When walking along the Seawall in Galveston, close to 21st Street near the historic Hotel Galvez, you’ll see a four-post structure with a burlap roof that is often billowing in the Gulf breeze. Once you get closer, yellow signs will tell you that it’s the historic Balinese Room Pier, or rather, what little that is left of it. Signs around the structure will give you some history of this historic club and how it was destroyed when Hurricane Ike made landfall in September, 2008.
The history of The Balinese Room is something that needs to be made into an epic in the style of GoodFellas or Casino, because it has everything: Sicilian barbers-turned mobsters who started a whole crime family, illustrious performers including Sinatra playing at the club, illegal gambling, foiling Texas Rangers until they finally figured out that they needed undercover agents to catch the illegal gambling, and finally a redemption story turned tragic thanks to a horrific hurricane. It’s also known, at least locally, of being one of the many places that claims to have invented the margarita, one of the best cocktails invented in North America.
Per the local lore, Balinese Room bartender Santos Cruz made singer Peggy Lee a margarita when she requested a drink like her husband’s sidecar but with tequila instead of brandy since the former was more novel. Per a sign in the Balinese Room which is presumably lost to the depths of the Gulf, the claim was a sidecar was made with lime juice which is incorrect–it’s made with lemon–and came with a rim of sugar which Cruz switched for salt for Ms. Lee’s tipple. Her husband allegedly suggested naming it after her, and all told it’s a pretty wonderful story.
Here’s the thing: it’s not necessarily true. Or rather, it is one of many origin stories of the margarita, and the Smithsoinan doesn’t even acknowledge The Balinese Room’s story as one of them. The reason why it resonates with me, at least, is how it resembles a story that Alton Brown uses in his Good Eats episode “Raising the Bar Again” in which he supposes a bartender at the US/Mexico border was asked to make a sidecar but didn’t have the ingredients so he improvised by using lime juice for lemon and tequila for the brandy. It makes me wonder if it’s the Balinese Room story he’s referencing because the similarities are so close, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
What’s funny is that his original version of the margarita isn’t very good–there’s an absurd amount of citrus involved that doesn’t impart much flavor. He was going to reload it in the canceled Good Eats: Reloaded season 3, but that never came to be; thankfully, he published his recipe in his cookbook Good Eats: The Final Years. He includes a recipe for how to make a homemade orange liqueur that is neither Cointreau nor Grand Mariner but a sort-of combination of them both, and it makes for a really flavorful concoction. It’s one more reason to get an immersion circulator so you can make all of these liqueurs, especially if you don’t want to keep a big bottle of triple sec or Grand Mariner in your bar at all times.
I like to think that this margarita feels close to whatever Peggy Lee enjoyed at the Balinese Room 75(!!!!) years ago.
Margarita 2.01
Lightly adapted from Good Eats: The Final Years by Alton Brown
Makes 1 cocktail
- 2 oz tequila blanco
- 1 oz orange liqueur, recipe to follow
- Juice of one fat lime
- ½ ounce agave (optional)
- Ice
Combine all ingredients into a cocktail shaker and shake vigorously for 30 seconds or until the shaker is ice cold. Strain into a coupe, Nick & Nora, or martini glass and serve immediately
IC Orange Liqueur
Lightly adapted from Good Eats: The Final Years by Alton Brown
(Note: I halved this because I didn’t want another one of my orange liqueurs sitting around, but I would make the full batch next time.)
- 1 cup vodka (Wheatley’s preferable)
- ½ cup brandy
- 3 oranges
- 38 g granulated sugar
- 1 ½ tsp bitter orange peel (I like this brand)
Special equipment: immersion circulator, Ziploc gallon freezer bags, sharp Y peeler, fine mesh strainer
Set your immersion circulator in a bath to 160 degrees. While it comes to temperature, prepare your infusion: peel the oranges, trying to avoid as much of the white pith as possible (if needed, you can scrape any off with a paring knife), and then add the zest, vodka, brandy, sugar, and bitter orange peel to the Ziploc bag. When the bath is ready, carefully lower the bag into the bath, letting the water push out the air, zip it closed, and then let it go for at least an hour. Prepare an ice bath, a carefully lower the bag into it and let it sit for 10 minutes. Strain into a glass container of your choice until you’re ready to make some cocktails.
The Manhattan [food] Project 