Caipirinha

• Chakana - The Inca Cross

Caipirinha is Brazil's national cocktail (yes, they actually have a national cocktail...come on! it's Brazil...every nation has it's favorite beferage such as chicha in Peru and beer in Germany...etc, but Brazil makes their favorite beverage official...). A Caipirinha is made of Cachaça (also known as pinga), lime and sugar (and sometimes a little bit of water too) and is served over ice. Cachaça is a potent alcohol, similar to rum. It is fermented and distilled sugarcane with an alcohol percentage of roughly 45% by volume.

In the absence of cachaça, Vodka or Rum is substituted as the alochol of choice in a caipirinha. The authentic caipirinha recipe calls for using limes called limões galegos, otherwise known as key limes.

The popularity of caipirinha outside of Brazil has been growing in recent years and can be found in many restaurants and bars in the Unites States and in the UK.

Though Caipirinha is an extremely popular drink in Brazil in its own right,a variation of it known as a Caipifruta is also very popular. The Caipifruta is prepared with a mixture of crushed fruits, crushed ice, condensed milk and of course, cachaça.