Yeah if I hadn’t grown up in New Jersey with log cabin syrup on my pancakes I probably wouldn’t know the difference between real maple syrup and that garbage. I can tell you my kids are born and raised here in Vermont and I don’t know if they’ve ever had fake syrup or even know that such a thing exists!
Number of years ago I had a customer that was the maple syrup producer and they used to give us a little bottles of the extra fancy grade super light stuff whenever we go to work for them. That stuff is great on ice cream
Right on brother we’ve got a small but well curated compendium of stoner approved cocktails!
Post your own too!
I’ve been following @CygnusX1 ’s lead and got myself on a spicy drink kick. My favorite taco joint has a jug with a spigot up on their liquor shelf that is packed with different kinds of hot chilis and topped up with Casamigos blanco tequila. I had a spicy marg from them about a month ago and I can’t get over how much I liked it. I’ve tried the chili margarita @CygnusX1 posted and it’s good. Now he’s got my interest piqued and I’m working on my own spicy drink using fresh jalapeño from the garden. It’s not perfect yet tho so more testing (drinkin) is necessary …. So necessary in august heat.
Thinking about it more right now and I think I need to try tossing in a smoked chili like a chipotle instead and go for the heat/smoke combo.
I’ll circle back when I have a few, but tried making Shrub for the first time recently. Made a Mango Habanero one that is a pretty outstanding addition to a Margarita as well.
I’ll circle back with details when I have a few, but if you’re not familiar with Shrubs, its time to do a little research and experimentation.
So, to circle back to this, here are some details on my first trial…
I took 2 fresh mangos and diced them into slightly smaller than 1” chunks. Side note, Mango is a fun fruit to cut up…
I also took 1 (probably do 2 next time) fresh Habanero from the garden and diced that up pretty small.
Put that all in a glass Tupperware type of bowl with one cup of granulated sugar and placed that in the fridge. It’s absolutely amazing how much “juice” the sugar will pull out. I stirred it up a few times a day and after about 2 days pulled it from the fridge, all sugars were dissolved.
I used a muddler to crush up the fruit a bit more then strained it into a mason jar.
Added about 3/4 of a cup of Bragg’s Apple Cider Vinegar (with Mother) at that point and put it back into the fridge. This is the Shrub.
For the Margarita I used roughly: 0.25 oz Grand Marnier, 1.5 oz Tequila Anejo (Tres Generaciones), ~1.25 oz of the Shrub and a very small splash of simple syrup.
Combine with Ice in a shaker then strain into an ice filled glass.
Yeah, seems like pretty much any fruit. Just started another batch of the Mango Habanero last night, I think blackberry will be next up.
If one were crazy enough to want it alcohol free, you can also mix a little with plain seltzer water. Though you’ll get more of the vinegar taste coming through that way and one may choose to use a lighter vinegar than cider.
Mixing that shrub with seltzer and some maple syrup and ginger is essentially the recipe for switchel. All the old timers that drink it around here use Natural Apple cider vinegar also.
Blackberry sounds amazing. Kind of makes me wonder if I could do a lime based shrub. The idea of lime habanero to go in a margarita sounds awesome.
I don’t see why you technically couldn’t, but, I think typically this “process” really benefits fruits that can’t easily be “juiced” in a traditional manner and have a fairly short shelf life.
I’m not sure I’d bother with lime unless it were to help preserve a bunch that were on the verge of turning…
I haven’t experimented yet but you’ll see people using lots of herbs in the mix as well from mint to basil, etc…
…. So necessary in august heat.
