Happy Hour with Strawberries and A Cool Website about Alcohol

It can be fairly easy to bring a smile to my husband's face - he's just an upbeat person.  But the grin he had last night as he walked in the door and saw me mixing cocktails could have lit the house.  He's so cute.

If you recall, we try to have a happy hour at home at least once a week.  Last night I decided to mix up a cocktail with some of our plentiful strawberries.  Then I remembered the mint our friend Wendy brought us on  Sunday and I had a brainstorm.  Mojitos with strawberries, mint, and lemon...

Strawberry Mojito
Makes 1 tall glass

2 to 3 fresh stawberries - washed, stemmed, and chopped into bite-size pieces
2 to 3 fresh mint leaves
1 small wedge of lemon
2 tsp (or to taste) of simple syrup
2 oz (or to taste) of light rum
4 oz (or to taste) of lemon seltzer
crushed ice

Drop the strawberries, mint, and lemon wedge in the bottom of a glass.

Muddle or "smush" with a spoon to slightly crush the ingredients and release the juice of the fruit and essence of mint leaves and lemon peel. Add simple syrup and do more of the same to infuse those flavors into syrup.

Pour in rum and slightly stir.  Add crushed ice and mix gently with spoon.  Top with lemon seltzer and serve.  Mmmm...refreshing.

NOTES:  My husband makes a batch of simple syrup for us to keep in the fridge.  He steeped the last one with some mint leaves, and it worked well in this cocktail to provide an additional level of minty flavor.  You may want to use this technique or add a bit more mint leaves to your muddling mixture.

I also liked the extra layer of lemon from the seltzer.  You could elect to use plain seltzer or club soda.  The fizz is a nice touch, so stick with bubbly.

You could also switch to lime, if you prefer, but I thought the lemon would not compete so much with the strawberries.  Regardless, have fun mixing and experimenting.

Now, about that cool website...

How does that song go?
"When I'm not drinkin', I think about drinkin'.  When I'm not thinkin', I drink about you..."

If you are like me, you enjoy drinking, you enjoy reading, and you really enjoy reading about drinking.  So, if that is the case, I encourage you to visit a cool website known as AlcoholReviews.com.

The founder and editor, Kevin R. Kosar has a witty style and he shares lots of neat tidbits of interest to drinkers.  And, I'm proud to say he also generously gave me a shout out about our visit to Copper Fox Distillery earlier this month.  I encourage you to visit his site and keep thinkin' about drinkin'.