Showing posts with label ratafia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ratafia. Show all posts

Sunday, November 30, 2008

Quince Liqueur - Ratafia de Coigns

Mash some very ripe quinces and take care to remove the pips and cores; macerate pulp for three days in a jar; then squeeze out all the juice; measure it, and mix it with an equal quantity of brandy; add six ounces of sugar to each quart of the mixture, some cinnamon and cloves; leave it to infuse two months; then filter it and bottle it. This liqueur becomes more excellent the longer it's kept.

Saturday, July 07, 2007

Cherry Ratafia

Ratafia de Cerises.
Take cherries* and their pits, & put them in a pot to crush them, & let them ferment 24 hours. Usually three pounds of cherries produce a pint of juice. When you strain them, squeeze them to extract all the juice, & put as much of eau-de-vie (brandy*) as that of juice, pint for pint; add a quarter pound of sugar per pint; i.e., on a jug of twelve pints; three pounds sugar; & to that jug; you will add a piece of cinnamon and a handful of crushed cherry pits & stopper the jug, letting it infuse six weeks. After six weeks, strain, bottle and cork, and set back in a cool place for at least 4 months. This ratafia only gets better with age.

Make certain your cherries are ripe and mature, without being spoiled; otherwise all the spices, which one has habit to put at it, are not worth anything for ratafia.

Dictionnaire Portatif de Cuisine, d'Office, et de Distillation. Chez Vincent, Paris 1767, p. 143-144.

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*If you use Royal Ann (Napoleon or Bigarreaux) cherries, use a white brandy (Marc, vodka). If you use a dark cherry (Bing or Black Tartarian) use dark brandy.
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