Happy Thanksgiving to all of you! We hope that you had a wonderful day filled with delicious food, tasty drinks, and - most importantly - spent it with people that you love dearly.

Amy and I have very different family dynamics and we celebrate in our own special way. For me it's all about a low key day in sweats and cooking the best food I know how for my little family of 3 (actually 4 if you count my Boston Terrier, Bean Sprout). While I love cooking the big meal, what I enjoy even more, is leftovers! Actually, to be more specific, I love transforming leftovers into something COMPLETELY different. And that's what inspired today's cocktail

Our cocktail today is a Cranberry Sauce Margarita! Yes, you heard me right! There's always leftover cranberry sauce, and what better way to use them up but to create a cocktail? 

You may be thinking "is she for real?' but just think about it...how can this be bad? A little tequila can't be bad, right?!

We happened to have some leftover bell peppers and lots of onions, so I was thinking turkey fajitas sounded like an easy quick dinner, especially since our turkey already gave a nod to Mexican in the apple, sage, chipotle glaze. (Side note, today was the first day of potty training bootcamp in my house, so quick and easy was key since we are officially spent!) 

So back to the tequila already...check out the ingredients below. You probably already have all of this on hand, right?

Ingredients
6 oz Silver Tequila
4 Tbsp Homemade cranberry sauce
4 oz Fresh squeezed orange juice
2 oz Fresh squeezed lime juice

To rim the glasses
1 tsp Salt
1 tsp Sugar
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 Tsp Chipotle powder

Directions
1. Mix the sugar and spice blend on a small plate, and rim 4 glasses by rubbing a wedge of lime along the rim of each glass, and then dipping each into the blend. Then fill with ice.
2. In a large cocktail shaker filled with ice, combine all of the ingredients above and shake until frosty.
3. Divide evenly among glasses and enjoy!

I hope you give this "leftovers" drink a try, it is so yummy! 

We would love to hear what you think of leftovers. Do you like to reinvent everything like I do? Do you just love a big "Thanksgiving Day" Sandwich with the works? Or maybe you're not a big fan of leftovers and are just ready to move onto the next meal...like sushi!

Till next time...remember to Shop Small Saturday!
​Adrienne

With Thanksgiving less than a week away, The Boastful Host is getting excited! We're finalizing our menus, our mouths are watering thinking about all of the yummy food, and even when you think it's complete, there's still always room to add just one more side! But with menus nearly complete, I now want to make sure you have a easy cocktail that you can drink all afternoon, and still be able to make it to dinner. 

Thanksgiving is one of those holidays, where you can really focus on spending time relaxing and spending time with the ones you love (or in some cases, maybe it's more like tolerate!). With parades, dog shows (my personal favorite TV viewing on Thanksgiving), and football, you're likely to be lounging around snacking and drinking all day long. I think it's nice to be able to offer a drink that's festive and complementary to the flavors of the holiday, but it also needs to be simple enough to please everyone, and light enough to ensure that no one's going to be passing out on the couch before dinner is served.

So we're taking a crowd favorite for Thanksgiving, cranberry, giving you one very simple recipe, and offering slight variations so you can customize it to best suit your tastes.

Cranberry Quencher (served 3 ways)
a. Basic recipe:
1 orange, cut into wedges
2 cups of cranberry juice
1 liter of seltzer
8 oz vodka

In a pitcher, place your orange wedges and muddle them until you get all of the juice out, and then add remaining ingredients and stir. Pour over ice into your favorite glass and you have a simple refreshing cocktail.

If you're thinking, "that's sounding just too simple, what else can we do to kick this cocktail into overdrive?" well then here are a couple of ways to switch it up.

b. All of that cranberry just a little too tart? Add a few teaspoons of sugar while you're muddling the oranges to bring out the natural sweetness, and if that's not enough, try swapping out the plain vodka for vanilla vodka. Who needs pie when this cocktail is being served?

c. Maybe it's not a celebration until there's bubbly? Hey, I can respect that! In this case, use only 1/2 the seltzer, and then as needed, pour enough for 1 or 2 drinks into a cocktail shaker with ice, shake until nice and icy. Pour into a martini glass leaving enough room for a splash of cava or prosecco. 

Hopefully you'll try one of these at your turkey day feast! 

We wish you all the happiest of Thanksgivings!
Adrienne
xoxo

Happy hour is here! And if you're using our blog as inspiration for what to pour tonight, why not open a bottle of your favorite red, while you read our "words of wisdom" (or should I say some very simple advice and we'll leave the wisdom to the true wine experts!). 

A quick recap from last week's post...

1. You can choose to pair your wine with food by contrasting or mirroring (we're focusing on mirroring)

2. Both white and red wine can be broken up into the categories of light, medium, and bold

3. All recommendations are merely suggestions and tips from the experts. The most important piece of advice when it comes to drinking wine, is just drink what makes you happy! 

Last week I gave a shout out to Clinton Kelly on the Chew for his easy, non-intimidating explanation of wine and food pairings, which is yet again, where this graphic below was  borrowed from:

As we did last week, we've chosen a red wine from each the light, medium, and bold, categories.

For the light category, we went with a Pinot Noir. With this chosen wine, berry preserves-raspberry, blueberry and cherry are coupled with hints of sweet spice and an earthiness on the nose. This would be amazing with a nice piece of salmon with a blueberry reduction, using a splash of the wine before serving and vinegar to create a bit of a sweet and sour effect. A hearty fish taco with halibut and a berry and avocado salsa would also provide a great compliment, mirroring the flavors in the wine. 

We chose a Merlot for the medium category. This one, with ripe plummy aromas with hints of dark chocolate, subtle herbs and black cherry with a mild fruity acidity, really would go well with so many different foods, as do most wines in the medium category. The mild acidity mirrors that which you get from tomatoes lending itself as an easy pick with a traditional Margherita Pizza. Or why not even give it a try with a rich chili that has a hint of bittersweet chocolate? 

Our final wine of this 2 part series, is a bold Cabernet Sauvignon, which is probably the most famous red wine grape variety on earth. This wine is dark garnet in color with a nose of black cherry and red plum. Its full bodied taste explodes with blackberries but is balanced by sweet cedary notes from its duration in American oak. Those cedar notes make it a perfect pairing with a steak that's gotten a nice char in a smokey cedar grill.

Hopefully, if you're a wine novice, this has given you some information to help you feel a bit more confident the next time you try to choose a wine to serve. Also know that whether in a wine shop or in a restaurant there is never any reason to be embarrassed to ask for a recommendation. It takes years to become a wine expert, so feel good knowing that they're helping to guide you based on your specific taste preferences. 

For those missing a fun cocktail...stay tuned till next Friday! 

XOXO
​Adrienne