How to make: Bloody Mary

Ingredients:

50ml (2 tots) vodka125ml (½ cup) tomato juice10ml (2 tsp) lemon juiceWorcestershire sauce, to tasteSalt and pepper, to tasteTabasco, to taste (or wasabi if you prefer)

Method:

Combine all the ingredients in a cocktail shaker filled with ice and shake well. Strain into a highball glass over ice cubes and serve with a celery stick.

This is the classic Bloody Mary, but there are hundreds of variations. Replace the vodka with gin and you have a Bloody Margaret. Mix sherry with the vodka and you get a Bloody Bishop. In Canada it is made with clamato juice, which is tomato juice mixed with clam extract (blame it on frozen taste buds). Leave out the alcohol and you have a Virgin Mary in the US, a Bloody Shame in Australia, and a Bloody Barbara in the UK (named after then transport minister Barbara Castle, who introduced the breathalyser test in the 1960s).