Forget whatever you've seen or heard before, this is hands down the best recipe for a Margarita ever! If after reading this, you disagree, I'll eat my sombrero!
2 Parts Good Quality Tequila, Chilled
The only way to tell if it's good is to taste it, even before you put it in the fridge. You can either pour a little into a shot glass, or just go ahead and sip it directly from the bottle. If it's early morning, say before breakfast, you might want to close the curtains to block the view of the neighbour, you wouldn't want to choke on your glug, er, sip I mean, when they come out to get their paper in that loud floral housecoat that usually makes you gasp in horror!
Don't worry about germs, alcohol is a great disinfectant - I'm sure you've seen those timeless old westerns where the doctor gets out a bottle of amber liquid and just splashes some of it onto the stoic hero's wound (bit of a waste right?) then passes the bottle to the patient for a makeshift general anaesthetic. Usually the doctor then has a swig just to prove the point that he's not worried about germs on the mouth of the bottle, so it's the right thing to clean that oozing bullet wound.
On the subject of tequila, most people have an interesting, if not hilarious (in retrospect) story somewhere in their past. My friend's mom once regaled us with an elaborate recounting of her experience with a 'last person standing' contest involving more than 1 bottle, a competitive barfly and at the end of the evening, her rolling under her car in the garage after a misstep down the steep driveway!
Right, back to the margarita. Olé! After tasting your choice of tequila, you should be quite energised: the light around you seem brighter, colours more vibrant, heart beating just a little bit faster? If you're experiencing this, it's a good tequila! If not, you might want to go back to the liquor store and get something in the R250+ range - that's about $22, yep South Africa's doing well on the international currency exchange again, thanks to a long overdue ousting of our cronyistic leader.
1 part Cointreau
I know, some recipes call for Triple Sec, but nothing beats la vraie affaire. It's sort of like the difference between vanilla extract and vanilla essence for the gastronomes, or Bitcoin and Bitconnect for the crypto enthusiasts, or your iPhone and your Canon EOS for the professional photographers! Sometimes similar means there's only one right choice!
I once spent Christmas with a some of my in-laws friends, a merry group of lifelong companions. The highlight of the event was the Christmas Pudding, which was drenched in a bottle of Cointreau before being briefly ignited. The pudding collapsed under the weight of the Cointreau, or maybe the intoxicating effects, but it was the best pudding I've ever tasted!
For the warmer climates, chilling the bottle of Cointreau helps the final product. Yes, you may as well have a little taste, after all, the curtains are closed and the family still asleep!
1 Part Lime Juice
Yes I know, is it really necessary at this stage? After all, the 2nd bottle of tequila you bought is really good dammit, hic! Why ruin the taste by diluting it? Also, squeezing out fresh lime juice might just be a bit too much work at this stage.
Ok, so I have a tip here. Take a little break, and while you're sitting in your chair with your bottle of tequila in front of the open curtains, waiting for the reaction of Lousy Floral Housecoat With Ugliest Colours, er, your neighbour, to discover their newspaper is missing (what were you supposed to do about the broken shards of glass from the first bottle of tequila that accidentally slipped out of your hands against their post box?) you can roll the uncut lime between the sticky palms of your hands to soften it and break the fruit cells so that when you eventually cut it, after a little power nap, the juice will just fall right out into your lap. Don't make that mistake, make sure you have the jug under the lime! Actually, the only reason they serve tequila with a slice of lime or lemon is so that you can clean your hands afterwards, after sloshing it out of that ridiculously small glass!
Now here's the steps where things get a bit hazy in my mind. Should there be some sugar with the lime? To make a sugar syrup requires the lime juice to be warmed with water and sugar, in a pot, on the stove. Should the lime juice just be added to the jug (don't worry, it's a plastic jug!) with the hope that it's not too bitter and there's sufficient sugar in the Cointreau? Actually I've tried it both ways, and I can't say which is better as long as you can still taste the tequila, so I guess it's a matter of personal preference and whether you really want to delay things by involving cooking and cooling in the process, which will ultimately drag out the moment until you can taste the margarita.
Shake, Rattle and Pour
Whatever you've decided, it's time to put it all together, if only to finish the blog for Steemit, so you have an excuse as to why you were drinking tequila first thing in the morning.
All your ingredients should now be in your jug. Get out the extra large cocktail shaker and half fill it with ice. You have to work quickly here to prevent the ice from melting so pour your mixture into the jug, no time for tasting here, and give it a good shake, make sure the lid's on securely so the dog doesn't have to lick the spillage off the floor! When the shaker has misted up, pour your awesome margarita into a glass. Dammit I forgot to prep the glass! Uh, I forgot to tell you about getting the glass ready. Go back a few sentences - you know you're supposed to read through the whole recipe before starting, right?
The Glass
Sigh, pour the mixture back into the jug and put it in the fridge. Get your margarita glass out and rub the lime around the rim of the glass - cut side on the glass. Finely grate some of the lime peel onto a flat plate and sprinkle some salt and sugar over it, mixing it together and spreading it out a bit so it's wide enough to press the glass into it. Now if you had one of those instant freeze freezers like they have on the cooking contest shows where they make homemade ice cream in 1 minute...but obviously you don't, so just put it in the freezer and count to 10 while taking deep breaths, OK close the freezer door now and fan your face with the rest of the neighbour's newspaper for a while. Pretend you have one of those super duper time travel freezers and make a loud DING! or if you're not good at 'dinging' use the microwave to make the sound by turning the dial quickly from On to Off. If you've got one of those newer models with electronic buttons, aren't you lucky? You'll just have to make your own ding, bet you didn't think of that when you bought it, huh?
The glass is ready DING! Pour the margarita from the jug into the glass, trying not to wash the lime, salt, sugar off the rim - you don't want to have to go through that whole dinging process again do you - then put it on a little tray, just in time to present as a peace offering to Mrs Loud Shouty Flowery Housecoat With Mismatched Slippers who's at your door complaining about the missing sections of her newspaper for the third time this week. As she raises the glass to her lips, toast her with the jug, you deserve a taste too!
PS. I don't own a sombrero!