My Sweet and Saucy

This past weekend I had the chance to hang out with some good friends of mine and celebrate my dear friend Kate’s birthday!  We thought it would be fun to try out a couple new drinks and have some appetizers, so my friend Matt was in charge of two drinks and I was in charge of one drink and the dessert.  It was my first time trying out drink recipes and I had a lot of fun!  I decided to try a recipe from Elizabeth Falkner’s book Demolition Desserts.  Once I read that this drink had passion fruit juice in it I knew I had to try it…and to make matters even more interesting the title of the drink was “Shagadelic”!  Elizabeth says that this recipe was made to match her “Shag cake” that was quite popular with her customers at Citizen Cake.  

As you can see from these photos this is definitely not my typical food photo shoot, but I still wanted to share these pictures and recipe with you…hope you enjoy them!  

Shagadelic

adapted from Demolition Desserts

serves two 

(I changed some things in the recipe…like the sugar rim instead of a shredded coconut rim and a strawberry instead of a maraschino cherry) 

1/2 c. bottled passion, such as Looza brand

1 T. Cointreau

1/4 c. white rum, such as 10 Cane brand

2 T. coconut rum, such as Malibu brand

Juice of 1/2 lime

Ice cubes

A couple strawberries

Sugar for the rim

Rub one of the cut limes around the edge of the glasses and then dip into sugar.

In a cocktail shaker, combine passion fruit juice, Cointreau, white and coconut rum, and lime juice.  Fill the shaker with ice, cover, and shake.

Strain into the sugar-rimmed glasses and add a sliced strawberry to the rim.  

Like I said earlier, my friend Matt made two drinks for us too…both which were a lot of fun and delicious too!  The first drink he made was a Peach Bellini.  He said you just need a good sparkling wine and a scoop of peach sorbet and presto dingdough your done!  

The other drink he made took a little preparation beforehand, but was really yummy and looked beautiful too!  He infused vodka with strawberries for 2 days or so and then drained the vodka from the jar.  (The strawberries definitely lose their beauty in the infusing process and end up looking more like little tongues, but the end result is worth it!)

Matt added simple syrup (equal parts of sugar and water heated until dissolved), mint, and ice to the strawberry vodka and muddled it around.  Overall, a really great drink!

Sadly I don’t have a great picture of the end result, but take my word for it…it’s a winner!  Thanks Matt!

To end the night off right I thought that I should try out a gift that my husband’s aunt had gotten me…a Skookie Cast Iron Skillet!!!  I had some leftover Peanut Butter M&M Monster cookie dough, so I thought it would make the perfect birthday dessert…and it did!  Here is the birthday girl with her own Skookie aka pizza cookie.

Hope you had a great birthday Kate!  Thanks for being such a great friend!

This is definitely a recipe must for everyone!  I am not a drinker by any means…the only kind of drinks I like are girly, fruity ones and I still find those hard to drink since they have calories (and loads of them) and I figure that I could have a dessert instead, BUT this drink/dessert is the perfect combo for me!  This recipe is from David Lebovitz’s book, The Perfect Scoop, a book soley devoted to ice creams, sorbets, granitas, and sweet accompaniments.  He describes granita as “a shaved ice, made from a lightly sweetened fruit puree or another liquid.”  Even though I have drooled over many recipes so far this was the first one I’ve tried.  The simplicity of the recipe is amazing, which lends itself to the pure and simple fact that you have no reason not to try it.  Well, if I haven’t convinced you already hopefully the photos will!

Mojito Granita

adapted by David Lebovitz’s, The Perfect Scoop

Makes about 1 quart

2 1/2 cups water

1/2 cup sugar

2 limes, preferably unsprayed

1 cup lightly packed fresh mint leaves

1/2 cup freshly squeezed lime juice (from about 6 limes)

3 Tablespoons white or light rum

Add the water and sugar to a small, non reactive saucepan and then grate the zest from the two limes directly into the saucepan.  Turn the heat to high and bring to a boil, so that the sugar completely dissolves.  Reserve 5 mint leaves and then add the rest to the saucepan and take it off of the heat.  Cover the pan for 8 minutes so that the mint infuses the liquid.  Then uncover and let liquid come to room temperature.

Once liquid is cool, strain the mixture into a flat container that is approximately 8 to 12 inches across, with a 2 quart capacity.  Make sure to squeeze all the yummy liquid out of the leaves and then discard them.  Stir in the lime juice and rum and then finely chop the remaining 5 leaves and add them to the liquid (I choose just to use them as garnish).  Place the container in the freezer and freeze for one hour.  Once the edges begin to freeze, take a fork and break up the frozen parts and rack them toward the center.  Return to the freezer and then check the mixture every 30 minutes and continue breaking up the ice particles until the mixture almost completely frozen or completely frozen (depending on your preference).

Here are some photos of the process…infusing the mint and then the stages of ice formation.

David suggests that you can serve it over any ice cream or sorbet (maybe mint ice cream), top it off with whipped cream, or simply pile the granita high in its own dish and enjoy it by itself…that is what I did!

I have to confess that my husband and I were so addicted to this delicious granita that almost every cup ended up like this one!