A Cajun Martini is sort of a
red headed stepchild of the
martini. A modified
vodka martini, this drink is 2 parts pepper
vodka and 1 part dry vermouth, often garnished with a small
jalapeno.
The Cajun Martini is a signature drink at K-Paul's Louisiana Kitchen in the French Quarter of New Orleans. It is the creation of chef Paul Prudhomme (proprietor of K-Paul's), and is marketed as a pre-mixed drink.
My first experience with this beverage was with the pre-mixed drink. My roomate had taken a cooking class in New Orleans one summer and came back sporting a bottle of the stuff. We finally pulled it out one evening and gathered the courage to try it. It was god awful. It was so bad, we couldn't give it away to college students in a dorm. Let me re-iterate that point. This was vile liquid was so foul that college students said 'no, thanks' to free liquor.
I subsequently ended up one evening eating at K-Paul's, and decided that no chef as well known as Paul Prudhomme could possibly have come up with something so bad, and that it must have just been that the bottled stuff was horrid. And here on the menu was a list of 4 or 5 specialty drinks, including the Cajun Martini. So I decided to find out what a fresh-mixed version from a well-stocked bar would be like. It was not completely undrinkable, as the bottled beverage had been, but it still was not good. The flavor of the pepper dominated the drink. The heat of the pepper was not the problem. It was the flavor. Empty pepper flavor in liquid form does not make for a good cocktail. To paraphrase Monty Python, this is not a drink for sipping, this is a drink for lying down and avoiding.
Your mileage may vary.
facts checked via Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville at http://margaritaville.com/firstlook/cajun.htm