Remember that time you bought a juicer because it seemed like a super good idea? And then it sat around and gathered dust after you made carrot-ginger juice, like, twice?
Cockatils, people. Use it for cocktails!
There is nothing like fresh juice in your drinks, be they alcohol-based or not. And this time of year, when fresh vegetables are spilling from crates on farmstands all over the South Fork, there’s no better time to get juiced.
At Flora in Westhampton Beach, it’s all about keeping things fresh, from the seafood-forward dishes to the creative cocktails curated by Derek Guzman, Rooted Hospitality Group’s beverage manager. While the Greenhouse — a vibrant, refreshing mix of silver tequila, agave nectar, freshly juiced green bell pepper and cucumber, as well as just-squeezed lime juice — is an excellent reason to get juicing again, it’s also clever in its this-goes-with-that simplicity.
Agave-based spirits tend to have earthy, vegetal (in a good way) notes, and the one-two punch of both the juiced bell pepper and cucumber are an easy match for unaged blue agave-based tequila. Says Guzman, “All you need to do is remove the stem and core, de-seed, rough chop and place into a masticating juicer!” And that pretty Greenhouse hue? All natural from the fresh veggies. The final embellishment of the cracked black pepper picks up the piquant notes of the spirit, too.
Get that juicer back in action!
The Greenhouse
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 oz Milagro silver tequila
- 1 oz cucumber juice
- 1/2 oz green bell pepper juice
- 3/4 oz lime juice
- 1/2 oz agave nectar
- fresh cracked black pepper
- 1 cucumber slice
Directions
- In a shaker with ice, add in the tequila, juices and agave nectar.
- Shake well for 10 to 15 seconds.
- Fill a Collins glass with ice and strain the cocktail into it.
- Garnish with the cucumber slice and one turn of fresh cracked black pepper.
