The Grapefruit Vodka Sour.

As for right now I am off Gin and Tequila, so with efforts to try and find a light and fun drink that is vodka based this beauty came to life.

For a little back story, I have started to try and keep some fresh squeezed citrus around the house and have been doing so with lemons and lime and this time around I wanted to add grapefruit too. Having some fresh squeezed lemon and lime juice in my fridge has been a game changer for my daily water as well as made cocktail making so much more enjoyable as I have everything on hand and don’t have to wip out my juicer every time.

Anyway..

I was juicing some fruit, I love buying a bag of lemons and limes at a time to make as much juice as i can and still have some fresh fruit on hand at all times. While at the farmers market I picked out some grapefruit for some sort of drink i knew i wanted to make later that evening. This really excited me because this time around i wanted to dry out and save the zest of my fruit. it dawned on me while at the store that lemon pepper seasoning was just dried lemon zest and cracked pepper. And with that realization I understood that the zest of the citrus was just as important as what was inside and I wanted to keep some on hand for baking, cocktailing and experimenting with my food. Oh, the possibilities, maybe I’ll get into all that in another post.

So here we are again I started thinking about what I wanted to drink I have been falling hard for tequila and whiskey sours lately and I love making them at home because I can do them just the way I like. This time around I wanted to try it our with vodka. I had never really heard of a vodka sour drink before so I was a little skeptical at first but after this I may never return to tequila again.

I started in a shaker ‘with no ice’ —this is important— with 2 oz of my fresh squeezed grapefruit juice, or just a good splash depending on how strong you want your cocktail. I then added 1/2 of and oz of cointreau or an orange liquor/triple sec you may have on hand. 1 to 1.5 oz of vodka. I personally used a little bit of absolute grapefruit and then a splash more of vodka bc thats what I had on hand and the absolute grapefruit was almost empty. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And now add in an egg white from a whole egg. I know it sounds weird but its the only way to get that creamy silky foam top and taste to the cocktail. This is also why you don’t have any ice in the shaker yet. Before you add ice to the shaker you need to do what bartenders call the ‘dry shake’ A dry shake is when you shake all the liquids in your shaker together before their is ice, so this combines all the liquids prior to the ice. Once you give it a good dry shake add some ice to your shaker and shake again. The key to a good martini is the shake. This is the only time that your cocktail will be receiving ice, so if you want that cocktail to last you better shake your heart out.

Once the tin on your shaker is frosty cold from shaking, strain into a coupe or martini class and watch that foam come to life.

I then topped mine with a dried lime slice and a few drops of earl grey bitters!

Now sip time to sip and enjoy!

Recipe:

  • 2 oz fresh squeezed grapefruit juice

  • 1 oz grapefruit vodka or regular vodka

  • .5 oz of cointruau or orange liquor

  • Egg whites from 1 egg

  • earl grey bitters

  • optional garnish:

  • dried lime slice

  • orange zest

  • salt if thats your kinda thing

Madison O'BrienComment