Fresh Mint Liqueur - From My Most Favorite Cookbook!

I reserve the last post of the year for one of my most favorite recipes.  This time I want to profile one of my most favorite cookbooks.  I realized while making one of its recipes that I have used it regularly for more than 20 years and have never been disappointed.  I've shared it with friends, talked about it with others, and tried a variety of its recipes.  That makes it long overdue for highlighting on my blog.

The book is Classic Liqueurs, The Art of Making and Cooking with Liqueurs by Cheryl Long and Heather Kibbey.  I came across it one day while traveling:  I needed a break from driving and saw a large tent sale of some kind in a parking lot.  What I discovered was a used book sale which was, of course, heaven!  This book just asked to go home with me, and I am so glad it did.

ISBN 0-914667-11-4

Mine is the 1990 edition, and I know there have been other editions since then.  The description on the back cover says it all:

The books tells, simply and exactly, how to make the world's most famous liqueurs as well as exquisite fruit liqueurs in the home kitchen. ... Their easy and natural approach results in high-quality liqueurs.

The chapters include the basics of liqueur making, making fruit liqueurs, and making non-fruit liqueurs, serving and mixing liqueurs, and cooking with liqueurs.  The authors' backgrounds include being a food consultant, an editor of restaurant magazines, teachers of cooking classes, and a food columnist. 

A liqueur consists of three basic ingredients:  alcohol, sugar, and flavoring.  (Although they list "alcohol, water, and flavorings" because they discuss how water quality varies and can influence the liqueur's final result.  Sugar is important, so I include it.)  The alcohols that I've used are vodka and brandy, but you can use other types like pure grain alcohol, cognac, whiskey, scotch, and rum.  

The flavorings vary between fresh and dried fruits, fruit peels, seeds, herbs, and spices.  They recommend other ingredients to adjust the body and smoothness of the liqueur, none of which I have ever used.  

Something you have to know about making liqueurs:  they require a lot of patience.  Quite often they are quick and easy to assemble (like the recipe I describe below) but then you have to wait, often for weeks, while the flavors infuse into the liquid.  After that, you have to wait for months for the liqueur to age.  Planning ahead if you are considering liqueurs as gifts is crucial.  

But oh, it is worth it.  Aging brings a smoothness to the flavor and the mouthfeel.  The taste sensations go from "good" to "sublime."  And while the authors mention that most recipes reach their peak flavor after a year of aging and hold that for up to three years, I have tried my liqueurs after they aged for a decade or more and still found them to be wonderful.  

One aspect of liqueur making that I love as compared to making wine or beer is how little space and equipment you need.  Long and Kibbey's recipes make small batches (which are easily doubled), so I have a few repurposed glass jars which easily tuck onto a shelf in a cupboard to be ignored while the required infusing and aging times are passing.  I have some cloth bags that I use for filtering and some metal mesh sieves that are in my kitchen for other purposes.  The items that take up the most space are the bottles needed for gift-giving.  I noticed I tend to hoard these, but still they don't take up much room in my storage areas.  I suppose if I wanted to make a lot of liqueurs at once I might be pressed for space, but it has never been an issue.  

The only complaint I have had with making small batches is that if a liqueur turns out to be quite exquisite, you only have a small amount of it.  Of course, that makes it even more precious!

The overall concept of liqueur making is simple:  infuse the flavors into the water and alcohol liquid (sometimes sugar is added at this time and sometimes later), strain out the solids, and finally, let the mixture age.  I recommend putting notes into a calendar to remind you when to check on them and move to the next stage.  I also put notes on the container, like the name and the starting/ending dates -- one friend writes the entire recipe she used as part of her container notes, which I think is an excellent idea.  The cupboard should be one that is dark, cool, and out of the way.

Once you understand these basics and have tried some recipes, you can confidently try your own combinations.  They didn't always turn out how I envisioned them, but they have always produced a liqueur that was worth drinking.  I've used fruits like loquats and mulberries, and fruit blends like guavas-and-limes and guavas-and-cranberries.  I've tossed in spices that I thought would go well with a particular fruit.  I currently have a fig leaf liqueur aging.  Once I had a large volume of maraschino cherry juice that I mixed with vodka and a little sugar.  My guest tasters liked it but suggested it needed something more to make it "just right."  One taster figured it out:  a little bit of almond extract did the trick.  

The recipe I want to share with you is a repeat of one I made in 2002 that turned out to be wonderful:  Fresh Mint Liqueur on page 54.

1 1/4 cups fresh mint leaves, slightly packed

3 cups vodka

2 cups granulated sugar

1 cup water

1 teaspoon glycerine*

8 drops green food coloring*

2 drops blue food coloring*

*I skipped these ingredients.

The mint variety is an important choice.

Wash leaves in cold water several times.  Shake or pat dry gently.  Snip each leaf in half or thirds; discard stems.  Measure cut mint leaves, packing gently.

Combine mint leaves and vodka in aging container.  Cap and let stand in a cool place for 2 weeks, shaking occasionally.

After the initial aging, pour liqueur through colander into a large bowl to remove the leaves; discard leaves.

In a saucepan, combine sugar and water.  Bring to a boil, stirring constantly.  Let cool.  Add cooled sugar syrup to mint liqueur base, stirring to combine.  Add glycerine and food color; pour into aging container for secondary aging of 1 to 3 more months.

My Notes

Mint comes in a wide variety of flavors, so if you have the opportunity to choose, consider what you really like about mint.  The first time I made it, I used a variety called chocolate mint (the stems are brownish), which has a mint flavor without the bite of spearmint or peppermint.  I really like that its mint flavor seems deeper, too.  I still have chocolate mint in my yard, so that is what I used here.  Timing is important, too, when using home-grown herbs.  I think spring or early summer is a good time to harvest them.

This is a single batch of the liqueur base:

Clamp lid, "lightning lid", jars are wonderful for this.

So I doubled it:

This is after the initial infusion period.  Notice how the color has changed, and the batch has a lovely mint scent:

This is filtered:

Making the sugar syrup:

In the beginning

Boiling and getting ready to cool.

I have never felt the need to add food coloring to my liqueurs.  I like them just the way they are.  Also, I have never used glycerine.  At first because I just couldn't find it in the stores; later, I felt that the sugar syrups usually give a good mouthfeel.  If they don't, I add a little more sugar, and that fixes the problem.

And here it is in its aging container.  The date is when the final aging began, not the initial infusing.

Planning in June for a December post.

The Verdict

The first time I made this I was new at liqueur-making, and I was astonished and pleased with the result.  The best way to describe the flavor is:  like drinking a candy cane with a kick!  Sweet (but not too sweet), minty in a wonderful way, and then the warmth of the alcohol washes over you.  It was one of the exquisite liqueurs I have made over the years.

So having a large amount of chocolate mint growing in my yard inspired me to try it again.  Doubling the recipe was my choice because of how good I expected it to be.

A close-up of the color with no food coloring added.

Liqueurs are for small quantities that are sipped and appreciated.

After about 5 months of aging, I tasted it.  It was minty without a bite, sweet but not too much so, a good mouthfeel, and reasonably smooth.  I think all of it will improve with more aging.  The double batch made almost 1/2 gallon, which will last me a long time unless I start giving it away.  Christmas is soon, so I just might.  There is plenty to share!

Success, again.  So far it is not at the epic level the first attempt was, but time may change that.  

Others of Long and Kibbey's recipes I've tried are:  apricot, lemon, peach, plum, taboo (citrus and vanilla, one of the epic liqueurs), and crème de cacao (but with cocoa powder, not the liquid chocolate they suggest).  I've also used their recipes as inspiration for other fruits, herbs, and spices in liqueurs.

Pickled Raisins -- A Medieval Syrian Recipe

I am thoroughly enchanted with Scents and Flavors, translated by Charles Perry.

ISBN  978-1-4798-5628-2

The recipes seem so do-able and intriguing, with flavor combinations I would not normally think of using and techniques easily replicated in the modern kitchen.  I previously tried one of its pickled lemon recipes, with great success.  So much so that I continue to keep a jar of it in my refrigerator whenever I can get lemons.  They are an excellent additive to sandwiches as well as a flavorful relish with any sort of cooked meat.  Read my post on it here.

Therefore I was excited to try another recipe.  There are so many I want to try!  I decided to go with another pickled something, and I was inspired to do the pickled raisins after pruning my mint plant.  This recipe, found on page 215, is #8.38 in the section on various types of sour and salty pickles:

The eighth type is raisin pickles, of which there are several kinds

The first kind

Pick over raisins to remove the useless ones, wash the rest, and dry in a sieve.  Take the smallest ones, wash, and pound in a mortar with mint and wine vinegar; when smooth, strain with vinegar several times until nothing is left of the raisins in the sieve.  Take stems of fresh mint and remove the remaining leaves from the stalks.  Put with the raisins into a pickling jar, alternating a layer of raisins and a generous layer of fresh mint until the jar is nearly filled.  Pour in the vinegar that was strained with the raisins.  If too sour, add honey, sugar, or date syrup, according to the disposition of the individual.  Add some mixed spices and ginger, set aside, and use after six or seven days.  If you want, put in petals of Nisibin roses when they are in season.

My Redaction

For the liquid:
52 grams golden raisins
3 grams fresh mint leaves
3/4 cup (6 ounces) white wine vinegar
3/4 teaspoon honey
3/4 teaspoon mixed spices (cinnamon, cloves, ginger, grains of paradise, pepper, saffron)
1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger

For the pickle:
More raisins
More fresh mint leaves



My Notes

My goal was to fill one pint canning jar.

I did not use rose petals of any kind.

To make the liquid, I started with the raisins and mint leaves and added 1/2 cup vinegar.

I blended the batch until it was finely pureed.  Then I mixed in the spices.  I tasted it and it was lovely!  Sour, slightly sweet, spicy (especially from the ginger), and very minty.  But it was thick and I suspected it was too thick for what the recipe's author intended.

Thick, like a milkshake

So I added another 1/4 cup vinegar and some honey to balance out the sourness.  This made it thinner but not thin, and I decided it would work.

I took the sterilized jar and put in a layer of raisins, tamped it down a little with a pestle, put on a layer of mint leaves and tamped that.  To fill the jar took five layers of raisins with four layers of mint in between, tamping at each layer.

When I poured the liquid over the top, I realized the problem:  it was too thick to work its way down through the layers to the bottom.  So I took a chopstick and poked it into the layers, mostly around the jar's sides, to encourage the liquid to move to the bottom.  It seemed to work, although I'm not sure how well it got into the middle of the jar.  I kept adding liquid until the jar was full.

Once it seemed full, I put the lid on and then tapped the jar a lot.  I hoped it got more liquid down to the bottom.

I still had a lot of liquid left over, so I decided to fill another jar with the raisin pickle.  This time I used dark raisins instead of the golden.  I also decided to pour some liquid over each layer as I was assembling it (after tamping).  This worked well until I ran out of liquid and still needed a little more to finish filling the jar.  So I put together another raisin/mint/vinegar puree (with dark raisins and without measuring), thinned it with a little more vinegar, and added honey and spices (without measuring).  It tasted good and I used it.

That finished the second jar.

You can see where I switched to the dark raisin puree in the top layer.

Both jars were labeled and put into the refrigerator for a week.


The Verdict

The directions, "strain with vinegar several times until nothing is left of the raisins in the sieve" had
me believe that a thick liquid was acceptable, even though most recipes for items that are pickled are in a fairly runny vinegar base.  If nothing was left, then all of the raisin should be reduced to tiny (strainable) bits.  It is why I blended it instead of straining -- I had that modern advantage and it was a way to get the mixture smooth without having to continue to strain several times.

I mixed the spices into the liquid instead of putting them at the top of the jar because it was so thick.  It seemed like they wouldn't have contact with the raisins below the top if just placed on top.

How was it?

I was surprised to see that the whole mass was thick, not liquidy or sloshy at all.  This made sense in that the raisins (dried grapes) soaked up the liquid.  What I spooned onto my plate was moist but firm and not runny.

This was all dark raisins.

The flavor was amazing.  It was spicy, almost too much at first, but I got used to it quickly.  Cinnamon, ginger, pepper, mint, sweet, sour, and more.  It made me think of chutney with the benefit of being quick and easy to assemble, and uncooked.

Initially I was put off by the whole mint leaves.  Sometimes I got a leaf in my mouth and it seemed too strong.  But after a few servings of pickled raisins, I got used to it and enjoyed it.  I think in the future I will cut them before putting them in the jar.  A chiffonade might work well.

I also tasted the mixture that was with golden raisins.  The flavors were the same -- lovely! -- but I believe the golden raisins were more tender than the dark raisins.  They were both excellent.

My guest taster and I both said, "Wow!  This is good!" as we put the pickle on sandwiches, alongside cooked meat, and sometimes just ate a spoonful.  The flavors pack a punch and really brighten whatever meal they accompany.  Although I might cut back on the ginger just a little bit.

Success!  You should look at this book!

Yum.