Seven Cocktails Inspired by This Year’s Oscar Nominees
The 2025 Oscars Dinner Party Recap: Overture.
What sets this list of seven movie-related cocktails apart from what you’ll find elsewhere is that these drinks have thematic ties to their paired films; it’s not solely based on puns. Although the ceremony is in just two days, it’s not too late to get the ingredients together for Sunday!
And in case you missed it, here’s my full run-down of food and drink ideas for this year’s Oscar nominated movies:
These drinks are all easy to put together, with only a couple requiring any special infusions. (In the interest of brevity, the specs assume you have a passing familiarity with mixing drinks; Robert Simonson’s guide in the New York Times is a great place to start. You’ll need a shaker, strainer, jigger, and citrus juicer, along with the appropriate glassware. And yes, freshly squeezed lime and lemon juice is better than the pasteurized crap.) Not all of these drinks are originals, but most are riffing off of established classics with the help of my friends!
Special thanks to Lai Eng for taking all the great photos you see below! Check out her work on her website or Instagram. And big thanks to Aeron Thai and Eric Truong for handling bartending duties last weekend.
Mexican 75 (Emilia Pérez)
This riff on the light and fizzy French 75 reflects the film it’s based on: seemingly Mexican, but it’s actually French. Developed with Brad Orego and Terry Wen.
1 oz tequila
1 oz mezcal
½ oz lemon juice
¼ oz simple syrup 1:1 (or a drop of rich simple)
3 oz sparkling wine (preferably Spanish cava in honor of Karla Sofía Gascón, but it doesn’t matter what you use)
All ingredients besides the wine are SHAKEN. Strain into a coupe and top with the wine. Garnish with a lime or lemon twist.
Note: due to a transcription error when printing out the specs, we served ½ oz each of the tequila and mezcal at my party, unless my bartenders knew better than I did and fixed it. Oops! But no one seemed to mind? It’s all about the bubbly, anyways. Play around with the amount of liquor; it’s a forgiving drink.
Caipirinha (I’m Still Here)
The national Oscar contender of Brazil is well represented by their national drink. I think this was the most popular thing that my guests ordered. (This is the same canonical recipe that you see in various sources, including Punch.)
2 ounces cachaça
1 lime, quartered
2 teaspoons sugar
BUILT: in a rocks glass, add lime pieces and sugar, and muddle until well juiced. (Alternatively, muddle just a couple wedges of lime and add a ½ oz of lime juice to make up for it.) Add cachaça and ice, stir. Garnish with another lime wedge.
Ani’s Cosmo (Anora)
This was my favorite drink on the menu, mostly because it was an original idea I created by mashing together two different drinks: a “Beetnik martini” that called for beet-infused vodka and Toby Cecchini’s original Cosmopolitan. I actually cannot stand Cosmos, but the beets ground the flavors very nicely. It almost feels healthy.
1 ½ ounces beet vodka (see below)
¾ ounce Cointreau or high quality triple sec
¾ ounce lime juice
¾ ounce cranberry cocktail, such as Ocean Spray
All ingredients are SHAKEN with ice and strained into a Nick & Nora or coupe glass. Garnish with lemon or lime twist.
To make the drink look fancy and lean into the Russianness of it all, use a pastry brush to smear sour cream on one side of the glass, then freeze it until solidified (this should only take a few minutes). It’ll look very pretty!
Beet Infused Vodka
Roughly 2 ½ lbs red beets, scrubbed and trimmed (no need to be exact)
1 bottle of vodka (750ml or 1L, doesn’t matter too much. I like Monopolowa.)
Bring a large pot of water to a boil and cook the beets at a hard simmer until tender enough that a knife slips in without resistance. This should take roughly 60-90 minutes.
Drain and let cool so you don’t hurt yourself when you peel the beets (they should slip off pretty easily) and make thick slices.
Combine warm beets and vodka in a large container (and save that vodka bottle to store the finished product).
Cover and chill for a couple days, up to one week. Give it a taste every day, it’s done when you think it is, or when it stops tasting different each day.
Strain into a bowl and discard beets, trust me when I say you don’t want to take a bite. Pour the infused vodka back into the reserved bottle (a funnel and mesh strainer come in handy). Store the beet vodka in the fridge.
The Mystical One (Dune 2)
This cinnamon-sage whiskey sour comes was developed by Natasha David, one of the founders of erstwhile LES hotspot Nitecap (RIP Nitecap). It’s a good match for Dune, with a powerful combination of sage and spice shaking things up.
3 sage leaves
½ ounce cinnamon syrup (see below)
¾ ounce lime juice
2 ounces bourbon
1 egg white or foam substitute (optional)
Combine the sage leaves and the cinnamon syrup in a cocktail shaker and MUDDLE. Add the lime juice and bourbon. If using egg white, add it and DRY SHAKE. Then add ice and SHAKE. Strain into a Nick & Nora or a coupe. Garnish with a nice looking sage leaf.
I think whiskey sours are much better with foam, so I include an egg white. But if you don’t have extra egg whites lying around, one of my bartender friends swears by Ms Better's Bitters Miraculous Foamer. Or just omit it and the drink will still be great!
If you want to turn this Dune drink into a hybrid with A Complete Unknown (both star Timothée Chalamet!), drizzle a spoon of red wine on top, as you would in a New York Sour. You’ve got yourself an Arrakis Sour!
Cinnamon Syrup
3 cinnamon sticks, broken up
1 cup water
1 cup sugar
Combine the cinnamon sticks and water in a saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat. Reduce the heat to low, add the sugar, and stir until the sugar dissolves, about 1 minute. Remove the pan from the heat and let the mixture cool and macerate for 1 hour. Strain through a cheesecloth into a glass bottle or jar and store in the fridge for up to 1 month.
Like a Whiskey Stone (A Complete Unknown)
Coffee and cigarettes was the prevailing gustatory vibe for the 1960s set, Bob Dylan in Manhattan movie. This is a smoky take on a Revolver, which itself is a riff on a Manhattan, one of the most famous Old Fashioned variants. Twenty people came to my Oscars dinner parties and literally one person ordered this. But it’s really good, if a bit acerbic. Definitely not for everyone; peated scotch is divisive. Just like Bob Dylan! Developed with Aeron Thai.
2 ounces Laphroaig 10 Year
1 ounces coffee liqueur
½ ounces simple syrup 1:1 (you can also use the cinnamon syrup you made for The Mystical One)
1 dash orange bitters
STIR all ingredients with ice, strain into a Nick & Nora. Garnish with flamed orange twist (it’s easier than it sounds).
The Substance Shooter
Definitely the most fun of all these cocktails! Bonus points if you have syringe shooters to showcase the sickly greenish yellow color of this sweet shot with a biting kicker. Don’t be surprised if your body starts to change after you take a dose…
Beyond aesthetics, the chartreuse not only refers to director Coralie Fargeat’s heritage, but the continued shortage of the herbal liqueur makes this substance just as rare as the one in the movie.
1.5 parts green chartreuse
1.5 parts yellow chartreuse
1 part lime juice
1 part Midori
SHAKEN and strained into shot glasses.
I recommend making a large batch and serving this one round at a time. 3 oz each of the chartreuses and 2 oz each of lime and Midori should be enough for eight small shots. If you can’t get your hands on both of the chartreuses, replace it with the other kind or use a substitute. Punch has a comprehensive guide. Though the flavor will be different from what I had, it should still be good enough.
Pickle Boys (Nickel Boys)
This isn’t really a cocktail… and this doesn’t really have anything to do with Nickel Boys besides the pun. Just fix yourself (and your friends) a pickleback shot: line up the shot of your choice (traditionally whiskey) and a shot of pickle juice. If you wanna go on theme with the movie, grab a Florida-made whiskey like St. Augustine. I don’t usually keep pickled cucumbers in my fridge, so I use the leftover pickle brine from cornichons, guindilla peppers… this is a flexible format. I dunno, usually if I’m having a pickleback I’m too drunk to care much!
Water of Life (Dune 2)
Late addition on March 3: Brad was really pushing for a “Water of Life” cocktail. It had to be blue, and it had to have eau de vie or aquavit. We workshopped something after this post was initially published and made a few rounds during my Oscars Watch Party. But for posterity, here’s the specs for a surprisingly refreshing drink.
2 oz Aquavit
1/2 oz Curaçao
1/4 oz lime
1/4 oz falernum
SHAKEN and strained.
Other Ideas
While not tied to a specific movie, the Final Credits (created at The Cambridge Public House in Paris) is a refreshing, tangy strawberry-forward drink. There’s a lot of batching required but it’s worth the effort!
Or if you can get your hands on Brahma or another brand of Brazilian beer, you’ve got the I’m Still Beer.
And if the thought of making a bunch of cocktails tires you out, there’s nothing wrong with drinking wine while you watch the Oscars! Beyond a bottle of bubbly, Maria Banson (aka Brunello Bombshell) has thoughtful pairings for nine of this year’s nominated films.
