MARGARITA

The Margarita has suffered in modern times. In an effort to make it hip, quick, trendy, and cheap it has been bastardized far worse than any cocktail before it. Whether it is the use of inferior (or just plain wrong) ingredients, or commercially made mixes, the common Margarita these days tastes more like a Limeade with a splash of orange juice than it does the delectable cocktail that once was.

A true Margarita is made from three ingredients. Tequila, Cointreau (a Triple Sec), and fresh squeezed Lime Juice. Just looking at the ingredients it clearly falls into the same category of cocktail as the Sidecar, Whiskey Sour, Aviation, and Cosmopolitan. These cocktails are knows as "Sours", and consist of a Spirit, Cordial and a Juice.

Like any cocktail, the true art comes in arriving at the proper ratio of the ingredients in order to present a balance of the flavours being used. And like most cocktail recipes, the more recipe books you look in, the more confused you will get as to the proper way to make a Margarita. While many recipe books will indicate that "equal parts" of three ingredients should be used, to me this does not result in a well-balanced drink. What I’ve discovered through many long nights of experimentation, is that the best ratio for Margarita is 3:2:1. Three parts Tequila, 2 parts Cointreau, and 1 part fresh squeezed lime juice.

As in all cocktails, I always recommend the use of quality ingredients. For the Tequila I recommend a decent quality silver (or blanco) tequila. This unaged Tequila will have a crisp and lively flavour that works well in mixed drinks. Any Tequila with "gold" in its name simply means it has been artificially flavoured and colour to make it look and taste like an aged (or Anejo) tequila. My choice for Triple Sec is always Cointreau or Grand Marnier, and the juice should always be fresh squeezed.

Histories Shadow
Nobody truly knows when or by whom, the first Margarita was made. There are many stories, many of them quite convincing, but no one story has been able to stand out as depicting the true origin of this classic drink.

Here are a few stories that claim to recount how this drink was first created:

• 
  In the early 1930’s, it was created at the Caliente Race Track in Tijuana.


• 
  In 1936, Danny Negrete invented this drink for his girlfriend, Margarita, while working at the Garci Crespo Hotel.


• 
  In 1938 or 1939, Carlos Hererra invented this drink for Marjorie King, who apparently couldn’t drink any hard liquor except Tequila without getting sick (Some stories will call him "Danny Hererra", apparently confusing him with Danny Negrete).



• 
  On the 4th of July, 1942, a customer asked Francisco "Pancho" Morales for a "Magnolia", but he couldn’t remember exactly how to make it, so he made something up, and he named it the "Daisy" instead (which in Mexican is Margarita).


• 
  Sometime in the 1940’s, Enrique Bastante Gutierez created this drink for Rita Hayward, whose real name was Margarita.


• 
  In 1948 Margaret Sames created this drink for a party she was holding in Acapulco.


• 
  In 1948 it was created in Galveston, Texas by Santo Cruz. Who mixed it up for singer Peggy Lee.


• 
  In the early 1950’s it was created at the "Tail o’ the Cock" restaurant in Los Angeles in order to find a way to introduce Jose Cuervo tequila into the market.

… and there are of course countless others as well.

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