summer's over: feel's good to be challenged again...

This entry will speak in a very round about way of cold-infusions, summer cocktails, and maybe ( if I feel it fits the overall theme) I'll throw in a word or two of the purée's I've been making...

I'm baaa'aaack,

well, it sure did take me a while before I got back to writing again.

Reasons?: well, mainly that summer came and pretty much made the need for creative thinking redundant: when you got absolutely fresh, perfect, ripe berries and fruit there isn't really much to do, as I see it, but to serve just that! Perfect! - but, be it perfect or not, I can't really write about that: Anyone with a little bit of sense and a palate is able to make that...

A few things did pass my way that really caught me off guard during summer! Unfortunately, they got to me so bad that for now I decide to keep them a secret. I let you in on it come April...

IN the meantime, winter is fast approaching and fresh ingredients are getting scarce: time to bring out the ol' thinking hat again... need to find alternative flavours and ways of serving them.

So far I've limited my choices of ingredients to 'whatever I can get fresh from Denmark (in principle)' and by now I'm down to... well, apples. So going away from fresh produce for a second I thought of 'winter.' Then about getting fat for the winter. Then entered 'Hot Buttered Rum' (that isn't really available in Denmark as of yet, but will be soon!). And finally, I got to thinking of the cold infusion process:

Cold infusion
Basically, it's an infusion process that let's you incorporate flavours from fatty products into the alcohol of you choice ( bacon, pop corn etc). Normally, if you'd undertake such an endeavour you'd end up with pearls of fat in the final product, but by freezing it before fine straining ( like, really fine straining!) you can get rid of all that. All of the sudden all these amazing flavours are available to you that instantly works with alcohol: fatty, salty, smoky flavours... you gotta love the potential here!:

amazing failure
Now, I tried the bacon infused bourbon - that is the big hit worldwide coming out of this process! - and I kinda gotta say that I failed... miserably. I mean, I did it right; the experiment as far as testing the cold infusion process turned out fine: it works! the flavour of the the bacon infused bourbon, however, did not prove to be a big hit. It just tasted like fat. And it's all my fault, so I can't rule out the possibility of it being amazing: you see, I went out and got bacon, fried it, threw some alcohol in there and that was it. I should have paid more attention to details: which bacon, which bourbon, how much, how long... all those basic choices that finally lead you to either great success or amazing failure. I just grabbed something out of the fridge, threw it in with some house brand bourbon, and that did not work well. I will try it again soon and let you know how it works...

great success
What did work, I'm glad to say, was a smaller side project that I've had in mind for some time: peanut butter! And in this case I paid attention, tasted a lot, smelled a lot before I did anything. And the result is fantastic!: I chose an organic peanut butter and paired it with Corralejo Blanco tequila, mixed it up real good and let it rest for about 3 days before cold filtering it ( I.E. freeze and filter!). The cocktails that will come out of this will blow you mind -here's one:

::: Peanut butter and blackberry jam-margarita :::
( sorry, haven't found a name yet)

5o ml Corralejo Blanco, Peanut butter stylee
20 ml lemon juice
15 ml agave nectar
1 barspoon of blackberry jam ( home made, ofcourse: from blackberries from my ma's back yard)

::shake that up for about 6 seconds, serve in highball glass on cubed ice.

- note that lime juice in this case is right out: it clashes with the peanut butter in a very not good way. Lemon is the way here



Cheers