This is a nice drink to mix up in a cocktail pitcher and serve to just a few close friends over for dinner. It’s an intimate drink that, for some reason, doesn’t mix well with larger parties or a night of heavy boozing. I think it’s the cognac. The spirit demands too much attention to just swallow on down with a handful of nuts. It goes better with candlelight, jazz and old friends.

Here we go –

• 1 ½ oz Cognac or Brandy
• ½ oz Curacao
• ½ oz pineapple juice
• couple dashes bitters

Mix above ingredients with ice in mixing glass or glass cocktail pitcher. Strain into cocktail glass.

Not a huge fan of the sweet, but the gin & bitters in this drink peck hard enough to make its taste worth your while plus, it does have the “ooooh, pretty” factor of being blue and all. Not part of the 90’s tartini craze and the newer version, this drink has some decades in its nest. I found it in an old bar bible.

Here we go –

• 3 oz Gin
• ½ tsp. Blue Curacao
• 4 dashes Angostura Bitters

Shake ingredients softly but long enough to really get the cold going in a nice shaker, strain into a cocktail glass with a lemon peel or Maraschino cherry on the lip of the glass. (Don’t shoot me, but they even make blue Maraschino cherries if you want to make some sort of statement).

Picked this one up from a book by Beach Bum Berry who learned the recipe from Hawaiian Bartender, Harry Yee. The drink dates to around 1957. I whipped up a batch for a backyard barbeque this past summer. Ended up burning the chicken, but thanks to this drink, my guests loved it. One of those drinks you really should be sitting down and buckled up to enjoy.

Here we go –

• 8 oz passion fruit juice
• 1 ½ Bacardi 151 Rum
• ½ oz Orange Curacao
• 2 dashes Angostura bitters
• 1 oz dark Rum
• 1 oz Bourbon

Fill a large glass or Tiki Mug with crushed ice, add all the ingredients and stir well. Garnish with pineapple, mint (add an orchid and a wooden back-scratcher if handy).

Doesn’t get more “colorful” than this one. If you’re going for that almost off-worldly, kitschy, hotel-bar vibe, then the Blue Hawaiian’s your drink. Far too blue for a traditional tiki mug, this one’s best served in a tulip style cocktail glass or anything see-thru. You’ll want to show this one off as you’re sipping; kind of like parking a new car in the drive.

Here we go –

• 1 oz Light Rum
• 1 oz Blue Curacao liqueur
• 2 oz Pineapple juice
• 1 oz Crème’ of Coconut

Blend above ingredients in blender with around a cup of cracked ice. Pour into glass and garnish with a pineapple chunk & cherry tooth-picked together.

You can make a Daisy with almost any liquor. This is a pretty basic & simple cocktail to make, yet with the addition of summer fruit, she sings. A tall glass and lots of ice add up to a great chugger.

Here we go –

• Crushed ice
• ½ oz simple syrup
• ½ oz Curacao
• ½ to ¾ oz lemon juice
• 3 oz Rum

Shake above ingredients with ice in shaker till ice cold. Pour everything, including ice, into a tall glass or hurricane. Float summer fruit – melon balls, peach slices or blueberries – in the glass and top with club soda.

One of those gasp-inducing drinks that is horrifically perfect for a Halloween party or simple gathering, the Blue Devil should go swell with most adult costumes. Think of it as a boozy accent piece to your sexy nun outfit or your zombie mask, that happens to taste great and will leave you even more likely to be less inhibited before the night is done with you. The kind of drink that will have you waking up on November 1st asking, through your sandpapered mouth, “Did I really do that last night?” Bartender’s warning: please be careful with the Blue Devil. Just ‘cause it’s Halloween, try not to blame The Devil for your outlandish deeds after the fact.

Here we go –

• 1 ½ oz gin
• ½ oz blue curacao
• 1 oz lemon juice

Shake with ice and serve chilled and up in a cocktail glass. Garnish with a floating lemon or orange slice.