Sunny’s Cantina – St. Louis, MO

Sunny’s Margarita

While at a Karaoke event with some friends, I met a someone who is a server at a Mexican restaurant called Sunny’s Cantina. I of course started talking Margaritas and she insisted that I come visit Sunny’s as soon as I could because I would love their Margaritas. As it turned out, I was able to visit just about a week later. Sunny’s has a nice selection of Margarita varieties so I of course had to sample as many as I could!

I started with what appeared to be their house Margarita, the aptly named Sunny’s Margarita. The listed ingredients were Espolon Blanco Tequila, fresh lime juice, & orange simple syrup with a salt rim. A seemingly simple but quality list of ingredients. And accordingly, this was a simple but quality Margarita. It had excellent balance and flavor, just a well-made Margarita. My only slight nitpick of this drink was that as solid of a Margarita as it was, the flavors just didn’t “wow” me. This is an odd contraction I admit, and maybe I had some grand expectation of what the Margarita would be but like I said, it was my only slight nitpick. Overall I give the Sunny’s Margarita an 8.5.

Next I tried their Jalapeño Margarita. The only difference in listed ingredients was jalapeño simple syrup instead of orange and a spicy salt rim instead of, um … a “not spicy” salt rim. Not surprisingly the Jalapeño Margarita was then very similar to the Sunny’s. I’m always wary of spicy Margaritas, as it is often too easy to have the spicy flavor overwhelm the rest of the drink. This one was very good, with just a pleasing hint of jalapeño flavor. I rate it an 8.

Finally, I tried their Cadillac Margarita. The ingredients listed were Teremana Reposado Tequila, fresh lime juice, orange simple syrup, and Grand Marnier. As always, I am wary of Grand Marnier in any Margarita because of the tendency for it to leave a bitter finish in my experience. The good news was that the Cadillac Margarita at Sunny’s Cantina was very good. It had a strong flavor as many Cadillacs do, however the Grand Marnier flavor in this drink was well balanced so it didn’t have an overly bitter finish. On the whole it was nicely balanced and very flavorful. It is worthy of an 8.5.

Additionally I was able to taste a Paloma, which is a Tequila-based drink that uses grapefruit juice instead of/or in addition to lime. While I don’t rate drinks like this on the same scale as a Margarita, since they are not Margaritas, if I were to guesstimate the quality of this Paloma in general, I’d say it might rate about an 8.

One of my friends ordered a drink called the Strawberry Margatini. which would make it seem like a strawberry Margarita and martini hybrid. I won’t say too much about it other than it tasted nice. I’d need to have more sips to get a good impression.

Unfortunately, I neglected to get pictures of all the varieties of Margaritas I had that evening. Which makes for a good excuse to return in the near future!

Sunny’s also has a variety of other Tequila-based drinks and an excellent food menu. We were all very pleased with our food and service that night so I highly recommend visiting Sunny’s Cantina.