole will be mostly smooth.

Up until this point, I had made guacamole from a recipe (in an otherwise excellent cookbook) that called for cream cheese. No, really. Cream cheese. And you used a food processor. Until that trip to Santa Fe, I thought guacamole was hard.

Until receiving a copy of The Drunken Botanist, I thought margaritas were hard, too. After all, they required a mix, did they not? Margaritas are as easy as guacamole, and with less chopping:

Salt the rim of a cocktail glass: wet the rim with a finger dipped in water or lime juice. Gently press the damp rim onto a saucer or small plate of kosher salt.

Shake over ice:

  • 1 1/2 oz tequila
  • 1/2 oz Cointreau
  • 1/2 oz fresh lime juice
  • squirt of agave nectar or simple syrup

[Margarita in a cocktail glass, copyright 2015 Jorj Bauer, all rights reserved]