Brazil’s national cocktail is the caipirinha. It’s fantastic and incredibly refreshing! If your local liquor store doesn’t carry cachaça, ask them to get some for you because there is no substitute.
| Prep Time: | 5 mins |
| Total Time: | 5 mins |
| Servings: | 1 |
Ingredients
- ½ lime, quartered
- 1 teaspoon white sugar
- 2 ½ fluid ounces cachaça (Brazilian rum)
- 1 cup ice cubes
Instructions
- Squeeze and drop lime wedges into a large rocks glass. Add sugar and muddle until juices release.
- Pour in cachaça and ice. Stir well.
Reviews
Should be raw cane sugar, or if not available brown sugar.
Double the recipe and enjoy. 🙂
made a batch of these for a World Cup party thanks to a recommendation from a Brazilian coworker. It has been our cocktail of choice ever since. Simple and delicious!
Super basic and all you need for a perfect cocktail. **Limes are essential; lemons aren’t ever used! Lemons are not readily avail in Brazil (&South America) Peel and all are thrown into a glass and broken down quickly with ice using a pestal.
I had never heard of this drink until someone had brought us the Cachaca and told us we had to try it. Very simple recipe, easy to make and very tasty. I used American limes, really good!
Whoa baby! I made these for ladies’ weekend at the cabin to have with pulled pork. I put them in shot glasses to start and am so glad I did! These taste a lot like lemoncello, but more tart not so sweet. I will make again and want to mix in club soda for a refreshing summer beverage without ALL the kick!
Use good quality cachaca. There is no real mix to speak of, so use lots of ice and sip as the ice melts. Fabulous on a hot day. I found the amounts of sugar to lime were just right: not too sweet, not too tart.
Finally found the rum needed to make these but it was so worth it! Excellent cocktail
I made as written and then ended up adding more sugar to it to help cut the bite. It was really refreshing and tasty!
Amazing fresh and lively, with lime, only.
March 1 snow storm in Philly. Never a bad time to make this drink! Great recipe!
As a Brazilian I’ve made many caipirinhas professionally. You definitely want to go with a Handcrafted/Artesnal Cachaca. I always use Cachaca São Paulo. No hangover and excellent quality with a competitive price. The half lime should be cut into cubes muddled with the sugar, add ice then the Cachaca. The secret is in the shake. If your caipirinha looks like a carbonated drink you have made an excellent one. Enjoy.
Very simple and straightforward recipe! Only problem is that some brazilians always insisted in mix up the things and translate “limão” as “lemon”, what is completely wrong: “Limão”(the green fruit) is lime, and “lima” (the yellow one) is lemon, in portuguese. I believe that thousands of poor american citizens were instructed the wrong way on caipirinha recipe. Blame on brazilians bad english knowledge (I`m one of them – but I do not confuse “vital” things like that…). One more thing: caipirinha is made of lime, sugar and cachaça on the rocks. Everything else is not caipirinha. Period!
as a Scotsman who has been to Brasil on many occasions- here is my take – 1. Yes limes only please. 2. Cane sugar only, unrefined if possible. 3. Im sure its great with pineapple and many other things but then it aint a Caiparinha. 4. No matter how good the cachaca, or how well you follow the recipe or how good the company is – it’ll never ever ever taste the same as it does in a bar anywhere in Brasil with the samba music blaring and the beautiful multicultural crazy clientel all around you – so do yourself a favour and go visit the most beautiful, hospitable and downright loco country in the world! and Yes Scotland runs a very close second- we just don’t get the weather 🙂
I used 2 tsp of cane sugar and it tastes great!
The best!
The best!
I had one at a Brazilian restaurant and loved it, so of course had to make it at home. The cachaca is very strong so I need to work on this recipe a bit yet.
Way too little sugar in this recipe. I use a rounded tablespoon. You want enough sugar to saturate the mix. There should be a little granulated sugar at the bottom of the glass once it is all stirred together. Sugar should be ground into the lime. I use a mortar & pestle. You want to bruise the peel of the lime to bring out the zest. I pour the lime and sugar into a glass with crushed ice, rinse the mortar with cachaca, and stir it into the glass. Wow! Best ingredients? As one reviewer says, good cachaca. Brazilian limes, way better than those I get in the States. And, O Samba.
Try with 2-3 oucnces of Midori melon liquer! yummy!!
Delicious! Novo Fogo is my favorite cachaca!