{Sip} Sinful (Girl Scout Cookie) Mint Madness Cocktail

One of my favorite holidays is St. Patrick’s Day.  Yes, I am Irish – well, I’m part Irish, part Welsh and part German, but whatever, I feel quite close to my Celtic roots.  It’s not just the color green either.  Well, let’s be honest, it hasn’t much to do with the color green at all.  Any celebratory day that has more to do with drinking and carousing with friends and less to do with present giving commercialism (now now, don’t get all wound up, I like Christmas too), is a holiday for me. 

Of course, I’m a Mom now, so my celebratory carousing with friends is WAY less than it used to be.  In fact, I’m not sure you can call my current state of celebrations ‘carousing’ at all.

ANYWHO, last year, Girl Scout Cookies came before St. Patrick’s Day.  They came before St. Patrick’s Day this year too.  But, this year I was sufficiently prepared to hide my Thin Mints (from myself as much as everyone else) as soon as they arrived, in preparation for my experimental St. Patrick’s Day cocktail.

I tweeted about my plan, I facebooked about my plan and I waited ever so patiently for St. Patrick’s Day to arrive.  I opened my freezer occasionally just to longingly stare at my Thin Mints before admonishing myself to be patient and wait.  “Thin Mints are good Shauna,” I said to myself, “but imagine how great they’ll be included with alcohol?”  Okay, now that didn’t sound like a very mature or responsible Mom, but truly, I am.  I just enjoy an occasional cocktail…or glass of wine…or beer – sheesh, I’m not very convincing am I?

So, we all know what yesterday was right?  Yup, it was St. Patrick’s Day, so I gathered my ingredients along with my son and sauntered, strutted, trotted walked (yes, just boringly walked) across the street to my guinea pigs’ neighbor’s house to create my long awaited St. Patrick’s Day Girl Scout Cookie Cocktail.  Here’s how it looked after I did my best Tom Cruise (Cocktail) impression (no picture of me though – I cannot throw a bottle in the air and catch it by the way):

Pretty no?  Well, it’s prettier in person I swear.  Now that I’m looking at it in the picture, it looks like someone accidentally droped dirt into our glasses of milk – hmmm?  But, no matter, it was pretty yummy.  The best part is that while some of the cookies stay floating on the top, plenty sink to the bottom and soak up the delicious mint chocolate liqueur cream.  It’s kind of like a grown up version of crushing Oreo cookies and putting them in milk.  So, if you’d like to try this at home, feel free (21 and up please – or whatever the legal drinking age is where you live).  

Here’s my recipe (remember, I don’t measure.  I know it’s a bad habit for a blogger, but I just can’t help it):

Ingredients:

• Chocolate Mint liqueur cream (I used Delaney’s.  Most people would think of Bailey’s Irish Cream, but I’m not most people now am I?)
• Vodka (if you haven’t yet tried it, Svedka is quite good.  I’m a Grey Goose gal myself, but when mixing, Svedka is really good and inexpensive.  I am so not helping my “I’m a good and responsible Mom” argument right now)
• Thin Mint Girl Scout Cookies (enough for crushing into the drink, enough for you to nibble on while shaking the drinks, enough to bribe the kids with while you sit idly sipping your newfound cocktail)

To Do:

Fill a shaker with ice, open vodka and pour ‘5 seconds worth’.  Yes, this is the way I measure – I count.  One, one thousand, two, one thousand…not too slow mind you, my drink was fairly strong as it was.  Then fill the shaker with the liqueur to within a couple of inches of the top (enough to give it a good shake).  Cover and shake it all up, pour into pretty glasses (martini would be nice, we just didn’t have any on hand). 

Now, the fun part – dump a bunch of the Thin Mints into a zipock bag, seal it – don’t forget this sealing part otherwise you’ll have a Thin Mint massacre in your kitchen.  I’m not speaking from experience as far as your concerned, just sayin’ – it would be bad.  Anyways, as I was saying, you’ve sealed your ziplock bag, now gather your meat tenderizer and using the smooth side.  What?  You don’t own a meat tenderizer you say?  I hope you don’t call yourself a serious chef my dear.  Seriously though, the best part of kitchen utensils is having something specifically for smashing – it makes it more civilized than using a hammer.  Granted you’re still hammering and smashing, but you feel so, so civilized doing it.  Okay, so you have your meat tenderizer (smooth side – no holes in the ziplock bag – remember the kitchen massacre warning) or you have your hammer.  Put said bag on a cutting board on the counter (unless you have those cool wood cutting board countertops like my neighbors have) and smash up the Thin Mints.  Open said bag and sprinkle however much Thin Mint Mash onto your drink as you’d like.

Next, and this is most important – Cheers!  I hope you know what comes after that.