As it turns out, when you move into a new place it doesn’t come fully-furnished with….kitchen utensils? Why did no one tell me this shit was BYO, I’m out here eating baked beans with my hands and spreading butter across toast with the back of my phone.
To get through these dire times, I thought I may as well treat myself to a cocktail or two given the only thing I’ve stocked the pantry with is alcohol. Priorities people, moving house is stressful so a stiff drink takes the edge off.
The idea to cook up some cocktails lead me to my second problem — if I don’t own literal spoons, why would I own the fancy cocktail shakers, strainers and all that other jazz bartenders seem to fling around in my face?
No matter though, I’m a resourceful soul and I found enough makeshift items in my kitchen to at least make something that slightly resembles this:
Well I mean, a boy can dream.
Having a quick peruse of recipes and not-so-discreetly trying to find the one with as few instructions as possible, I stumbled across the following:
Margarita On The Rocks
120ml Master of Mixes Margarita Mixer
60ml tequila
Lemon wheel
Salt
Ice
Dip glass into salt, shake Margarita mixer and tequila in an ice-filled cocktail shaker, strain into ice-filled glass, garnish with a lemon wheel
I had ice! I had a glass! I had salt! I was halfway there.
After a quick scoot over to the bottle-o to fetch the rest of the ingredients (not an actual scoot though, I hear you have to wear a helmet on those scooters and I’m trying really hard to not look like a dud), I was ready to prep.
For the margarita mix, you can make it yourself with lime juice, water and sugar, but it’s about 500 times easier to just buy a Master of Mixes Margarita Mixer and avoid having to squeeze 500 limes with your forehead.
As mentioned, I didn’t have a cocktail shaker handy but I did have a saucepan at my disposal.
Look, if I had a piece of advice for people using a saucepan, I’d say to cover the little hole where steam usually comes out when you’re shaking the liquid around. Did I learn the hard way? Perhaps. Did most of the margarita spill onto the kitchen table and I had to start again while fighting back tears? Most definitely.
After chucking in the ice, Margarita Mixer and tequila the second time around, I plugged that steam hole with my thumb and gave it a vigorous shake-a-roo.
I then dipped the wine glasses (are you expecting me to have margarita-specific glasses on hand when I had to use a saucepan?) into some salt and frankly, my skills leave a lot to be desired.
After plonking a few more ice blocks into each glass, I poured the margarita recipe in and topped with some poorly chopped limes. Honestly, it could’ve looked a lot worse than it did so clicks for me.
While I’d give the presentation a respectful D+, the taste was a solid A so I’m really patting myself on the back for this one. No one’s prouder of me than me.
The final takeaway is that if I, a genetically shaky human with the bartending skills of a candle holder, can make a cocktail at home, then you definitely can.
