Poppin' Bottles

Remember being a kid in the summertime, when the best thing ever was your mom pulling a box of popsicles out of the freezer for you and your friends? It's a phenomenon that disappears when you get older, for some reason. Popsicles are still tasty, and still refreshing on a hot summer day. But they have no magic about them anymore.

As with most things in this world, the solution is to add alcohol. Thrillist has compiled a list called, accurately, "Boozy Popsicle Recipes." And it could just be the best way to beat the heat.

I Love the Smell of Jager in the Morning

...no, really, I don't. Ever. But they say that you can't taste the Jager found in the Wake-Up Call, so I'm game to try one the next time I'm in Minneapolis.

(okay, it's really just about the candied bacon)

This Drink is The Balls

Not to feed any further into the Anchorman 2 hype machine, but a tasty drink recipe is a tasty drink recipe.

From Foodbeast:

The Ron Burgundy

What You Need

• 2 cups brown sugar
• 2 oz. Scotch (i.e. Famous Grouse)
• ½ oz. fresh lemon juice
• ½ oz. fresh grapefruit juice
• 2 dashes peach bitters
• 2 dashes angostura bitters
• Orange or lemon peel, for garnish

How to Make It

1. In a small saucepan over medium heat, heat brown sugar and 1 cup water. Stir until sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and let cool.
2. In a shaker with ice, combine the Scotch, lemon and grapefruit juices, ½ oz. brown sugar simple syrup, and bitters. Shake vigorously and strain into a short glass with large ice. Garnish with an orange peel. (Leftover brown sugar syrup can be stored in a jar to use in future cocktails.)

Snap, Crackle, Pop Bottles

I'm not much of a baking aficianado, but add whiskey to a list of ingredients and I'm there. You had me at "whiskey." Try out this recipe and report back (or, better yet, send some samples of the finished product my way).

"How to make Jim Beam Rice Whiskey Treats," from Guyism:

Ingredients:

• 5 ½ cups Rice Krispies
• 10-oz. bag marshmallows
• 1/4 cup salted butter
• 2 shots Black Cherry Red Stag from Jim Beam
• ¼ teaspoon cinnamon
• salt to taste

Instructions:

1. In a sauce pan, melt butter, stir in cinnamon and marshmallows.
2. Once marshmallows have melted completely, remove from heat and quickly stir in bourbon and a sprinkle of salt.
3. Don’t stop for pictures… narcissist.
4. Add Rice Krispies and stir until evenly combined.
5. Press treats into buttered 8×8″ baking dish.
6. Admit you can’t level the treats.
7. Cover with parchment (wax) paper, find square object, press down evenly.
8. Add a sprinkle of finishing salt over the top.
9. Cut into squares with sharp knife.
10. Stack on penguin plate.
11. Watch disappear.
12. Mourn the loss of your delicious Rice Whiskey Treats.
13. Move on to next recipe.

Get Grown

Men drink Manhattans. That's not some overwrought attempt to puff out my proverbial chest. And it's not a misogynistic jab at the ladies; a woman drinking a Manhattan neat is sex personified.

Look you can drink whatever you want. But if you've never reveled in the exquisite dance of whiskey, vermouth, and bitters seducing your tongue, you can't call yourself an adult. Not within earshot of me. Frankly, "Drink Manhattans" should have been found somewhere on the Business Insider list I posted the other day. (As much as I loved that collection of rules, the fact that it makes no mention of Manhattans threatens to invalidate the whole thing.) So take this lesson from Joaquin Simo to heart, and step into your big boy (or big girl) pants.

From Thrillist:

If you ask 10 different bartenders how to make a drink, you'll likely get 10 different answers. Which is why you should just listen to us, and our man Joaquín Simó, the face of NYC's Pouring Ribbons, who was named nothing less than Bartender of the Year at Tales of the Cocktail 2012.

This time we're taking on one of the classic-est of classics -- prepare to get step-by-stepped through the Only Manhattan You'll Ever Need.

Skittle Vodka

I suppose this could serve as the "Hers" counterpart to last month's bacon-flavored vodka post, which was a decidedly "His" interest piece. I plan on making my own bottle of bacon vodka in the coming month, and I wouldn't be too surprised if Girlfriend was hard at work alongside me making herself some Skittle-infused vodka. I would have to imagine the resulting concoctions here are incredibly sweet, but to each their own.

Here are step-by-step directions from Mix That Drink on how to make a bottle of each flavor found in a standard bag of skittles (cherry, orange, lemon, lime, and grape):

For this project, you’ll need:

* One 1.75 liter bottle of vodka (I used Stoli - you don’t need the most expensive vodka, but do avoid the cheap ones)
* Five 8.5 ounce flasks or bottles
* One 1 pound bag of Skittles
* Five empty plastic water bottles
* A funnel
* Bowls for separating the Skittles into flavors
* A measuring cup (not pictured)
* Coffee filters or paper towels

This vodka-infusion trend is really starting to pick up. What's next, chocolate cake vodka?

Hmmmmmm...

"I, Booze, take thee, Bacon..."

Who out there—amongst what I have to believe is a fairly large cross section of people who hold an equally strong love for both alcohol and bacon—hasn’t dreamed of combining the two? Thanks to the folks at Sloshspot, you can now create your own bacon-flavored vodka, bourbon, and mixed drinks. Oh the wonders of creativity that house arrest can produce.

Making bacon-infused vodka is relatively easy, albeit time consuming process. In order to properly execute this infusion you will need some time. Therefore, it is best to plan ahead, about three weeks ahead. And, this is how you do it: Cook three to four pieces of bacon in a frying pan. Once cooked, add bacon to a clean pint sized mason jar. Trim the ends of the bacon if they are too tall to fit in the jar. You could also go hog wild pile in a bunch of fried up bacon scraps. Optional: add crushed black peppercorns. Fill the jar up with Vodka. Cap and place in a dark cupboard for at least three weeks. At the end of the three week resting period, place the bacon vodka in the freezer to solidify the fats. Strain out the fats through a coffee filter to yield a clear-filtered, pale yellow bacon vodka. Decant into bottles and enjoy (Makes one pint of vodka). Badda-bing badda-boom.

For more recipes, check out the original post at Sloshspot.