Strawberries in red wine.

[Patrick]

Unashamedly 'nicked' from Hugh Firmly Withholdallstall in the Grauniad:

This makes an easy but rather splendid end to a great meal. And it requires you to eat with your fingers - one of the essentials of summer feasting. Serves four.

500g perfectly ripe strawberries, larger ones halved
300ml fruity red wine
1 squeeze lemon juice
2-3 tbsp caster sugar or vanilla sugar
Crème fraîche, to serve (optional)

Gently wash the strawberries and pat them dry with kitchen paper. In a large bowl, stir together the wine, lemon juice and two tablespoons of the sugar until the sugar dissolves. Taste, and add more sugar if you think it needs it. Stir in the strawberries and leave them to macerate at room temperature for 30 minutes, then chill in the fridge for no longer than an hour - any longer and they start to go a bit mushy. Serve with a little of the sweetened wine poured over and, if you like, give each person a little pot of crème fraîche to dip them in.

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/jun/20/british-strawberries-recipes

[stephan]

If you ever get bored with strawberries and cream they are nice with a touch of balsamic vinegar as well

[sesley]

strawberry are lovely in a glass of sparkling wine

[housesparrow]

I'm clearing out my fridge in preparation for my hols tomorrow, so tidied up the strawberries with balsmaic vinegar. Not bad, Stephan!

Alas, no sparkling wine available to try Selsey's suggestion.

[trubble]

I prefer raspberries in gin.


Recipe for raspberry gin:

Ingredients:

300g of raspberries
330g of white granulated sugar
1.5 litres (or more) of medium quality gin
Sterilised 2 litre Le Parfait jar or 2 or 3 (70 cl) washed and sterilised gin bottles


Method:

Wash raspberries and discard any bruised fruit. Place rasberries in either a large 2 litre Kilner/Le Parfait jar or divide the raspberries between 2 or 3 (70 cl) saved gin bottles.

Using a funnel, add the sugar (divide the amounts if using several bottles) and top up with gin to the rim.

Shake every day until the sugar is dissolved and then store in a cool, dark place until you can resist it no longer (leave for at least three months, we usually let it mature for a year).

If you are making blackberry gin remove the fruit after 3 months (pour through muslin) to stop the woody taste developing and mature for at least a year.

- taken from : www.cottagesmallholder.com/?p=53


But it's exactly how I've made it before and it is so beautiful. Forget blackberry vodka, sloe gin, peach schnapps etc - this is the best homemade liqueur you will ever have.

[Patrick]

One of the saddest things for me once was finding out that (despite promises to the contrary) the hedge where my Dad and I used to collect sloes was buried under housing estate. I don't know about the sugar - but the big bottle of gin with the sloes (and a handful of hazelnuts from the garden) would sit on the mantelpiece for a few weeks with Dad regularly turning it over once a night. Happy memories.

[jean]

Jun 23, 2009 14:07:06 GMT trubble said:

Recipe for raspberry gin:

Sounds brilliant.

Reminds me that I found a recipe for cassis last year.

Must look it out before the blackcurrants are ready.

[jean]

I have now made some raspberry gin following your recipe, but with a modest 1 bottle of gin to start with.

It had better be good. I will let you know (in 3 months or so!)

[Patrick]

For general use I like to have Golden/unbleached Granulated sugar, usually Billington's Organic. I find it gives a much fuller, more rounded flavour to drinks yet it isn't as sharp or sweet as white sugar. For instance is gives a far nicer flavour to custard than when using white and is also adaptable enough to be able to put on porridge instead of demerara. I wonder what it would do for that gin!

[trubble]

Jun 24, 2009 16:07:41 GMT jean said:

I have now made some raspberry gin following your recipe, but with a modest 1 bottle of gin to start with.

It had better be good. I will let you know (in 3 months or so!)

Fantastic.

You won't regret it, Jean!

It's sweet, so I hope you like sweet drams. The best way to drink it is a little sneaky sip on your doorstep with a good friend on a sunny Indian Summer evening or at Christmas. Sip sip sip now. No knocking it back. You'll be on your ear in a very pleasant happy fashion.

At worst, you can bottle it up in miniature bottles as Christmas gifts.

[trubble]

Jun 24, 2009 11:01:04 GMT jean said:

Jun 23, 2009 14:07:06 GMT trubble said:

Recipe for raspberry gin:

Sounds brilliant.

Reminds me that I found a recipe for cassis last year.

Must look it out before the blackcurrants are ready.

Cassis is lovely. My friend made some for christmas gifts one year and I used it to drop into the bottom of a gin every now and then. It's nice in a lemonade too, gives it a little extra sparkle.

If you find your recipe, you know to put it here, right?

[trubble]

Jun 24, 2009 17:18:51 GMT Patrick said:

For general use I like to have Golden/unbleached Granulated sugar, usually Billington's Organic. I find it gives a much fuller, more rounded flavour to drinks yet it isn't as sharp or sweet as white sugar. For instance is gives a far nicer flavour to custard than when using white and is also adaptable enough to be able to put on porridge instead of demerara. I wonder what it would do for that gin!

Prolly nothin.

[Patrick]

Jun 24, 2009 17:32:13 GMT trubble said:

Jun 24, 2009 17:18:51 GMT Patrick said:

For general use I like to have Golden/unbleached Granulated sugar, usually Billington's Organic. I find it gives a much fuller, more rounded flavour to drinks yet it isn't as sharp or sweet as white sugar. For instance is gives a far nicer flavour to custard than when using white and is also adaptable enough to be able to put on porridge instead of demerara. I wonder what it would do for that gin!

Prolly nothin.

Now, now, that's not using our imagination is it Children! Come along now.........

I would say it'd give it a more honeyed flavour.

Anyway, today's suggestion is - What alcohol would go well with bananas?

[sinistral]

Jul 4, 2009 11:09:30 GMT Patrick said:

Anyway, today's suggestion is - What alcohol would go well with bananas?

Well I've never tried it....but there is a liqueur Creme de Bananes.....though perhaps two banana tastes together would be too much.

[trubble]

I've tried Creme de Bananes and I think you're right, Sin, it wouldn't work. It has that fake banana taste.

Would brandy go with bananas?


Or rum?

[jean]

Jun 24, 2009 17:30:44 GMT trubble said:

Cassis is lovely...If you find your recipe, you know to put it here, right?

It's getting urgent now, and I can't find it.

I haven't used it, mind, because I found it too late last year - and I printed it because I found it in a not-very-obvious place on the internet.

I'm still looking.

There may be something here.

It's all redcurrants at the moment - so huge, so beautiful and so sour. They make wonderful jelly of course - any other ideas?

[trubble]

Redcurrants are pretty but I wouldn't know what you could do with them. When we were kids, my friend's mum had a signature dish of a redcurrant dessert - layers of puff pastry and cream and redcurrants, all towered up high and dusted in sugar. It was a great combination if that inspires you.

[jean]

I'm making the jelly (which I always do) but I'm freezing some of the finest strings as well, for garnish or whatever - they are so big this year, because we had sun and lots of rain all at once I suppose.

[jean]

I think this may be the one I found last year. I'm going to try it, anyway.

It's very similar to trubble's raspberry gin, except that you steep the currants in the liquor without the sugar, and then you make a syrup & add it months later.

[jean]

I had to look for this thread because I couldn't remember what I was supposed to do with the blackcurrants in the recipe I'd posted on it.

I am reviving it to let you know that the raspberry gin is very good inteed.