Boozed + Infused

Infusing liqueurs at home with inspiring and seasonal ingredients

Tag Archives: recipe


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Rose Hip Vodka

Wow! Time flies, doesn’t it?! This week is a blur. I don’t know about you, but I’m sure ready for the weekend…

Several months ago, I found a recipe for a Rosehip Tipple from Wildcraft Vita. If you are not familiar with this blog, you should check it out. In addition to some amazing ideas for infusions, there are many other inspirations for flowers, herbs and foraging.

Back to the rose hips… I don’t happen to have any roses of my own. I have some friends with lots of lovely rose bushes, and have already laid claim to their rose hips. But the rose hips have not formed yet. And I’ve really been wanting to make a rose hip infusion.

As it turns out, I was able to find some dried rose hips. And the infusion could not have been easier.

Rose Hip Vodka

2 TB Dried Rose Hips

1 c. Vodka

Infuse for approximately one week. Strain.

This infusion is very nice. The flavor has hints of citrus, floral, and a bit like fruit leather. If you enjoy rose hip tea, you will like this. And the cocktails are fabulous.

The infusion will end up looking quite a bit like tea… and tastes good with tea as well. I started out with a small batch of this to test it out, but will definitely make more.

Cheers!


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Green Heather Vodka Tonic

I’ve mentioned this a few times before, but I happen to be a bit of a canning addict. So with everyone touting their delicious jam cocktails, I decided to try one of my own… with Green Tomato Jam!

We made this jam last fall, long after we had picked our green tomatoes. They sat on the kitchen counter for what seemed to be forever, and we finally decided to can them. At first I wasn’t sure what to think of the jam. And in fact we left it in the pantry for months. We finally brought it out a little while back and tested it with a delicious Parrano cheese and baguette. It was fabulous! And it was wonderful in this cocktail as well.

Green Heather Vodka Tonic

2 oz Heather Flower Vodka

1/2 TB Green Tomato Jam

5 oz Tonic Water

Lemon Twist

Stir the Heather flower vodka and green tomato jam with ice, add tonic and garnish with a twist. Add more ice if needed.

This was very tasty and refreshing. The green tomato jam added a lovely tangy lemony sweet flavor, and the heather flowers paired nicely.

I think this is a great cocktail to drink during next week’s #GartenderChat! If you haven’t checked it out yet, the next one is Thursday, June 21 at 6:00 pm Pacific time.

Cheers!


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Heather Flower Vodka

We like to try lots of new flavors over here at Boozed + Infused. When out shopping for groceries, I often scour the shelves looking for ideas of things to infuse. I go to certain stores looking specifically for interesting flavors. One of my favorite stores to find different ingredients is the local Home Brewing supply store. You may be surprised to find that there are a lot of home brew stores out there, and many of them sell online.

At a recent trip to the Homebrew Exchange, I picked up bunch of fun bottles, ingredients, and some inspiration! One of these ingredients was dried heather flowers.

While I didn’t really know what heather flowers would taste like, I was excited to try a new infusion.

Heather Flower Vodka

2 TB Dried Heather flowers

1 c. Vodka

Infuse for about 7-9 days, strain and filter. Enjoy in cocktails!

The result is a lovely golden color. The flavor is only slightly floral. It has a nice taste to it, but is hard to describe. I can tell you that it makes a great cocktail… recipes will be forthcoming. In the meantime, try a heather flower infusion, or better yet let us know about something new and interesting that you have infused.

Cheers!


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Banana Bourbon

When I first started doing infusions, a banana liqueur wasn’t really at the top of my list. It simply didn’t appeal to me. But the longer I do this, I hear more and more people talking about banana liqueurs they have had and how tasty they are. At some point, I would like to do a banana rum. But since I have more experience infusing bourbon, and I really think of bourbon as a fool-proof spirit base for infusions (ok, I’m sure someone will tell me otherwise). So, with a small leap of faith, we embarked on banana bourbon.

This is really easy and delicious.

We let the bananas get really ripe and tasty…

They may not look pretty, but they were perfect.

We took these two perfectly ripe bananas, added two cups of bourbon, and infused for just over two weeks. I guess two was the magic number because this is another keeper. It tastes like sweet bananas and a mellow bourbon. I think this will make for some great cocktails, but it is also great on its own.

Be sure to filter, then strain through cheesecloth and coffee filters.

Cheers!

Related Posts:

Apple Pie Bourbon

Bourbon, Bourbon, Infused Bourbon!

Coffee Bourbon

Cherry Bourbon


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Sesame-Honey Vodka

I like sesame, and I like honey. When I was a kid, we used to make a variety of a honey-sesame candy, and somehow I thought it would be good to infuse vodka with these flavors. … it is delicious!

Sesame-Honey Vodka

1 oz Sesame Seeds

1 c. Vodka

2 TB Honey

Stirring frequently, toast the sesame seeds in a frying pan on low, until they start to brown. Remove from heat and allow to cool. Add all ingredients to a small canning jar or other sealing jar. Shake, and allow to infuse in a dark, cool place for 3-4 weeks. Strain and filter, with cheesecloth and a coffee filter, then enjoy!

This infusion really tastes like sesame and honey. I think it will be great in cocktails… any ideas?

Ok, so back to these sesame seeds… Since I’ve been on a roll trying to use my infused ingredients, I decided to keep the infused, vodka soaked seeds. I toasted them on low in the oven until they started to brown, stirring occasionally. I then roughly followed the instructions for a sesame-honey candy (from Nourished Kitchen), and … they were pretty good! They disappeared pretty fast.

If you like sesame, you will like this liqueur.

Cheers!
Sesame-Honey Vodka on Punk Domestics


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Star Anise Gin

Anise… I think this is one of those flavors where you either love it or hate it. My mother happens to love it, and she loves gin. So this was one of her Mother’s Day goodies.

Star Anise Gin

20 grams Star Anise

1 c. gin

1 TB Simple Syrup (or more/less to taste)

Place Star Anise in a jar, add gin, seal tight and shake. Allow to infuse for about 2-3 days, then add simple syrup.

At 3 days, this tasted pretty good. Keep infusing until it reaches your desired taste, then strain and filter with cheesecloth and coffee filter if desired. Your infusion time will depend on how strong you want the flavor. It reminded me of a Good and Plenty candy (which I always loved).

I happened to have a lot of star anise, but you could probably cut way back on the amount in the infusion and just allow it to sit for a longer period.

This was very easy and really tasty on its own. And I think might make for a very refreshing gin and tonic!

Cheers to Mom!


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Boozy Prune Jam

Happy Mothers Day!

Our plans changed a bit this year, and we had to come up with a portable breakfast. What we came up with turned out to be a winner.

Remember the prune liqueur taste test from a few weeks ago? Well we still had the prunes soaking in the booze. We finally strained them and decided to make something useful.

Boozy Prune Jam

1 generous cup booze soaked prunes (half of our prunes were soaked in bourbon, half in brandy)

3/4 cup orange juice

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1/2 c. dark brown sugar

pinch of salt

– Make sure the prunes are very soft, and have soaked in the alcohol for a long time. (ours had soaked for a month, so they were very soft and spreadable inside)

– Quarter the prunes, then give them a rough chop.

– Place all ingredients in a small saucepan, and bring to a simmer on medium/low, stirring often and breaking up the prunes.

– Reduce heat to low, and continue to simmer until this reaches the consistency of a thick sauce or loose jam. (It will thicken up a bit upon cooling.) This will probably take about 5-10 minutes.

– Remove from heat and allow to cool.

– Store in refrigerator. Will keep for a few weeks.

We made some mini cream scones to spread this on, and it was perfect! In fact, this spread was so tasty, I could eat it by the spoonful. It was such a hit, I’m tempted to get a big bag of dried prunes to soak in booze for the sole purpose of making this jam and canning it (I’m a canning addict).

If you don’t have booze soaked prunes, you could probably start with dried prunes and stew them on low in a bit of water and brandy or bourbon until they get really soft. Then chop them and proceed with the recipe above.

After the success of this spread, I think we are going to start using a lot more of our booze-soaked ingredients.

Have a great Mother’s Day!


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Coffee Bourbon Milkshake: Quite possibly the best milkshake you will ever have!

I suppose it is possible that I will have a better milkshake at some point in my life. But up to this point, this is easily the best milkshake I have ever had.

Coffee Bourbon Milkshake

2 c. Vanilla Ice Cream (we used natural vanilla with vanilla bean)

3 oz. Coffee Bourbon

Blend in a blender, food processor, or with a hand mixer until very well blended and creamy. At this point, it will be pretty runny. Return it to the freezer, and allow to cool for several hours or longer if possible. If you are very impatient, you can drink it any time. But if you make it in advance and allow it to cool, it will reach the consistency of a soft serve ice cream. Because of the alcohol, it will not freeze too firm, it will maintain this consistency.

I served this milkshake at the get-together with fellow bloggers Evelyn, Poppy, and Krista.  And I know I heard the words “this is the best milkshake I’ve ever had”. I mixed this up a day in advance and was very happy with the result.

If you like thick, creamy milkshakes, and if you like coffee… you know what to do.

ENJOY!


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Blueberry Gin

Today I hosted a small get together for a few Portland area bloggers. It was a bit of a leap of faith for all of us as we had never met, and they came over to my home. Luckily, we are all still alive to tell the tale. And fortunately I believe a good time was had by all. A few fun cocktails were flowing, and eventually we got out a stack of spoons for everyone to start taste-testing (I think they may have tasted a few dozen…)

So, a big thank you to Evelyn from Momsicle, Poppy from Funny or Snot, and Krista from Mostly Mommyhood.

Eventually, I will post about our cocktails (and they might too…) so stay tuned. In the meantime, I wanted to share the infusion that was the base of our featured cocktail from today’s gathering.

Blueberry Gin

2 c. Gin

2 c. frozen blueberries

1/4 c. sugar

zest of 1 lemon

2 whole cloves

1/2 inch piece of a cinnamon stick

Place the frozen blueberries in a small saucepan. Crush them lightly (I used a pastry cutter). Lightly cook them on low for about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool completely. This amounted to about 1 cup of a gelatinous blueberry goop.

After the blueberries are cool, place all ingredients in a quart jar (or larger). Shake and allow to infuse for at least 4 weeks, stirring or shaking occasionally.When it has reached your desired taste, Strain and Filter through a colander, cheesecloth, jelly bag, and coffee filter.

I got some of the inspiration for this liqueur from Post Prohibition. He recommends using frozen berries because of the organic breakdown of frozen fruit (or something like that… I was willing to give it a try) and also lightly cooking the berries.

The flavor came out great. I really love blueberry pie, so the intent was to include a few spices that you might find in a blueberry pie.

It is delicious! I have not yet tried making a blueberry liqueur with fresh berries, but have had a few blueberry infusions that tasted quite weak. I wanted to make sure we didn’t fall into that trap. The result was great.

Cheers!

Related Posts:

The Blueberry Pieball: Our new favorite highball

Blueberry-Orange Liqueur


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Coffee Bourbon

Coffee… many of us can’t imagine a morning without it (I’m certainly one of them). And coffee liqueur… who doesn’t love a good White or Black Russian?

We knew we wanted to do a coffee liqueur, but took some time trying to decide exactly how we would do it. A lot of coffee liqueur recipes call for vodka, lots of sugar, instant coffee or brewed coffee, etc. In general, we like to use less sugar in our recipes and wanted to incorporate a different booze. So, Coffee Bourbon seemed a natural choice!

Coffee Bourbon

1/4 c. Whole Coffee Beans, Smashed (preferably dark, espresso roast)

1/2 vanilla bean, split

1 TB dark brown sugar (packed)

1 1/4 c. Bourbon

First we took the coffee beans and placed them in two plastic bags. We took a metal muddler and smashed the beans until they were gently crushed (see photo).

Place all ingredients in a small canning jar, and set the jar in a dark, cool location. Every few days, shake the jar lightly.

Infuse for about 3 weeks, or until this reaches your desired taste.

Strain and filter through cheesecloth, jelly bag (if desired) and finally coffee filters.

This coffee liqueur is so rich and delicious. You can taste all the nuances of the bourbon, and the espresso roast coffee gives it such a good flavor.

We are also going to try this same recipe with brandy.

This is a “must try”! If you love coffee, you need to make this.

Enjoy!

Related Posts:

Coffee Bourbon Milkshake: Quite possibly the best milkshake you will ever have!

Coffee Liqueur on Punk Domestics