It’s finally Friday! Does anyone else need a drink? I needed a drink. It was a long week, guys. Really long. But now it’s over – and I’m on vacation! For ten whole days! I’m headed up to Maine with Trevor and my family tomorrow morning, and I’ll be relaxing, eating well, and spending time outside, rain or shine (it’s looking like rain, unfortunately).
When I saw the recipe for “The Sweet Pea” cocktail in the April issue of Bon Appetit, I got really excited. English peas? In a cocktail? I’m in! Plus that drink is such a gorgeous pale green color I’m not sure how I was supposed to resist riffing on it. I wanted to be a little bit more adventurous with the flavor profile of this drink, and since I’ve been reading green pea recipes all week, I’ve got all kinds of ingredients that pair well with peas on my mind. After mulling it over for the past few days, I decided on the following combo: fresh green peas, cucumber, tarragon, lemon, and elderflower rum. And yes, this is what I saved my super-sweet-from-our-garden peas for.
The resulting drink was lovely. It had a wonderful herbalness from the tarragon, natural sweetness from the peas, a refreshing hint of cucumber, and the acidity of the lemon tied the other flavors together – definitely a departure from my usual super-sweet, super-fruity cocktails of choice. The elderflower rum is a little sweet on its own, and is definitely a nice addition, but if you can’t find it using regular rum is fine. Personally, I don’t like gin, but I imagine that it would work well here if you’re a fan of it.
So cheers! Here’s to a lovely weekend!
Green Pea Rum Cooler
Inspired by Bon Appetit. Serves 1.
- 3 TBS fresh green peas, shelled
- 3 slices of cucumber, about 1/2-inch thick each
- 1/2 TBS roughly chopped tarragon leaves
- 1 slice lemon
- 1 tsp sugar
- 1-1/2 oz. elderflower rum, or other white rum
- ice
- Muddle the peas, cucumber, tarragon, lemon, and sugar in a cocktail shaker until peas and cucumber are completely mashed. Add rum and ice to shaker and shake for 30 seconds, then strain into a glass. Serve cold, garnished with additional lemon or cucumber slices and a few whole fresh peas.
Sounds refreshing and I could definitely use that this weekend! Might be good with vodka too!
Yes, for sure it would be! That’s what the original Bon Appetit recipe used.
This sounds amazing and looks so pretty! Can’t wait to try it out.
This drink is cray – and I love it! Looks awesome Katie!
Beautiful, and what and intriguing combination – I’ve never thought of anything like this, but then I don’t really “do” alcohol so I have no idea how to use it in cooking except brandy in cakes and wine in stews! I’d love to try this though.
Wait, what? Peas and rum? MOST INTRIGUING. It sounds especially interesting with the anisey kick fromt he tarragon.
What a cool combination of ingredients! I love this.