Cocktail cabinet essentials
Not every spicy drink needs to be made to a recipe. All it needs is to add a bit of this, a bit of that, and you are on your way. It's great fun to experiment and come up with your own cocktails and drinks (especially with Chillies). There are some essentials that you will need to keep in your cocktail cabinet to do this.
Chilli salts and sugars
Use these to dust the rims of glasses for making Margarita and Martini type drinks. Chilli salt is excellent for making Tequilla shots with lemons. Chilli salts and sugars are easily made by simply adding Chilli powder or flakes to sugar or salt and mixing well
Hot sauce.
Hot sauce is a staple for your cocktail cabinet. Use it to spice up your Bloody Marys, Bloody Marias (bloody Mary made with tequila), Micheladas ( Spicy Mexican beers) and margaritas. It is good to have a selection of hot sauces with different heat intensities, e.g. Tabasco, Habanero and Piri-Piri sauce
Pickled Jalapenos
Pickled Jalapenos are great to have on hand to add to most drinks with Chillies. Also, using the pickling juice is fantastic to add to Bloody Mary and Maria type drinks.
Chilli Flakes
Use Chilli flakes to dust lemons and limes for drinking Micheladas and Tequilla shots.
Chilli Infused Vodka
Make your own Chilli infused Vodka and keep it in the refrigerator. Use it as a base for making drinks like Vodka Ginger cocktails and Bloody Marys
A shaker
Use this to muddle fresh Chillies with other ingredients. Examples of drinks where Chillies are muddled are Burning Mandarin Martinis and Hot in Rios
Finally
Great fresh Chillies to have on hand for making spicy drinks include Jalapenos, Cayennes, Serranos, Aji Amarillos, Habaneros and Scotch bonnets An excellent example of a drink made with Habaneros is the Habanero blood orange margarita
Cheers