Happy Spring! I love this time of year. The sun starts shining more and the trees start to grow green again, flowers start to come up and everything just starts to come back to life. We are celebrating with a bright and fresh cocktail. A vanilla infused lemon martini. Its the perfect way to bring in this new season.
The vanilla infused simple syrup is the star of this martini. Made with real vanilla beans, the syrup infuses the fresh squeezed meyer lemons and creates a slightly sweet and lovely aromatic lemon martini. I love the little specs of vanilla that float around in the martini.
To enhance the vanilla flavor just a little bit more, we scraped a vanilla bean and added it to sugar and rimmed our glasses with it. That vanilla sugar is absolutely divine!
When Debbie and I first made this cocktail we had planned to our little photo shoot that day, but pretty much every recipe we made that day either failed miserably or the photographs I took just sucked. It was just one of those days… We decided to scrap the next photoshoot and just sit and have a cocktail. We knew that it was going to be good. What has real vanilla in it that isn’t good? But we were not prepared for just HOW good it was. It’s a perfect combination and everyone we have made it for since is in love with it.
This lemon martini is unlike any other lemon martini you have ever had. Bold statement, I know, but try it and tell me I am wrong 🙂
The property that Kevin and I have just moved to has a gorgeous forest behind it. I love it so much and I have already gone on many exploratory hikes with my puppy Vegas. Today when we went for our walk, it was as if the forest floor sprouted overnight. The beautiful green shoots are coming up all over to create a green carpet over the forest floor. So pretty!
Our new home will go in the middle of that forest and we are so excited to get started!
Other Cocktail Recipes You Might Like
- rose infused lemon drop martini
- raspberry & limoncello vodka sour
- elderflower, peach and lavender gin sour
- apple chai whiskey sour
Ingredients
- VANILLA SUGAR
- 1 vanilla bean
- 1/4 cup coarse sugarVANILLA SIMPLE SYRUP
- 1 Vanilla bean
- 1 cup water
- 1 cup sugarMARTINI (Makes two Martinis)
- 4 oz vanilla vodka
- 3 oz lemon juice
- 4 oz water
- 1 oz vanilla syrup
Instructions
- Make the syrup. Add the water and sugar to a small pot. Heat over medium heat. Split the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape out the seeds inside and add them to the pot. Throw in the bean pod as well. Cook until the mixture becomes thick like a syrup. Let it cool.
- Make the sugar for the rim of the glasses. Split the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape out the seeds inside and add them to the sugar. Mix the sugar and vanilla well so the vanilla gets distributed evenly in the sugar. Dip the rim of the glasses in water and dip them in the vanilla sugar to coat well.
- To make the martini, add all the ingredients to a martini shaker and pour into the sugar rimmed glasses.
- Love!
I served this particular Meyer lemon vodka cocktail to my mom one day and she gave it two thumbs up. She also declared it Grandma s Juice so I think that s also a good sign she enjoyed her drink.
Love it! Grandmas juice 🙂 Super happy to hear that she liked it