Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Milk Liqueur

When I saw a recipe for Milk Liqueur at Serious Eats, I had to give it a try.

Back in the day, I used to be quite fond of White Russians, and Baileys is still on my list for winter sipping now and then, so a liqueur based on milk and infused with chocolate sounded pretty darned good.

As far as recipes go, it was a slam-dunk. Pour it all into a big jar, shake it once a day, and strain it after 10 days.

The ingredient list was a little strange, with vodka (or grappa), milk, sugar, lemon, and grated chocolate. And this mess is left to sit at room temperature.

I ended up making it with both grappa and vodka - I had grappa on hand, and thought I had enough. But no. So I bought vodka to make up the difference.

The instructions noted that the mixture would curdle. No lie there:


Ten days later, the mixture looked a little more homogeneous, but the chunks of lemon still looked wrong. I strained it first through a very fine-mesh metal strainer, which removed the clumps, the lemon chunks, and much of the curdled milk.


The strained liquid looked a little like chocolate milk that was having a bad day.

But when I strained that liquid through a coffee filter, the result was a clear golden liquid. I strained a couple more times as the recipe suggested, but I don't think I caught any more in the filter. It was pretty clean after the first run through the coffee filter.


Caroline Russock, the writer at Serious Eats who posted the recipe, described it as "creamy and chocolaty, with a sharp hit of lemon." I didn't notice the lemon as much, but there are dairy notes and chocolate, for sure. And a little hint of fruit, probably from the grappa that I used. It's a little bit sweet, and the flavors are complex enough to make it worth sipping. It's different. No doubt about that.


For the complete recipe, click on the Serious Eats link above. It'll take you right there.
Yum

2 comments:

Shea M. @ Blissfully Unrefined said...

That is so cool - to think that curdles mess became such a beautifully colored liqueur! I've been thinking about making various liqueurs as Christmas presents (since almost everyone in the family is now legal), like coffee liqueur, Eierlikoer (very German). I think this might be nice with orange instead of the lemon - thanks for the inspiration!

Swapna said...

Hi Donna,
Made this Milk Liqueur after seeing yours and we really loved it...posted it in my blog...
http://swapnascuisine.blogspot.com/2010/12/milk-liqueur.html

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