Spicy Blood Orange Margarita Recipe
Spicy Blood Orange Margarita Ingredients
2 oz / 60 ml Blanco tequila (I used Patron)
1 oz / 30 ml Ancho Reyes chili liqueur
1 oz / 30 ml Lime juice, fresh
1 oz / 30 ml Blood orange juice, fresh
.25 oz / 7 ml Agave nectar
Black Hawaiian sea salt for the rim
Blood orange wheel and dried lime wheel for garnish
How to make a Spicy Blood Orange Margarita
Run a lime wedge around the outside edge of the glass and roll it in black Hawaiian sea salt. Rimming the outside instead of dipping keeps the salt out of the drink.
Add the tequila, Ancho Reyes, lime juice, blood orange juice, and agave nectar to a shaker with ice.
Shake until well chilled, then pour over fresh crushed ice.
Garnish with a blood orange wheel and a dried lime wheel.
Mezcal in place of the blanco tequila pushes the smoke further and works with the ancho.
A margarita gets its color from whatever you put in it, which is why so many Halloween versions reach for red food dye. This one does not need it. An ounce of fresh blood orange juice does the whole job, and the color that comes out is darker and less even than anything poured from a bottle. The oranges in the video are sold under the Dracula label, an Australian brand whose US supply peaks in October, which is convenient timing for a drink like this one. Any blood orange works. Moro is the most common in American grocery stores and the darkest of the bunch.
The build is where this stops being an ordinary margarita. A standard spec runs two ounces of tequila to half an ounce of orange liqueur. Here Ancho Reyes takes that slot on its own at a full ounce and the Cointreau comes out entirely. Ancho Reyes is a chili liqueur made from dried ancho peppers, so it carries smoke and a slow heat along with the sweetness the drink needs to stay in the daisy family. Worth knowing before you pour: it is 40% ABV, the same as the tequila, so a full ounce makes this stronger than the margarita you are used to, not softer. If you are building out a Halloween menu, the black margarita takes its color from squid ink and the blood bag margarita is the party pouch version of the same fruit.
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