Happy in a Snap: Friday Cocktails

In my search for a fun and different FC, I looked no further than the pomegranate. The awesome company, POM Wonderful was nice enough to send me a few bottles of their juice to try. Having never sampled pomegranate juice (except maybe in the form of one or two pomegranate margaritas), I was really pleasantly surprised. It's super light and not overly sweet. I immediately started searching for fun ways to use the juice in a cocktail. While, I am dying to try the Pomtini, I was craving something a little more unusual this week. Enter the Pomegranate Ginger Cocktail. I set off to make a perfect pomegranate ginger simple syrup and ended up with an incredilbly thick substance. Needless to say, I let too much of the liquid from the pomegranate juice evaporate. When I went to mix my first drink, the syrup hardened up, on contact with the ice cold liquors. Not wanting to waste the valuable juice, I remembered a cocktail I had at Bang! in Charlottesville about a month ago. The bartender had taken a martini glass and striped it with honey. What a fun presentation with candy stripes for your cocktail glass. Cheers to that!

Pomegranate-Ginger Cocktail (adapted from Bon Appetit)

• 1 cup pomegranate juice
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 1/4-inch-thick slice fresh ginger

• 4 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• 1/4 cup of pomegranate juice
• 1 ounce Cointreau or other orange liqueur
• Ginger Beer or Club Soda

Preparation

Boil first 3 ingredients in heavy small saucepan until syrup is reduced to 1/3 cup, stirring often, about 10 minutes. Cool. Or boil the syrup for a while longer until it's reduced to a considerably thick syrup.

Stripe glasses with thick pomegranate syrup. In a shaker, combine pomegranate juice, lime juice, Cointreau, and ice. Shake well. Strain into striped glasses.