Healthy Happy Hour — Two Veggie Cocktails
Our friends Matt and Jenny Dorsey have a new book, Healthy Cocktails, which includes so many ideas for easy, all-natural, low-sugar, and low-alcohol drinks. Have a calm, cold pick-me-up with some better-for-you booze. We’re staying healthy by drinking our veggies — thanks to the two cocktails below! If peas and carrots aren’t typically your thing, we highly recommend giving them another try.
gotham sunset
Carrot juice gives this cocktail that vibrant color, while being slightly heavier to balance out the intensity and directness of London Dry gin. Orange blossom water (a by-product of bitter orange oil production) is a specialty ingredient, popular in the Middle East for its distinctive perfume. We love this beautiful root veggie and its health benefits. With beta carotene, fiber, vitamin K1, potassium, and antioxidants, carrots are packed with good stuff! They take 2-4 months to mature, but spring is the perfect time to plant them, so if you have a full sunlight patch out back, it’s time to prepare your endless supply for this delicious drink.
ingredients:
- 1-½ oz. London Dry gin
- 1-½ oz. fresh carrot juice
- 1 oz. fresh orange juice
- ¾ oz. sweet syrup
- ½ oz. fresh lemon juice
- 3-4 drops orange blossom water
directions:
1. Combine all ingredients over ice and shake.
2. Pour into Old-Fashioned glass with a large ice cube.
3. Garnish with an orange blossom flower, if desired.
eat your peas
This cocktail is meant to evoke the essence of salad in a glass: refreshing, bright, a little floral, and all-around a feel-good beverage. The use of Old Tom here allows the demure qualities of snap peas to really stand out, while providing a supple mouthfeel and adding some body to the otherwise airy note of tarragon. Peas are an excellent source of vitamins and antioxidants, and have a high amount of protein and fiber relative to other vegetables. Late spring is the best time to grow peas, so if this becomes your new favorite drink, get out the gardening gloves and plant your own! There’s little as satisfying as growing cocktail ingredients like this — embrace the green thumb!
ingredients:
- 4 sugar snap pea pods
- 8-10 tarragon leaves
- ¾ oz. sweet syrup
- 2 oz. Old Tom gin
- ½ oz. dry vermouth
directions:
1. Muddle snap pea pods, tarragon, and simple syrup in a cocktail shaker.
2. Add gin and vermouth with ice.
3. Shake vigorously and double strain into Old-Fashioned glass filled with crushed ice or a large ice cube.
4. Garnish with sugar snap pea pod, if desired.
Matt Dorsey is a modern day renaissance man — finance executive by day and the head mixologist of Studio ATAO by night. While building his business career, Matt honed his skills as a self-trained mixologist by creating hundreds of original cocktails to pair along Jenny’s food. Find more of his unique and award-winning cocktail creations on Instagram: @mixologistmattdorsey.
Jenny Dorsey is a professional chef, author, and artist specializing in interdisciplinary storytelling fusing food with social good. In addition to founding nonprofit culinary production studio, Studio ATAO, Jenny's work and food has also been featured on outlets such as Harper's Bazaar, NowTHIS, Eater, Food & Wine, Oxygen TV and Food Network. Her full biography and portfolio can be found at jennydorsey.co.
For more recipes and cocktail inspiration from Matt and Jenny, be sure to order their new book Healthy Cocktails.
RECIPE BY:
Matt Dorsey
PHOTOGRAPHY BY:
Jenny Dorsey
Celebrate every day!
From recipes and entertaining, to style, wellness, and more, for an unforgettable year.
Healthy Cockatils
This photo-filled recipe book takes the guilt out of happy hour!
