Dragon's Blood...The Combination

Last week in my post Dragon's Blood...The Beginning I spoke about how I was putting together a concoction with a Jalapeño infused vodka. After four days of infusion, the vodka started to take on a light green hue from the peppers and smelled quite spicy. Here is a picture of what it looked like.

Now I decided to put the whole drink together. I used a base of tomato juice, orange juice and fresh lime juice. Here is the recipe I started with:

Dragon's Blood (Beginning)
2 cups of Jalapeño Infused Vodka
2 cups of Tomato Juice
2 cups of Orange Juice
1 Fresh Squeezed Lime

I found that the Jalapeno flavor was hidden a little bit by the juices. So to ramp up the spice factor (hell, Dragon's Blood should have a bit of a kick, no?) by adding to teaspoons of White Pepper Powder, .5oz of olive juice and 8oz. of tomato juice to thick it up a bit. Here is the final recipe:

Dragon's Blood (Final)
2 cups of Jalapeño Infused Vodka
2.5 cups of Tomato Juice
2 cups of Orange Juice
1 Fresh Squeezed Lime
2 tsp of White Pepper Powder
.5 oz of Olive juice

I served myself some over ice with a lemon and lime wedge squeezed over the ice and here is what I came up with. How did it taste? I would characterize it as a milder version of a Bloody Mary. At the first taste the drink was smooth then my taste buds started lighting up as an old telephone switchboard would during an emergency. I felt a kick near the back of my tongue on both sides, in the back of my throat and on the tip of my tongue. Not that it was unpleasant. Not in the least. I quite enjoyed the drink. Hopefully Chuck and his cohorts will like it. I'll try to get a statement from him next week when he gets back from his excursion.

Happy Drinking,
Sisco Vanilla

Dragon's Blood...The Beginning

My friend Chuck "DragonBlack" has a Memorial Day custom where he and a few friends go away to a cabin in the woods for a weekend of movies, video games and unwinding. So about a month or so ago he was mentioning how he would like to take something to drink for the camping trip that would resemble his nom de plume. I started thinking to myself, what would "Dragon's Blood" resemble in the form of a drink.

I figured it had to be red and have a bit of a kick to it. I didn't want it to be a drink resembling a Bloody Mary. I mean who really wants to shoot a Bloody Mary shot. I would imagine that it would be too thick. I wanted it to be something light and with a hint of sweetness to it to balance out the spice the kick would give. So I whipped up something really quick containing Vodka, Hot Sauce, Tomato Juice, Orange Juice and freshly squeezed Lime Juice. I don't have any specific measurements since I was just winging it. But that initial shot worked out pretty well, enough so that I wanted to do something a bit more.

Since I am feeling confident in my fledgling infusing skills, I decided to infuse my own spicy vodka. Using some of the remaining New Amsterdam Vodka and two green jalapeño peppers I came up with the following. To avoid making it too spicy, I cleaned out the seeds. Half a day in and the aroma of the peppers is noticable in the vodka. I'll let it sit for about two days or so and see how it tastes like. I'll report back on it then.

Until Then Happy Drinking,
Sisco Vanilla