Ina Garten and Ree Drummond Use the Same Trick to Take Cocktails to the Next Level
Ina Garten and Ree Drummond have a trick for cocktails that make for a delicious next-level drink. The Food Network hosts turn to sugar for some of their cocktails and it’s a sweet gamechanging move.
Ina Garten adds a delicious sugar rim to cocktails
Garten and Drummond both have used sugar on the rims of cocktail glasses for a fun and delicious twist.
Garten showed her trick during a 2018 appearance on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. The Barefoot Contessa star did a cooking segment that started with a drink, of course. She taught Colbert how to make daiquiris — and the host was surprised by the sugar rim.
“They’re really good daiquiris,” she told Colbert. “Daiquiris got into like bananas and strawberries — they’re like smoothies, nobody wants them anymore.”
To make her cocktail, she added fresh lime juice, sugar syrup, and rum to a shaker filled with ice. Garten shared an easy tip: “You have to shake it for 30 seconds.”
They poured the cocktail over ice in a glass rimmed with sugar. “I didn’t know you salted the rim of a daiquiri,” Colbert said.
Garten corrected him, pointing out, “It’s sugar.”
How to make a sugar rim cocktail glass
It’s easy to make a sugar rim glass for a cocktail. Garten includes the easy directions in the recipe for classic daiquiris on her Barefoot Contessa website.
“When ready to make the cocktails, rub the cut lime on the rims of 6 glasses and lightly dip the rims in a plate of sugar,” she notes in the recipe instructions. “Turn the glasses upright and set aside to dry.”
Garten makes another cocktail with a sugar rim — her sidecars with dried cherries recipe, as seen on her Barefoot Contessa website. She puts lemon juice in a shallow bowl, dips the rim of a highball or martini glass in it, then dips the rim in a plate of sugar. The Food Network host sets the glasses aside to dry while she mixes the cocktail.
She combines lemon juice, Cognac, Grand Marnier, and marinated cherry liquid in a cocktail shaker with ice, shakes it for 30 seconds, then strains the cocktail into the rimmed glasses either straight up or over ice.
Garten makes an easy garnish by marinating dried cherries. She combines dried cherries with Cognac and microwaves them on high for 60 seconds. Then she threads them on a skewer.
Ree Drummond uses the same sugar rim trick for margaritas, with a twist
Drummond is also a fan of a sugar rim for margaritas but she adds a slight twist to the sugar.
While demonstrating how to make her dessert chimichangas recipe on an episode of The Pioneer Woman she made a lime sugar mixture to dip the fried treat into.
“It’s good if you can zest the lime a little bit ahead of time and lay it out on a plate,” Drummond explained. “And then the lime zest kind of dries out a little bit and doesn’t make the sugar clump. Just a little trick for you.”
She also revealed how it works perfectly for a cocktail. “Here’s another little secret I need to tell you about myself,” she said. “When I have a margarita I like to dip the rim in lime sugar and not salt.”
Drummond’s recipe for blackberry margaritas on The Pioneer Woman website shows the steps for making the cocktail’s sugar rim.
“To make the lime sugar, zest the 3 limes and lay out on a paper towel to dry for 30 minutes,” she explains in the recipe instructions. “Add the zest to 1 cup of sugar and mix together. Rub a lime wedge around the rims of margarita glasses and dip in the sugar to coat.”
She noted, “I’m definitely a sugar-on-the-rim person when it comes to cocktails. So much better than salt!”
