The deep love of a G&T continually proves strong, not just in the summer and most definitely not just stateside — the New York Times called 2013 the Year of the Gin and Tonic and Europeans love this little cocktail just as much as we do. Yet, on a recent trip to Portugal, I found their G&Ts to be quite different than what I was used to sipping. That’s when a local bartender dropped some knowledge on me.

Summer is in full swing with parties taking to patios, porches, and parks from coast to coast. Don’t want to show up empty handed, but also not loving the idea of hanging out near a hot stove before your next soirée? Here’s the perfect fix: offer to bring the drinks instead! Whether you’re headed to a picnic or BBQ, this simple summer cocktail is perfect for a happy hour on the go.Mason jars are a slight obsession of mine in the summer.

The last two weeks at our CSA we got to PYO (Pick Your Own) blackberries. After we ate enough to give us belly aches, we put them aside for a couple of days. Unfortunately, when I went to grab a handful, some were too soft and squishy for snacking. I wasn’t up for making jam or baking so into this week’s cocktail they went.As I was muddling a few, I said to my kids, “Look how lucky we are to have all of this food from our garden and the farm.

Before last week, I may have thought convincing a non-Cognac drinker to choose a Cognac-based cocktail for happy hour to be a difficult task. Au contraire, mon frère! A recent visit to Courvoisier poured up a perfect fall drink that leaves even skeptics thirsty for more. This week’s happy hour has a rich French flair you can enjoy right at home. Being a cocktail writer has some advantages including my recent trek to France’s fabulous Cognac region.

Ice cream floats get a full-on adult makeover for this week’s 10-Minute Happy Hour. Grab a spoon and join in on the fun. Making beer floats for happy hour is super easy, indulgent and delicious. It’s as simple as choosing two high-quality ingredients and joining them together for spoonful after spoonful of cold, soothing goodness.

Every week I write the 10-Minute Happy Hour to allow each of us permission to make a moment. No overly involved dinner party or stress-filled gatherings touted here. Just 10 minutes and you get to take a beat and toast the week behind or the weekend to come. Following suit, the newly released book Storied Sips, page after page, highlights how a simple cocktail can “strip away the mundane, gild an evening … and add a little flair.

Some happy hours, like this week’s, aren’t conducted in a standard bar or kitchen. Here in the northeast, the fall foliage is at its peak. It sounds geeky but truly, the images are of the kind that inspire great artists, poets and philosophers. Seeking an infusion of inspiration and some fresh air, my family packed up our gear — including some suitable fall libations — and hit the trail for a weekend in the wilderness. Camping isn’t for everyone.

Don’t feel like drinking your candy corns or sipping on a snickers bar? Me either, so this Halloween, I gave one of my favorite cocktails a holiday makeover that makes drinking something spooky a little easier to swallow. If you still have a Halloween party or two in your weekend plans, make sure this cocktail is on the menu. I’m a sucker for picture perfect drinks that capture the spirit of Halloween, but I find looking at them much more fun than actually drinking them.

A friend of mine recently dined at Tashan, this killer upscale Indian spot in Philadelphia, and she said I must go and order a particular whiskey cocktail. She described it as an Indian Old-Fashioned. So I ventured downtown only to find that the cocktail my friend thought she was describing was something else entirely. What she thought was a whiskey cocktail was in fact made with an aged tequila, a trace of blood orange liqueur and a hint of bitters.

This time of year I do love the heavier, spicy, whiskey-based cocktails. But if we all go hardcore comfort food and heavy hitter cocktails, we’ll be in a food-and-drink coma before Christmas gets here! For many of us, we’ve got a long winter ahead, and while it’s dark at 5 o’clock, there’s no need to hibernate already. The idea for the 10-Minute Happy Hour was born of lack of time and need of good drink.

Making caramel sauce is simple, and additions of sea salt, lavender or even chilies take a basic sauce and make it into something special. This holiday season, I made mine boozy with an infusion of maple bourbon. Maple bourbon is the most popular flavor of bourbon on the market now with big guys like Jim Beam and Knob Creek topping the list of producers. It’s a sweeter style and works well in lots of hot cocktails, after dinner drinks and desserts.

When I was kid, eggnog was a staple at every Christmas party. My mom’s punch bowl was always filled to the top with the creamy cocktail. Like with most classic cocktails, it’s fair game to finesse them to fit your taste. This year our nog gets a good ol’ Kentucky-inspired makeover. My mom always made her eggnog with spiced rum, but I’ve been on a bourbon kick as of late, so I switched up tradition.

One of the best parts of winter is a snow day. Whether you make a snowman or get in a snowball fight or stay in your pajamas all day to watch the snow fall, snow days are especially awesome when you can cozy up with a delicious hot cocktail. Right now this is what it looks like outside our window, so on goes the kettle for cocoa.

You, me and millions of others just got our Downton Abbey fix last Sunday. After what seemed like years, we once again filled our homes with that indelible theme song. Sunday’s premiere proved that Season Four is sure to bring many magnificent moments — and of course a few more one liners from the fantastic Maggie Smith’s portrayal of the Dowager Countess. For this happy hour, we’re stirring up a toast in honor of the undeniably cheeky Violet Crawley.

In the winter I crave two things: juicy Florida grapefruit and rye whiskey. Until the Blinker, I had no idea how good they could be together. Typically, I rave over the case of grapefruit that arrives each January, and this year is no different. This is some of the sweetest, juiciest and most delicious grapefruit and I eat at least one a day. I fancy other grapefruit cocktails, like the Paloma, but this week I was looking for a way to incorporate my favorite winter liquor — rye whiskey.

Everyone has their take on what a nightcap should be. Some even say it should always be brown — that’s right, they say your G&T is better off as an aperitif than your last sip of the evening. (That being said, a nightcap is much different than last call!) For this week’s happy hour, a simple combination of two delicious ingredients will have you pouring the perfect nightcap in no time. For me the perfect nightcap requires little effort with much reward.

For many of us around the country, it’s been a very trying winter. A friend of mine today said, “I’m beyond the winter blues at this point. I’m fully in the black.” For her and any others out there needing a little pick-me-up, here’s a sure-fire cure for the winter blues that will have you happy in no time. This cocktail, the Nor’easter, was served to me in a bourbon-centric bar in Brooklyn’s Cobble Hill neighborhood, Char No. 4.

Sloe gin is not gin at all. This plum-colored and plum-flavored spirit is sweet to sip, but plays nicely with citrus. Add some lemon and some spritz, and we have a lovely drink perfect for brunch. Sloe gin comes from little fruits called sloes, a relative of larger plums. On their own, they are tart and unpleasant but our friends across the pond discovered how to turn them into a lovely spirit. It’s not so popular these days, but at one time, it was consumed as a morning sip.

St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated with all things green, including beer and cocktails. This cocktail however, skips the green food coloring and celebrates with the most recognized Irish stout in the world: Guinness. What better mate to pair it with than champagne? I mean, we’re celebrating after all! The Black Velvet cocktail is all about the pour. First you pour your bubbly into the glass. Then slowly pour your Guinness on top.

In a time when snow in the southern states isn’t unheard of and power outages have become the norm, the arrival of spring has been suspect. So today when something woke me up and it wasn’t a snow plow, a generator, or even a chainsaw, I blinked my eyes open and thought, Sunshine? Birds chirping? Could it really be spring? Bursting with excitement like a child on Christmas morning, I bound from my bed and threw open the curtains. What was this bright light that seared my eyes?

For some reason, with the warm weather also comes a plethora of sweet cocktails. But if you like your drinks dry — which is to say, the opposite of sweet — then you’re going to love my new must-have mixer behind the bar, not to mention this sparkling cucumber cocktail. I recently discovered Dry Soda when grocery shopping and was intrigued by the low calories.

While the Cosmopolitan Cocktail (Cosmo for short) may be pink, it is anything but a frilly drink. When made correctly, the Cosmo delivers a delicious sip of cold smooth vodka flavored with a splash of cranberry juice, orange-flavored Cointreau, and a squeeze of fresh lime to finish. Like many cocktails, this one is often made incorrectly with way too much cranberry juice, so I wanted to make sure readers of The Cocktail Club get to taste what a great Cosmo is.

Combine killer spicy Thai food with the first few hot days of summer, and all you need to cool down is this simply delightful, little cocktail. Pok Pok is a very popular Thai restaurant with spots in Portland, Oregon, and Brooklyn, New York. Both locations serve up fantastic flavors from Thailand with that mix of chile, garlicky, herb and sour flavors that just work perfectly together. Sticky rice, lots of pork dishes and dried fish make numerous appearances on the menu.

Happy hour in the summer is just a little bit happier. Combine an artisanal gin made from wine along with that dose of sunshine and we’re off to a delicious start for the weekend. Tasting all sorts of spirits is part of my job. While many spirits in the same respective category can tend to present themselves as almost identical, gin is a category that continues to be exciting.

When it comes to cocktails, by no means does “frozen” necessarily translate to “frilly.” In fact, one hot spot in the Midwest has a menu of high-end, rock-star cocktails all served frozen. Inspired by the heat and in a toast to the 4th of July, this week we decided to follow suit and take the gin and tonic, that most sublime summertime sip, to the frozen side of cocktails. I took some tips from the pros, Kansas City’s Snow & Co.

Soccer fans across the globe are still spinning from the Germany smack down on Brazil a few weeks ago. If you’re among the mourners, cheer up. This Brazilian-inspired sip is sure to score a win this weekend. You may know cachaça from its appearance in the caipirinha (which is much like the mojito but with cachaça in place of rum and without mint).

I’ve never met a Bloody Mary I didn’t like, but thick tomato juice in the dead of summer isn’t exactly something I crave. Take a quick trip to farmers market, and you can have this fresh Bloody Mary makeover instead, perfect for summer sipping. The secret? Tomato water. Savory and cool, tomato water is a far more refreshing base for a breakfast cocktail. What’s tomato water, you say? You really should find out.

This season kicked off with a bumper crop of strawberries and now our melons just won’t quit. From watermelon and honeydew to this year’s winner, Boule d’ Or, our garden has offered up more than we can eat or share. That’s why we’ve taken our melons to the bar for this week’s 10-Minute Happy Hour. While many of you have already finished harvesting melons, we will be picking and enjoying these sweet beasts until mid-October, barring any killer early frost.

If you spend time with or are even remotely associated with a writer, you must know you are fair game for material. My husband of almost 15 years knows this all too well, and this week’s happy hour proves it once again. Though I had never seen a blood orange until I was in my twenties and in culinary school, my half-Sicilian husband has been eating them since he was a kid.

Fall festivals are in full swing here in the Northeast. Weekends are full of apple picking, pumpkin patches, corn mazes and hay rides — not to mention insanely gorgeous foliage. Inspired by the season and a childhood game I once adored comes this week’s 10-Minute Happy Hour. Bobbing for apples used to be a fierce competition between me and my siblings.

Ever since this little cocktail named The Black Lily scored the signature drink spot at San Francisco’s Cocktail Week a few years back, I’ve been dying to share it with you. Three little ingredients and your weekend will be made! Credit goes to Remy Cointreau’s mixologist Kyle Ford for creating this weirdly addictive sip. It’s based on two ingredients we don’t typically see as the stars at the bar: Cointreau and Fernet Branca.

It’s the most wonderful time of the year to put on a pot of hot cocktails and call up some friends for some holiday cheer. This week for our 10-Minute Happy Hour, the classic Buttered Rum cocktail gets nutty with a little browned butter. Butter in your cocktail is a bit odd, but even I can admit that this drink — like anything with a little butter — is delicious.

Complete with toasty marshmallows, of course.

We’re savoring the last days of summer with grilling and some killer cocktails. Combine the two and you’ve got a head start on an amazing happy hour this weekend. The muddler is one of my favorite tools on the bar. No special instructions required for use; just insert and smash away. This tool can take pretty herbs, fruits and even vegetables, and make sure they release all their amazing flavors and aromas into the cocktail.

The Fourth of July weekend included our annual summer kick-off: a backyard campout complete with too much food and lots of leftovers, including a big bowl of the sweetest watermelon. I couldn’t have been happier to juice it, strain it and quickly transform into a perfect summer sip for this week’s 10-minute happy hour.

This week I was all set to share a spicy cocktail recipe, but then I came upon the sweetest bunch of cherries at the market. You know the saying, “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” So when life gave me cherries I made a cherry-infused cocktail for this week’s 10-Minute Happy Hour! I love cherry pie, but making pie dough was no where near my to-do list this week. Instead, I went to the shaker, or shall I say jam jars, for some drink inspiration.

Where there’s brunch, there are Bloody Marys. So at today’s Cinco de Mayo brunch celebration, it just makes sense that we’ll be happily sipping Mary’s Mexican cousin: the Bloody Maria. The Bloody Maria is the same as a Bloody Mary, but tequila takes the place of vodka, giving this brunch favorite a simple and delicious makeover.

At our house we entertain — a lot. Asian-inspired dishes like Thai curry, Vietnamese Bahn Mi sandwiches, and sushi are often on the menu. Sriracha is our condiment of choice, and while we enjoy cold beer to tame its heat, the search for the perfect cocktail to pair with it has finally come to a very happy ending with this week’s drink. Cilantro is one of those flavors you either love or you vehemently despise. I happen to love it.

People are forever asking what’s my favorite wine. For me it could be about the occasion or what I’m eating but mostly it’s about the weather. I change my wine like my wardrobe. If it’s cold I crave a big chewy red and if it’s hot I only want chilly whites. Sometimes with the change of seasons I’m not always ready to completely switch. For instance, lately I’ve been really enjoying light Pinot Noirs.