Bloody Mary
50 ml Vodka, 120 ml Tomato juice, 15 ml Lemon juice, 3 dashes Worcestershire sauce, 2 dashes Tabasco, 1 pinch Celery salt, 1 pinch Black pepper, 1 Celery stick
Ingredients
- 50 ml Jigger The large side of a standard jigger, filled to the top: 50 ml, with 25 ml on the other side. Vodka
- 20 ml Spoons A tablespoon and a teaspoon. Coffee liqueur - A little more if you like it sweeter
Measured in Millilitres (UK). Sign in to read these in American measures. Print a kitchen card at this size.
What the jigger, the spoons and the jug hold, in millilitres and in fluid ounces, is on the measures reference.
Quick version
- Pour the two over ice and stir.
Method
- Fill a rocks glass with ice.
- Pour in the vodka and the coffee liqueur and stir for 10 seconds.
- Float three coffee beans on top, if you have them.
Serve it
Black Russian
This was made in 1949 at the Metropole Hotel in Brussels by a bartender called Gustave Tops, for the American ambassador to Luxembourg, and it was named for the vodka rather than for anybody's politics. Two ingredients and a stir is a hard thing to make badly, which is why it has been on the back of every bar's list since.
Getting it right
The quality of the coffee liqueur is the whole drink, so use one that tastes of coffee rather than of syrup - a good one is bitter, rounded and slightly boozy. Keep the vodka in the freezer and the liqueur in the cupboard, and stir rather than shake: there is nothing here to mix but the temperature, and shaking just makes it cloudy.
Tasting notes
Sweet, dark and warming, with coffee right through it and a clean alcoholic edge from the vodka. It is the last drink of the evening more often than not, and it is also excellent with an espresso alongside.
More Vodka cocktails
Cosmopolitan
40 ml Vodka, 20 ml Triple sec, 30 ml Cranberry juice, 15 ml Lime juice, 1 Orange slice
Espresso Martini
40 ml Vodka, 20 ml Coffee liqueur, 30 ml Espresso, 10 ml Simple syrup, 3 Coffee beans