Today, February 22, is National Margarita Day! There has never been a more valid excuse to “waste away in Margaritaville.”

You could celebrate with a frozen margarita–after all, its Texas roots run deep. As TEXAS MONTHLY editor Jake Silverstein wrote to mark this holiday in the Huffington Post last year:

For the delicious slushy variety, we have one man to thank. Mariano Martinez did not invent the frozen margarita, but he invented the frozen margarita machine. Inspiration struck him on May 11, 1974, as he tinkered with a soft-serve ice cream machine at his legendary Dallas restaurant, Mariano’s.

Last July, Courtney Bond tackled the state of the margarita in the pages of TEXAS MONTHLY:

“What passes for a margarita looks like a Slurpee, tastes like a limeade, and packs as much kick as the punch at a Baptist wedding reception.” It was back in 1979, in “Requiem for a Margarita,” that this magazine made that sad declaration. And it is with heavy heart that I report that not much has changed. It’s a pitiful concoction that masquerades as a margarita these days: a soupçon of tequila drowned in a sickly sweet brew that’s never known a squeeze of fresh lime.

But Bond goes on to say that the beverage is undergoing something of a “boozy renaissance” in the hands of Texas bartenders who are leading a “return to the kind of well-made drink our grandparents would recognize.” For her piece, Bond picks the brains of three bartenders for new takes on this old drink, but for those that want something simple and easy, get out a shaker and mix up this classic recipe:

CLASSIC MARGARITA
2 ounces 
100-percent-agave 
silver tequila
1 ounce Cointreau liqueur
juice of 2 Mexican limes
Combine all ingredients in a shaker, shake with cracked ice, and strain into a chilled, salt-rimmed coupe or martini glass.

Cheers!