Verde Maria

By Florence Cherruault Clare Lewington
Published on July 22, 2019
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I made this cocktail for an event we did with Pantone and Airbnb. They’d turned a house in London into a beautiful inside-out garden house and wanted a green Bloody Mary for the event. This one’s also just as good without the booze.

Serves 1

Ingredients:

  • 25 ml (3/4 fl oz) white rum
  • 25 ml (3/4 fl oz) green chilli liqueur
  • 125 ml (4 fl oz) Maria Mix (see below)
  • ice cubes, to serve
  • lime wedge, avocado slice,
  • cornichon and rosemary sprig, to garnish

Maria Mix

  • 1 cucumber, peeled and deseeded
  • 6 coriander (cilantro) sprigs
  • 50 ml (2 fl oz) Pickle Juice (see below)
  • 1 green pepper (bell pepper)
  • juice of 1/2 lime
  • 1 celery stalk
  • pinch of ground cumin
  • pinch of celery salt
  • pinch of ground coriander
  • pinch of coarsely ground black pepper
  • 100 ml (3-1/2 fl oz) water
  • 10 dashes green Tabasco

Instructions:

  1. To make the Maria mix, combine all the ingredients in a blender and blend to a purée. Pass the mixture through a piece of muslin (cheesecloth) into a bowl.
  2. Build the ingredients over ice in a rocks glass, starting with the rum, then the green chilli liqueur and finally the Maria mix.
  3. Stir thoroughly, then garnish with a lime wedge, a slice of avocado, cornichon and a sprig of rosemary.

Pickle Juice

This is a really good basic pickle juice, a great place to start if you’re new to the pickling game. Once you’ve mastered this recipe, you can play around with different herbs and spices.

Makes 1 litre (34 fl oz)

Ingredients:

  • 1 tablespoon white mustard seeds
  • 1 teaspoon coriander seeds
  • 1 teaspoon celery seeds
  • 1 cucumber, sliced lengthways into 2.5 cm (1 in) sticks or 2 cm (3/4 in) thick circles
  • few dashes of Tabasco

Pickling Juice

  • 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) water
  • 500 ml (17 fl oz/2 cups) apple cider vinegar
  • 1 teaspoon ground turmeric
  • 2 tablespoons salt
  • 5 tablespoons unrefined caster (superfine) sugar

Instructions:

  1. Place the mustard seeds, coriander seeds and celery seeds in a sterilised Kilner jar, or divide between 2 jars, depending on their size. Pack the jars as tightly as you can with the cucumbers.
  2. Combine all the ingredients in a large saucepan for the pickling juice and heat slowly until everything has dissolved.
  3. Using a funnel, pour the hot pickling juice into the jar. Make sure the juice covers the cucumbers, but leave about 1 cm (1/2 in) of room between the lid and the vinegar. Seal the jar, then leave them to cool for a couple of hours. Once cooled, refrigerate.
  4. The pickles will be ready to eat the next day, but they’re best left for 2 weeks before eating to mellow out the acidity of the vinegar, making the pickle juice smoother to drink. If you want something really special, don’t touch them for up to 6 months. When making our Original Pickle Juice, we now leave the jars to sit for 1 year so the juices in the cucumber mellow out the acidity in the vinegar.

More from Pickle Juice:


Recipes excerpted with permission fromPickle Juice by Florence Cherruault, published by Hardie Grant Books November 2018, RRP $19.99 hardcover.

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