Over Father’s Day Weekend, I had the opportunity to share some of my kitchen magic that I’ve developed over the years with my good friend, SB. We had been discussing the Dirty Martini for a couple of months, and I have come up with a way to extend the olive brine to last as long as the olives do.
I know, you are saying to yourself “What does this have to do with preparedness, homesteading, or homeschooling?”
Preparedness -In my house, drink fixin’s are a stockpiled item. Since after a hurricane (our most likely natural disaster), alcohol sales are stopped, and with nothing to do, alcohol does wonders to pass the time, as well as makes a fantastic trade item.
Homesteading – We make it ourselves, or at least take what we have and use methods available from items kept in the home. Call this the DIY angle.
Homeschooling – Chemistry? Home Economics? Life Lessons? Yeah, its a stretch, so let’s say that it has nothing to do with homeschooling, OK?
But then 2 out of 3 ain’t bad! If nothing else, this is a very workable frugal method.
The problem.
Making a Dirty Martini from my wife’s favorite recipe is:
- 2 parts ice cold vodka
- 1-2 parts olive brine from the jar, mostly depending on the smoothness of the vodka.
Enough olives for dozens of martinis, but only enough brine for 3-4. How do we solve this? - Garnish with three olives.
- An ice cube or two is optional.
This means by the time you’ve used up all of the brine, you have only used up about 9 olives. The brine to olive ratio is all off on the packaging for this recipe.
We needed more olive-flavored brine!
The Solution (get it?)
I started researching options, and found many variations, some convoluted, others as simple as “Top off the jar with spring water”.
And I tried many of them, some worked, other did not. Many were a hassle. What I came up with that seems to work flawlessly is also very simple, and only contains items that any prepper should have on hand already.
In fact, I’d guess that every person reading this already has the base ingredients in their cupboards. They are:
- Water
- Salt (non-iodized preferred)
- Vinegar (White preferred)
The ratio is also rather simple.
- 1 cup water
- 1 tablespoon of salt
- 1 tablespoon of vinegar
Mix all three together then stir thoroughly to dissolve all salt. Pour over olives, and refrigerate for at least a day. After a day or two, as you drain off the liquid for Dirty Martinis, simply refill the olive jar with more home made brine. Repeat until the olive jar no longer has olives, then open a new jar and start again.
I did this off the cuff for SB, who was showing me some of his purchased martini brines. One we agreed was fairly good, but the other simply didn’t have any olive flavor to it. When SB tried my concoction, he was so impressed, before adding it to olives, that he made a double batch of brine for later additional testing.
Sure, you can buy pre-made brines for making martinis in lots of places. But why would you when you can make your own that not only saves you money, but tastes great also?
If you must, here are 35 options for Dirty Martini olive brines from Amazon, let me know if you like any of them.
For me, I’ll make my own…
Peace,
db
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Awesome. I actually had no idea what “olice juice” was. And now I will begin practicing making vodka martinis so that I am fully prepared if (when?) we get a hurricane(hurricance season started June 1, no?). Practice makes perfect.
I’m surprised this one isn’t already in your portfolio…I’ve heard some crazy stories coming out of Palm City…
I’m not much of a drinker, but I like these for their lack of grains and sugars…
What about filling the jar of olives with vodka? It works with maraschino cherries right?
I was homeschooled for years, and martini ingredients would have been very relevant. Anything to dull my poor parent’s pain…
Thanks for the hilarious comment… I laughed so loud my wife came in to see what was so funny…then she joined me in the laughter.
Fantastic 🙂
db
Thanks my friend, had 14 jars of dry.olives
Sounds like its time to find a recipe for Tapenade, eh??
🙂
Glad to help!
Peace,
db
I’m giving this a try. I’ll let you know how it turns out tomorrow! 🙂
Well????
🙂
I MADE YOUR RECIPE IT WAS WAY TO SALTY.
To each, his own.
I’d suggest adding more vodka then 🙂
Yes!!! Too salty !!! Threw mine away!!
Add more vodka!
Yeah! Half the salt
What type of vinegar, apple cider or white?
Can’t read…I see it now.
Thank you, db! I love my dirty martinis and this is perfect!
Thanks…and it suuuuure is!
🙂
Just made some brine; will put it in the olives here in a minute. Will let you know the outcome.
I’m waiting…..
I love dirty vodka martinis, too, and had a bottle of store-bought brine but ran out. I had three jars of dry olives in my refrigerator, and the only place locally that I had found some was at Winn Dixie and I don’t have one in my neighborhood any more. I was looking online a few minutes ago to see if any other local stores carried it and came across your site.
I just mixed up a double batch and tasted it. It was good, so I poured it into the bottles with the olives and will see how well that works. Thanks for the great idea! South Louisiana gets hurricanes, too, as you well know, lol!
Always glad to help!
We have been using your recipe now for quite some time and it works great! Thanks so much.
*BURP*
Me too!
Thanks!
Love this!
For global visitors:
1 cup ~= 240ml
1 tblspn ~= 15ml
Now you can scale the recipe the the size of your olive jar 🙂
Thanks for that!
Just mixed it up today! I’ll let you know!
This recipe is perfect !!! I have been using your recipe for the past year. Thank You I have saved so much money!
Thank You!! I just bougth 2 pounds of olives on bulk (they are in brine on the market but they weigth it and give it to you without brine) and was looking for a recipe for vinegar brine for olives to put them in jars.
Hope all is well. I recently started a home bar in PSL Florida and had my first dirty martini order actually several. I quickly learned the olive juice in the jar won’t go far. I found this post and recipe. Thank you.
Excellent! And from a neighbor!
I use your recipe all the time – it’s great! – here’s a funny story – I was at a Wedding reception ordered a Vodka Tuni from the bar(up) a young man approached me asked me what I was drinking – I replied a Martini – he ordered one – thought it was great!
Their is hope for our Yutes!
Have been using your recipe for a while now. Awesome. Curious though, I found a jar of Martini Vermouth olives at Kroger today. The ingredients list vermouth, sea salt, white wine vinegar … any thoughts on how to recreate this oh wise one?
“Oh wise one”? You need to meet more people 😛
I’ve had several requests for vermouth-added recipes, I’d say, add some `til it suits your tastes. Everyone has different tastes…and being that I don’t drink, couldn’t tell you what vermouth tastes like 🙁
Best of luck! Thanks for stopping by!
Thank you so much for this recipe!!! I like my dirty martinis dirty and hated spending money on the bottles of brine. But that was the only way to get them the flavor I wanted. Funny story: on vacation a couple years ago, I ordered a dirty martini and the bartender asked me, “so how dirty? Hallmark channel or hardcore porn?” 😆(which I’ve never seen). I think I’m “Outlander” range
Thank you – I think this is a great work-around when short of Olive Brine – I’ve tweaked it modestly by Crushing (with flat knife blade; like when chopping garlic cloves) and finely chopping a couple olives to add to the recipe – thereby amping-up the olive flavor. Makes it dirtier somehow. Strain when using if looking for less particulate. Salt amount was fine for me. Use Kosher to ‘margin down’ saltiness.
Small tweak but seems to assist the drink – the end result.
Sounds like a great upgrade!
I saw another post suggesting to add vermouth to the brine. I’m curious if anybody has a suggestion on what proportion of vermouth to this recipe.
Also thinking of adding a sprig or two of rosemary in time to add some depth!
Try it! Experimenting like this would be interesting. I’m not a drinker though, so can only go off what others tell me.
Got a pork belly question? I GOT those answers 😀