Covers & Cocktails: Spicy Lime Margarita

Happy October! The scourge of the pumpkin spice is now upon us. I do not have many personal traditions, but one of the few I do have consists of the annual reading of “It’s Decorative Gourd Season, Motherfuckers.” I’m sorry to disappoint the masses, though, in saying that I will not be flavoring any drinks with pumpkin on Covers & Cocktails. Personally, I’m more of an apple pie girl. But I promise something warm and cozy to drink for November.

Instead this month, we’re going to use a quintessential fall fruit in our drink. Limes, clearly. There’s nothing like the autumn lime harvest. I’m kidding of course. Not about the limes, but about doing any sort of harvesting.

You Are Mine
A | K | AB
You Are Mine by Jackie Ashenden may look familiar to you, and that’s because Elyse mentioned in as part of October’s Hide Your Wallet. She reviewed the previous book in the Nine Circles series and loved it. The series is BDSM erotic romance and I wanted a drink that, to quote John Mellencamp, “hurt so good.” Plus, with the sugar salt rim, you get a tiny bit of sweetness, since our hero has been in love with the heroine for quite some time. Aside from the book’s content, just take a look at the cover. That man is probably wearing a bespoke suit and with those tats, there’s no way I was making something like a daiquiri. Sure, I could have just poured some scotch and called it a day, but where’s the fun in that? Apart from drinking it, of course.

Normally, I have an aversion to spicy things because I’m a giant baby, though funnily enough, my mother always likes to remind me she had a craving for spicy foods when she was pregnant with me. However, both of my lovely roommates, who are willing taste testers for all of my drink experiments, seem to enjoy spicy things, so I trusted their opinions. And I eventually tried it myself.

For me, there’s a good balance of lime flavor, and you don’t taste the kick of the jalapeño until the very end. It kind of tingles on your tongue. People also have different tolerances and preferences when it comes to margaritas. Frozen or on the rocks? Salt or sugar on the rim? What I like about this recipe the most is that it’s very customizable if you want it spicier or have steadfast feelings on garnishes.

Ingredients for a spicy lime margarita

Shopping List:
Tequila
Triple Sec
Two limes
Lime juice
Jalapeño
Sugar
Salt

Proportions:
1oz. jalapeño tequila
1oz. tequila
2oz. triple sec
1oz. lime juice

 

Jalapeno Infused tequilaJalapeño tequila recipe:

To make this, I took about ten ounces of the tequila I had and chopped half of a jalapeño. I had some huge jalapeños. If they were smaller, I would have put in the whole thing. After removing the seeds and dicing the pepper, I put them into my shaker and muddled them a bit to break them down. I also don’t own a muddler, so being the resourceful woman I am, I used a wooden spoon. I poured in the tequila and popped it into the fridge where it sat for about three days before I used it. Whatever I didn’t use, I sealed up in a mason jar for future margaritas.

 

Lime sugar/salt recipe:

I’m on the fence on whether I prefer sugar or salt on the rim, so I like to combine the two of them. I mix 1/4 cup of sugar and 1/8 cup salt. I then zested two limes and mixed this all up. I winded up using the actual limes for garnishing the drink.

If I have any leftover, it typically doesn’t go to waste as one of my roommates drinks gin & tonics on the regular. Whatever sugar/salt is left can easily be sealed in a small container for future use.

Directions:

  1. Before beginning, take a wedge of lime and run it around the rim of your glass. Dip the rim into the lime sugar/salt so it sticks to the edges. Fill the glass up with ice.
  2. Pour all the proportions into a shaker. I usually forgo the ice in the shaker since I tend to pour the drink over ice and, because we use ice trays and I’m lazy, I don’t want to waste any ice. YES, I KNOW IT’S JUST WATER.
  3. Give everything a thorough shake and then pour into your glass.
  4. Garnish with as much lime as you want because you deserve it.

 

Modifications and notes:

  • As I mentioned earlier, you can adjust the spice on this recipe. This can be done a couple ways. Add more jalapeño during the “infusion” process or you can just use the jalapeño tequila instead of cutting it with an ounce of regular tequila like I did.
  • Don’t like salt on your rim? Just use sugar. Hate sugar with your margaritas? Leave it out and use salt instead.
  • If you’d like to use fresh lime juice, go right ahead! I tend to use the stuff in the little lime-shaped bottle because for me, trying to get juice from a lime (no matter how much I roll it around on the counter or do that Rachel Ray trick where I pop it into the microwave), it’s like squeezing blood from a damn stone.

spicy lime margarita alongside an iPad with the cover for You Are Mine - a dude in a suit about to unbutton his jacket and his hands are covered with tats. Yowser.

Wait, what’s that?

Where did I get those fantastic mason jar wine glasses? You need one or two for your very own?

No problem! Here they are! 

Two mason jars with wine glass bottoms and metal screw tops, sold as rednek wine glasses. They are adorable and $10.21 each.

Comments are Closed

  1. SAO says:

    I’ve noticed a lot of “Pumpkin spice” foods talk don’t have any pumpkin in them. They have the spices that go in pumpkin pie. These are the same as are used in Gingerbread, so when fall is over, the same drinks and foods are suddenly Gingerbread flavored.

  2. LauraL says:

    Recently went to a “dinner in the field” where a similar cocktail was served before dinner. They were yummy and this recipe looks yummy! Alas, no tatted men in bespoke suits at the dinner. However, a cute bearded farmer with torn jeans and tats did give us a tour of the fields.

  3. Katie Lynn says:

    It’s salgur! You used salgur on the rims (thanks, Leslie Knope)

  4. Amanda says:

    @LauraL: Torn jeans, tattoos, and a beard?! Do you have his contact info by any chance? ASKING FOR A FRIEND!

  5. LauraL says:

    @ Amanda – Farmer Pete is adorable! He can be found near Farmville, Virginia, no joke.

  6. The only place something called “pumpkin pie spice” belongs is in pumpkin pie. If the same spices are in gingerbread, I’ll allow it as long the emphasis in the spices in gingerbread is ginger. I really like to taste the ginger in that.

    As for sugar on the rim, I can’t stand that because it melts all down the glass and my fingers get sticky. And, of course, we are no longer offered fingerbowls.

  7. Coco says:

    Gourd.

    I was stumped over just what a decorative guard would look like. Turns out http://www.buzzfeed.com/conzpreti/meet-the-hottest-subway-security-guard#.baQL4LMlR

  8. Amanda says:

    @Coco: Ah! I’ll fix the typo. But I can’t really be angry about it considering you’ve shared such a beautiful link.

  9. Tiffany says:

    I’ve stayed in Farmville, VA! It was on a archaeology project in the winter at Ft Pickett, it was terrible. We almost set a bag on unexploded munitions and ended up snowed into our hotel.

  10. Mary Star says:

    “Salt on your rim” sounds like a nice tagline for this book 😉

  11. Sheila says:

    Yum yum yum thank you for the recipe

  12. Katrina says:

    Hang on: does this imply that your room mate uses a sugar/lime/salt rim for her gin and tonic? That’s utterly heretical (at least to English/Commonwealth drinkers) but kind of sounds like fun.

  13. Katrina says:

    Oh no–clearly it’s the sliced limes for the G&T–that’s perfectly sensible!

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