Firecracker Spritzer

Here we are.

Somehow.....someway.....it's July.

Have I got a fun layered 4th of July cocktail for you!

I call it, Firecracker Spritzer.

I knew I wanted to create a layered cocktail for you all for the 4th.....partly because I THINK THEY'RE SUUUPER FUN TO MAKE.  Partly because I enjoy making holiday cocktails.....and honestly partly because I haven't made a new cocktail in a while.

The Firecracker Spritzer is a very easy to make cocktail.  I promise.

The layering isn't that hard, mostly because grenadine is pretty much heavy enough to sink to the bottom of any cocktail.

Isn't it a pretty cocktail?!?!

I loooove the layered effect.

First things first.  Grenadine.

Next ice.

Followed by lemon-lime soda.

Lastly the blue layer.

See, I told you it wasn't hard!

Look how pretty it looks!!

Author: Jennifer Penas

Firecracker Spritzer

ingredients:

• 1 ounce citrus vodka
• 1/2 ounce blue curacao
• 1 1/2 ounces lemon-lime soda
• 1/2 ounce grenadine

instructions:

1. In a glass pour in the grenadine.
2. Fill the glass with ice.
3. Pour in the lemon-lime soda.
4. In a shaker, add ice, citrus vodka and blue curacao.
5. Shake and slowly strain into the glass.

Created using The Recipes Generator

There you have it!  A Firecracker Spritzer.  Such rich fun colors and layers.

I hope you all have a wonderful 4th of July!

Cheers!!

The Cocktail Lady

Red, White & Hpnotiq Blue Martini

Day 140

Red, White & Hpnotiq Blue Martini

4.5 shots out of 5

**This posts pictures have been updated & I wanted to share this amazing recipe with you all again too!**

Happy Fourth of July!  

A day to celebrate our Independence and wear, eat and drink Red, White & Blue!  

I have to say that I was excited when I found this cocktail online at the barnonedrinks website!  

I haven't had Hpnotiq is quite a few years and was excited to try it again.  

I was given a bottle by one of my husbands Best Men at our wedding and have liked it ever since.......but that was some years ago.

I gave tonight's cocktail 4.5 shots out of 5.  

This is a very yummy cocktail!  The citrus vodka blends very well with the Hpnotiq and sprite to give it a yummy citrusey flavor that goes down pretty smooth.  

This is a perfect way to celebrate the 4th surrounded by family, friends and cocktails!  

I hope you find a patriotic cocktail in color or name......or just a cocktail to celebrate our national holiday with today!

Here is a photo of the end result:

Here is a photo of the ingredients:

Here is the recipe for a Red, White & Hpnotiq Blue Martini:

Author: The Cocktail Lady

Red, White & Hpnotiq Blue Martini

ingredients:

• 2 ounces Hpnotiq
• 1 ounce citrus vodka
• 1/2 ounce lemon-lime soda
• 1/4 ounce grenadine

instructions:

1. In a shaker add ice, Hpnotic, citrus vodka and lemon-lime soda.
2. Shake it up well and strain into a martini glass.
3. Pour the grenadine down the middle of the glass and enjoy.

Created using The Recipes Generator

Cheers to you Ed!  Thank You for introducing me to Hpnotiq on our camping trip all those years ago.  I think you would have liked this cocktail.

The Cocktail Lady

Honeydew

Happy Friday!  

What a week........what......a.......week.  

Every day seems to have been insane and filled with stuff to do.  Starting Tuesday of this week my remaining 3 children that have been home, started school!  Yeay!!  Now I have 3 children in school 5 days a week (one of which is only a half day since she's in kindergarten) and our fourth child goes to preschool 2 days a week for a few hours.  

I officially have no children in the house for 5 hours and 40 minutes a week.  Yes...I counted.  
When you have 4 kids, you count those things.......trust me! 

Tonight is opening night for soccer which our oldest daughter (5yo) is SUPERDY DUPERDY excited about.  

Then she has her first official soccer game tomorrow morning.....more excitement.  Our oldest has another baseball tourney this weekend as well, which means it will be another busy weekend.

Wait did I mention that this weekend marks our first official game of the season for our SF 49ers??  

Oh, well it is!  

Plus we are playing the Cowboys......which makes it fun because good friends of ours are......gasp......Cowboy fans!  

Rivalry, smack talking, bragging rights, you know how those games go.  Go Niners!!

Anyways, onto today's cocktail!  

I saw a post today of 13 vodka shots you actually want to take.  

Sounded promising.  

I chose a couple and decided on this one today.  

I mixed it up, strained it and shooted it.  

Ah, it was OK.  

For some reason I could taste the lime juice more then I had hoped for.  I might leave the lime juice out next time and add more melon liqueur.  

Either way, it was another day where I took a shot too early.

Here is a photo of the end result:

Here is a photo of the ingredients:

Here is the recipe for a Honeydew:

• 1 ounce citrus vodka
• 1/4 ounce melon liqueur
• 1/4 ounce honey liqueur
• 1/4 ounce lime juice

In a shaker, add ice and all of the ingredients above.  Shake and strain into a shot glass.

Hope you all had a good week.  Enjoy your weekend!!  Remember (at least in this house), it's pizza and beer Friday!!

Cheers!!

The Cocktail Lady

Shot of Grinch

Hello!!  

I would have loved to have had MANY more cocktails for you since my last post......but the wintertime sickness has infected our family......once again.  

I am finally to a point to where I can taste things for real now!  

If I was to taste and blog about cocktails before today I don't think my opinion would have been valid.

Over the weekend we had a small get together with friends.  

We made some hot coffee mixed with your choice of liquor/liqueur, filled up our thermoses and headed a few cities away to walk a few blocks and check out the awesome Christmas lights!  

Each and every house was overdone (in a great way) with Christmas lights and decorations.........except for one........they call it, The Grinch House!  This house has a TON of Grinch dolls all over the place and one cage in which all of these Grinches have trapped Santa inside.  We all had a great time and the kids all LOVED it!  

I think Christmas lights are one of the few things (you know besides family, friends, and Christmas trees) during the holiday season that make me the happiest.

Anyways, we all came back and played a game I had not played before, Cards Against Humanity (thanks Marisa for bringing it).  

OMG this game was a lot of fun!  

Basically it's Apples To Apples but for adults.  

Oh the card choices are endless and some are not for young ears (good thing we put them all to bed before we started playing).  I just found out that there is like 4 expansion packs for that game too.......oh we'll be playing for quite some time!

Remembering our fun night and that Grinch house, I decided to create a shot dedicated to that house, I call it Shot of Grinch.  

It's pretty good!  

Nothing in that shot makes you squinch up your face, it actually has a pretty smooth taste and leaves a nice aftertaste in your mouth as well. 

Here is a photo of the end result:

Here is a photo of the ingredients:

Here is my recipe for a Shot of Grinch:

• 1 ounce Midori
• 1/2 ounce citrus vodka
• 1/2 teaspoon simple syrup

In a shaker, add ice and all of the ingredients above.  Shake and strain into a shot glass.

Fingers crossed that we get rid of this sickness once and for all and can enjoy the rest of the holiday season!

Cheers!!

The Cocktail Lady

Pride Shots

I woke up late today!  

Did you hear that?  

I slept in!!  

What that actually means is that I kept my kids up late enough last night that THEY all slept in......which in turn allows me to sleep in.  

It was nice being able to wake up after 7:00 in the morning.  

I then got up, made my children (those who were awake......the 14 year old seems to sleep in a lot) breakfast, myself coffee and logged onto my computer.  

Today I created a rainbow of shots (not all good I will totally admit) and called them Pride Shots.  

In my head I came up with the combinations of alcohols and liqueurs to create the colors I wanted (totally hoping they'd all taste good......kind of knowing they might not).  

Now saying that, some of these combos........weren't the best tasting flavors, but the colors, perfect!  

I did have a friend over and she started at one end and I the other and we drank half of each shot each until we hit opposite ends.  

We smiled at some and make yucky faces at the others.  

All in all it was fun!

I have not come up with individual names yet for each shot, but I think they're all part of a greater group.

Here is a photo of the end result:

Here is a photo of the ingredients:

Here's to a rainbow of shots!

The Cocktail Lady

Elf Cocktail

Day 314

Elf Cocktail

2 shots out of 5

Merry Christmas!  

WOW can't believe it's finally here.  

Where exactly has the year gone?  

I hope you are all having a wonderful holiday season, whatever your holiday that you are celebrating is.  

Are we ready for a brand new year?  I know I am!

I gave tonight's cocktail 2 shots out of 5.  


I found tonight's cocktail at the freefunchristmas website.  

I love elves and thought this might be a fun cocktail to have on Christmas.....WRONG! 

Oh well, you win some and you loose some.  

This one was too sweet (I hear those of you gasping that have been with my since this beginning of my adventure), and the flavors trick you on the first sip making you "think" that you may just almost like this cocktail, then BAM you take a second sip and you know what you knew all along, yuck!  

Here is a photo of the end result:

Here is a photo of the ingredients:

Here is the recipe for an Elf Cocktail:

• 1 oz midori
• 2 oz citrus vodka
• 1 oz white cranberry juice
• cherries for garnish

In a shaker, add ice and all of the ingredients above except for the cherries.  Shake and strain into a martini glass.  Garnish with cherries.

I hope you are all having a wonder holiday season!

Cheers!!

The Cocktail Lady

Vanilla Vixen

Day 301

Vanilla Vixen

2.5 shots out of 5

Half way through the week.  

What does that mean?  

That means that my husband only has two, yes TWO more days left of work before he's off for three whole weeks!!  

I am very excited.....actually we are all very excited to have him home, especially since the kids will be home for two of those three weeks from school.

I gave tonight's cocktail 2.5 shots out of 5.  

Vixen must be a strong reindeer, because this cocktail packs a punch.  

I would first off change the name to Citrus Vixen.....although it doesn't quite roll off the tongue like vanilla vixen.  

This cocktail is quite alcoholy, I can totally taste the citrus vodka and if I think real hard, squint my eyes and tilt my head to the left, I can taste the Midori too.  

The vanilla vixen was worth a shot....plus it's been a while since I've made a green cocktail.  

I found tonight's recipe here.  (I've recieved a request for another White Christmas from my husband.....and after tonight's cocktail, I'm going to make one for myself as well!)

Here is a photo of the end result:

Here is a photo of the ingredients:

Here is the recipe for a Vanilla Vixen:

• 1 oz vanilla vodka
• 2 oz citrus vodka
• 1 oz Midori
• 1/2 oz lime juice

In a shaker, add ice and all of the ingredients above.  Shake and strain into a cocktail glass filled with ice.

Here's to day 301!  Wait.........I've tried Three Hundred and One different cocktails?!?!  Holy Moley!!

Cheers!!

The Cocktail Lady

Roq Candy Martini

Day 187

Roq Candy Martini

4.5 shots out of 5

Happy Monday!  

This is our last week before school is back in session!  

The boys start on Monday and our oldest girl will be starting tiny tots very soon after.  

These kids are getting too big.  

This Friday my second oldest will be turning 8, it's crazy to think that many years have gone by since he's been born and even crazier to think we had 2 more kids after him!  

Wow, just thinking of that lets me know that tonight's cocktail is very, very needed!

I gave tonight's cocktail 4.5 shots out of 5.  

I got this recipe from the Hpnotiq website.  

This is a pretty darn good cocktail!  

I enjoy Hpnotiq and the citrus flavored vodka mixed with it is a nice surprise.  

The citrus flavor was a little shocking at first, I have to admit, but by sip 3 it was working very well in this cocktail.  

The Roq Candy Martini is nice way to end a Monday.

Here is a photo of the end result:

Here is a photo of the ingredients:

Here is the recipe for a Roq Candy Martini:

• 2 oz Hpnotiq
• 1 oz citrus vodka
• 1/4 oz white grape juice

In a shaker add ice and all of the ingredients above.  Shake and strain into a martini glass and enjoy!!

Here's to Hpnotiq!  I really enjoy its flavoring and tonight's cocktail!

Cheers!!

The Cocktail Lady