Spooky Spirits: Our Favorite Halloween-Themed Cocktails

Keeping your eyes peeled for a spooky cocktail? Check out the Midori Melon Eye-tini.

Halloween brings out the kid in us when we pose the perennial question we’ve asked since we were 5 years old: “What are you going to be?” But now that we’ve traded in our trick-or-treating for Halloween parties, discussions also include fun decorations and the perfect Halloween playlists. (In our opinion, two musts are Bauhaus’ “Bela Lugosi’s Dead” and Ministry’s “Every Day Is Halloween.”) We also love the spooky food and drinks that show up on All Hallows’ Eve. So when we saw the photo of the Midori Melon Eye-Tini and Riazul Tequila Fake Blood, we were intrigued. (And, yes, a little creeped out.)

Note that the eye-tini calls for spanked basil — but that doesn’t mean you’ll have to wrangle a guest dressed as a dominatrix to mix your drinks. To spank basil, simply slap it between your palms to release its fragrant oils. In the following recipe, one part is equal to about 1 ounce.

Midori Melon Eye-Tini

1¼ parts Midori Melon liqueur

¾ part SKYY Infusions citrus vodka

½ part Finest Call agave syrup

3 orange wedges

3 fresh basil leaves, 2 ripped, 1 spanked

1 scoop ice (about ½ martini shaker)

2 parts Finest Call sweet & sour mix

2 parts Canada Dry green tea ginger ale

Strawberry sundae syrup

1 red seedless grape

In a shaker glass, combine Midori Melon liqueur, citrus vodka, agave syrup, orange wedges and ripped basil leaves. Muddle ingredients together. Add ice and sweet & sour mix. Shake for 10 seconds. Add Canada Dry green tea ginger ale and roll drink back and forth between your mixing tin and shaker glass. Strain into a chilled martini glass drizzled with strawberry sundae syrup to give the effect of a bloodshot eye. For garnish, place a chilled red seedless grape at bottom of glass (to look like an eyeball) and float spanked basil leaf on top of the cocktail for aroma.

With the popularity of vampires — from Twilight to True Blood — as well as the rise in bedbugs (and the resulting costumes), you may want to have a cocktail available that appeals to the bloodsucking crowd. The Fake Blood recipes below call for glow-in-the-dark candy vampire fangs, but since we’re a little wary of ingesting something that glows in the dark, we think regular candy fangs will do.

Fake Blood

1 ounce Riazul Silver Tequila

1 ounce crème de cassis

1 lime wedge

Ginger beer

Combine tequila, crème de cassis and squeezed lime juice with a handful or scoop of ice, shake and strain into a chilled glass. Fill with ginger beer. Garnish with candy vampire fangs!

No crème de cassis? Use this alternate recipe with cranberry juice, simple syrup and ginger ale instead.

1½ ounces Riazul Silver Tequila

1 ounce cranberry juice

1 lime wedge

½ ounce simple syrup

1 splash ginger ale

Combine tequila, cranberry juice, squeezed lime juice and simple sugar with a handful or scoop of ice. Shake and strain into a chilled glass. Fill with a splash of ginger ale.

Just make sure cocktails are consumed judiciously, so that post-party, your eyes don’t look like the eye-tini. Do you have any Halloween party cocktail recipes to share?