Ten Best Drinks for Spring | How to Drink

well the weather is turning irises and tulips are punching through the dirt there's buds on trees birds are singing snow is gone daylight savings time has completely disrupted my life and that's how i know it must be spring so today nothing but drinks as i share my favorite cocktails for spring with you so what makes a good cocktail for spring you know i find that kind of tough to define but also i bet you know what i mean right maybe it's one of those things where it's easier to start by defining what it isn't rather than what it is so i don't think a spring drink is hot or terrifically spirit forward and i don't think it's tiki i think a drink of spring would feature fresh ingredients bright flavors and be easy to drink pleasant refreshing without commanding attention or contemplation by the way this episode is going to feature a large number of drinks and a variety of bottles and so it feels like the perfect place to really officially announce a pretty huge partnership that i am super proud of with curiata if you're really plugged into the world of hdd you may already be clued into this so sorry if you've heard this one before but i'm working with curiata to help you get the bottles i use on the show which is something i get asked about a lot online curiata is brand new they just launched and basically it's a site where you can order liquors online and have them shipped directly to your home right now you can check out the how to drink collection and buy the bottles i use on the show at drink.curiata.com but we're working together on a lot more than that like pages dedicated to specific episodes so you can easily find everything i'm using right now in this episode that you are watching at this moment with a single click and those links will always be in the video description and the pinned comment below so if you need a bottle of sus or maraschino or rey and nephew to make something you saw on the show and it's not at your local liquor store well it's on curiata and they ship straight to you and orders shipped fast generally next day sounds awesome right because it is of course there is actually a catch so one curiata is available in most u.s states in case you're unaware selling spirits direct to consumers online is an extremely complex thing to navigate in the u.s and that is why no one has 100 figured it out yet the curiata is available in most u.s states seriously if you think there's no possible way they're shipping to you you should check it out because the odds are that they are and the number of states that carry out can ship to is expanding all the time second shipping is not free i know you hate that everyone hates that but i've got two solutions for it for you first at any given time on curiata select bottles will include free shipping and if you happen to be buying one of those or decide to include one in your order or your whole order will ship free go to the website and see what's shipping free right now second though if your order is over 199.99 you can use code how to drink at checkout and get free shipping it'll work 100 of the time every time so if you want to make any of these drinks you want to stock up your bar for the summer check out drink.curiata.com or use the link in the pinned comment below okay let's get on with some drinks right i think probably the first thing that comes to mind when i shout the drinks of spring into the void that exists behind my eyes is an april spritz and i'm probably pronouncing april incorrectly all of europe right now is sniggering it fits the bill perfectly right it's effervescent it's refreshing it's carefree and thoughtless it's not rocket fuel i'm feeling a bit parched so why don't i make one of these right away before i get into the rest of this episode i don't actually think i've ever made an epperol spritz on the show either so first appearance for the april spritz april spritz april is it april aperol apparel april maybe many of the letters are silent it's just like april april uh these are commonly built in a balloon glass or maybe a snifter if you like something with a shorter stem this suits me fine crack some ice into your glass two ounces of april april i'm gonna pronounce this different every single time [Music] i always fire the obs open this thing uh downrange at the edge most people at this point just top it up with prosecco um ratio wise it should be three ounces i mean i am using should be in a in a very light way um and you could eyeball three ounces or just know where three ounces are i am gonna measure i'm just gonna measure it somewhat pedantically okay and then a lot of people at this point they like to add uh believe it or not two ounces of like club soda or seltzer this is made in my i drink mate very bubbly so that's the thing it's a spritz you know it's not a drink of very powerful strong flavors it's pretty it's pretty light and and yes most people are going to not measure i tend to measure things on the show because you know it's an informational show ostensibly um and garnish usually with an orange wedge or two i do not eat enough oranges i [ __ ] love these a little bit too much peel there and then garnish with an orange wheel there you go nice spritz this is an april spritz all right i can see that my april was sitting largely at the bottom no harm in stirring it up and kind of really incorporating it it's delicious i mean this is a sweet light fresh kind of candy summer cooler i have a feeling my wife will like these a lot when i start making them again this summer i like that it's a little bit bitter but very mildly i mean way less than like a gin and tonic way less than anything with campari in it just enough so it's like a little bite to it it's fresh it is cold it is a little light it's bubbly it has a lot of orange notes in it because i think that you'll find that orange something in my eye i think that you'll find that orange is a really dominant flavor in april this garnish is kind of driving me nuts and you know what just put it in the drink honestly i think it's even better that way um just kind of going off with it feels like a glass of spring been in the summer too on a hot day honestly and you know what these oranges they're delicious why would i waste them i'm not going to waste them if you were kid in the 90s you had a soccer team which i was on for like five seconds because i hated running at some point there would be half time orange why just kids you got large wedges so you're okay they're good crabs you got a marshmallow just like that [ __ ] matter yeah another thing i don't think people do anymore is pasta parties i used to tell the kids who were like into sports oh you have a pasta party tonight before little carb ups we have energy tomorrow i think there was some crap that berea came barrilla came up with the pot the spaghetti company i don't i don't see how waking up with a belly full of spaghetti is going to help you win any races or whatever you can make a spritz with other apparativos as well like campari but i think that april is the standard by which others must be judged um if i'm not mistaken a year or two ago the new york times did an article on the april spritz being a bad drink who cares sprezzatura but if the spritz wasn't the as i'm spritzing i'm i own spritz if the spritz wasn't the first drink that sprang to mind when i started talking about spring cocktails i'm gonna bet that it was a pims cup right it's gotta be a toss up between those two personally i respect the fact that these are a staple in the uk and the people love them i have yet to personally find a build that i really adore i would go with a spritz over the pims cup but not everything is everyone's cup of tea i'm told that the way to do these is really in a picture and as you refill the pitcher through the day the balance moves more and more in favor of the pims and away from the lemon soda that would be lemonade for the uk portion of my audience over here we would not call that lemonade a thin ribbon of cucumber maybe some sliced apples sliced strawberry stuffed into a glass or pitcher with two ounces of pims which is basically a liqueur built from gin and four ounces of lemon lime soda not my favorite but they are undeniably refreshing and light and easy to drink fun to share really honestly they are a perfect spring drink if it's if i'm at a gun pony which i find myself at not that often but if i were and you offered me a pims cup i would say yes sir thank you very much i will enjoy this instead i'm having this it was really good i think my wife and i are having those tonight after i wrap i mean we have a bottle of prosecco here why not so this is a drink i do adore it's a garden in a glass it is the sherry cobbler it is positively ancient by cocktail standards going back to the early 1800s and it is credited with making the drinking straw popular actually so before that no drinking straws uh shake up a few orange slices a half an ounce of simple or gums here four ounces of amontillado sherry le stau is fine here garnish it with everything you've got um like just throw the kitchen sink out of berries oranges mint whatever the garnish should be a flooring bouquet of abundance you know it really should exemplify spring that is traditional uh that is that goes back to what it was invented in the 1800s a garden in a glass you know i think that they're really perfect for those afternoons when it's just too damn nice to convince yourself to stick to work and you just need to emerge from your winter hibernation for a few hours and get out on the deck or lawn or whatever and knock off for a bit so a similar drink in both its dependence on crushed ice and its ancientness is the mint julep the official drink of the kentucky derby which always falls in spring this year i think it's actually april 30th or may 1st so it's got to be a spring drink right the julip has a long history that i explore a bit in my episode on it um which there's a link for down there over its history it's been made with a variety of bass spirits sometimes even split spirits and floaters but i favor bourbon in mine i used buffalo trace back when i shot this one uh it's still a perfect choice but i gotta say my beloved old grandad bottle and bond works very phenomenally in a uh intimate julep i think that mint juleps are are both easy to over sweeten but they do need to be sweet if you've ever had like a chip a cheap mint julep in new orleans or something like that you've probably had a glass of syrup i know i have and hated it so they're easy to over sweeten uh but they do need to be on the sweeter side there's a line they got to go right to it and not over it i keep the simple syrup in them to about a half an ounce i actually like a couple of dashes of angus store bitters in mine which is not necessarily a standard choice but possibly a historic choice you are free to ignore i muddle the mint one that is another somewhat controversial choice a lot of people do not muddle the mint there's a whole thing where you just kind of like gently touch the mint inside of the the beaker i i want mint in my you know it's a mint julep i want it minty i'm gonna muddle them in i go three ounces of bourbon uh with crushed ice stir or swizzle that a bit finish with more ice garnish it with as much mint as you can stand and put your feet up because you're in jewel town another perfect drink for spring that i love in spring is it's a modern classic it is the gordon's cup from the now long gone milk and honey which was it the epicenter of the new york city speakeasy revival it's debatable but if not the center of it it was certainly one of the brighter spots or well actually it's a candlelit spot but you know what i mean i have yet to meet somebody who doesn't like this drink um or it's breakfast version the with hot sauce the gordon's breakfast it's got cucumbers in it therefore it's a spring drink this is my show i make the rules to make it you'll start by cutting up a lime and then some cucumber wheels shake the lime and the cucumber and three quarters of an ounce of simple syrup two ounces of london dry together for london dry i love ford's gin but tanqueray would be great here i think beefeder is a gin that's wonderful um i mean your big standards of gin i think gordon's is honestly maligned i think gordon's gin is fine uh shake all of that together and strain it into a double old fashioned over rocks then add a few more cucumber wheels for garnish a little kosher salt and black pepper the drink is in you're in paradise of this drink it is heavy on earth any london dry gin will be fine here i think make this drink you will love it another neo classic from the new york bar scene is audrey saunders's earl grey martini i did an episode on this where i talked about pegu club the bar that she owned um where this drink was invented and made famous uh and i'm gonna put a link down there below uh it was a very important hot spot in the kind of cocktail revival of new york city okay um one of my favorite bars too it's real bummer that it's gone especially as pandemic might be lightning and i can't go back to my all my favorite places are gone it sucks ah [ __ ] to make this drink you will need to make an earl grey tea infused gin and the ratio for that is roughly four tablespoons of loose leaf twinings earl grey per 750 milliliter bottle of london dry and if you're trying to replicate the pegu club experience note for note i'm told that they use tank array i used fords when i made it last time i was very pleased with the results they stood up admirably to what i was served at the bar so i don't think that you know i think that a decent london dry is gonna suit you perfectly here you put the tea into the gin in the bottle or in another bottle shake it up wait two hours strain it all out put it through like a fine tea strainer a fine fine t-shirt t-strainer maybe like a coffee filter because you don't want less particles in there the better um strain it all out bob's your alcohol and that tea infused gin will be shelf-stable you can keep it you know at room temperature like gin it's just gin with earl grey tea in it's great for the cocktail it's a sour and it presents as such so it's an ounce of simple syrup three quarters of an ounce of lemon juice an ounce and a half of the infused gin with an egg white dry shake it hit it with some ice shake it again strain it into a sugar-rimmed coop this drink was invented to be a crowd-pleasing show-stopper and it is it is easy to drink it is a joy to all who encounter it and what could be more spring appropriate than an earl grey tea at a garden party i think it's perfect it's a perfect drink well let me look at these gym based sours there's an original drink of mine a drink i call a gin whisper it's a positively ancient episode of how to drink episode number five i recall liking it a lot i invented it for a friend i haven't drank it a ton since then um but it's a great drink if i'm not mistaken i'd love to see how it holds up i'm certain it belongs on a perfect spring drinks list uh when you see why in a minute it just hasn't come up in my life very much since then so i i don't know i i haven't had in a while you know so to make it you will need a shaker and a few mint leaves and a very few a lot of drinks with mint call for a large number of mint like um 10 15 leaves i made this um and i stand by this with three mint leaves um then a quarter ounce of simple syrup [Music] um a quarter ounce of sangjomin i always pronounce it saint germain i just recently learned that it's pronounced sangha men song that's what i've been told the compt de san juan was a very famous vampire not like a fictional vampire like a real one muddle that maybe now a little bit you know you can muddle it at any point really i think in the original i did the simple with the mint and then muddled i'm gonna muddle here just lightly press you know just want to help the mint do its thing there we go yeah i mean if i lightly press i mean press i don't know why is it lightly pressed we're just expressing those oils it's a lot of my drink is now on my muddler so what i'm gonna do leave my muddler in there i'm gonna take two ounces of gin i did it with fords previously this bulrush gin is a an alternative that i really have been enjoying lately it's an excellent gin available via curiata in the link below but you know use the london dry or i mean you probably get away with like a couple different kinds of gin here see what i'm doing i'm just kind of like literally rinsing my cocktail stuff off of my muddler to the degree that i'm able to make sure we get as much of that in the drink as possible now it goes with an egg white and there's a bit of sorcery here i'm just remembering all this stuff what i stumbled into that i did not know is that saint germain is actually super acidic and in order to make an egg white do its thing in a cocktail you need acid um when i i was just noodling around when i came up with this so it was like one of those things where like i didn't know at that time that this would shouldn't work but it works great dry shake ice one big one small take a sour glass like this one if you have it strain away probably should double strain this one but i didn't grab my tea strainer when i came out here i like to garnish that with like a tiny little you know like one of these like mint buds you can take one of these guys and just put that right in the middle the drinks it'll float just like that i think that's perfect um and there it is the gin whisper oh that's really good oh my god this is a perfect drink for spring it is minty fresh gin the gin is really not dominant it has a sort of peppery quality to it it is silky smooth with the egg white texture which is well frothed the mint is just right it is is present without being overpowering super mint has a light kind of fresh air to it the saint germain is in balance with the mint i did something okay when i made this one up a few years ago i could see a touch i mean and i don't even mean just a touch of lemon brightening it slightly but that would change the character of the drink and when i say a touch i mean a quarter ounce less than you would use in anything else just a little touch um maybe a half an ounce but a quarter probably is where i would start um but i don't think it needs it i stand by the name i think it is a whisper it is a gin wisp it's elegant refined and subtle and lovely really nice very vegetal very i don't know fresh tasting what is that what does that mean what am i doing who knows my hands are sticky so is a caperina spring drink i don't see why it shouldn't be and i love the damn things it's a brazilian staple it's refreshing and easy to drink they are wonderfully simple and sloppy to make i think they're perfect you get yourself a shaker you get some super fine sugar you get a whole lime you cut it into eighths you muddle that with some sugar yeah you take two ounces of kahasha kasha kachasa still have a hard time with that you take two ounces of cachaca i really like nova fogo shake that up and open poured into a rocks class and what i say i really like it because i've had some other kashasas since then i don't like as much um the nova fogo is like a real serious head and shoulders cut above the regular it's good stuff one thing a lot of people have advised me about in regards to cape arena is that it's best practice to carve away the pith from the quartered up lime that's the white bits that are in the middle it can add unwanted bitterness even if you don't do this it is an incredibly unbelievably good drink picasa is pretty forward here which does break my spirit forward rule so the bottle you use will matter and as a result i do strongly recommend the nova fogo because this is a drink that favors and and features that kashasa uh using using a a um an unpleasant kasha is not going to reward you i don't think personally that's not to say that you would turn down a caperina made with some hooch um i certainly wouldn't but if you're making it for yourself i would get the good stuff i think it's just you're gonna like a lot more uh it's a yummy yummy yummy yummy my last phenomenal drink of spring is a paloma sure like a lot of the drinks on this list paloma is great any time of year it's great in the summer on a hot day but they're so darn refreshing the whole thing drinks like a breath of fresh air after a winter hold up inside it's like emerging from hibernation or crawling out of a dirt hole in the ground i don't know in a glass you put that in the glass but that whole concept into a glass me crawling out of the dirt rising from the dead in the glass that's what it is the traditional way to make them is super duper simple it is just a combo of squirt grapefruit soda and tequila and they're great that way um i like some fresh grapefruit in mine it's just a little bit more bitter and a little bit more a little brighter i like it that way so i go with ivy stark's recipe because it kind of bridges the gap between both ways to do this there's four lime quarters uh two big wedges of grapefruit muddled together in a salt rimmed glass with some ice two ounces of tequila i love fortaleza reposado three ounces of squirt grapefruit soda with a little mint which i'm told is some gringo [ __ ] but i don't care i like it you can skip the mint and you have this neat magic trick of a disappearing cocktail because you'll have it in your hand and the next thing you know it's gone where did it go who knows who could say guess i'll need to make a replacement oh well well i hope you enjoyed my top 10 drinks of spring there's obviously a bunch of drinks i didn't include in this list um very simple things like high balls like tom collins probably belong on the list i didn't include it because this is my top 10 drinks of spring um and these are all drinks that i think of that really evoke the way i feel about spring about the flowers in bloom and the birds coming back to life and singing their songs and the melt and the thaw and the lichens are freshening the lichens are freshening that's a normal thing greg what what yeah so these are the drinks i think of when i think of spring um i hope you enjoyed this check out drink.curiata.com in the link below if you're looking to pick up any of these bottles make any of these drinks that's going to be a huge help to you probably statistically speaking it is likely that it will be a big help to you if you're not in one of the states we can shift to i apologize but we're working on it so check back frequently get yourself on a list or something so they can let you know and i'm greg you will find me on twitter at howtodrink with a number in it you'll find me on instagram at howtodrink with a number in the middle there the number two you will find me on twitch at twitch.tv greg from htd where mostly lately we are doing tabletop role-playing game actual plays on tuesday nights lately at 7 p.m nobody watches this i can say anything i want here at this part of the episode this is this is over the episode listen i've been making the show for a long time like five years maybe some of these other things that we've done are interesting to you uh until then which will not be very long i'll see you next week i'll see you in a couple of days with another episode i'll see you in a couple of days with another episode of how to drink that was a mess i didn't have anything written for the end there i'm a mess all right i'm cutting

Channel: How To Drink

Views: 314,473

Keywords: htd, how to drink, mixology, tape brothers territory, alcohol, liquor, bartending, mixed drinks, how to, how to make, spirits, bitters, drink, cocktails, cocktail, classic, recipes, drinks for spring season, refreshing alcoholic drinks, aperol spritz cocktail, mint julep recipe, paloma recipe, pimms cup cocktail recipe, drinks with gin, how to make a caipirinha, tequila drinks, spring drinks, garden party drinks, day drinking, day drinks, drinks of summer

Id: KUIzlocL0Dg

Length: 22min 58sec (1378 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 09 2021