9 Nasty Truths About Your Favorite Foods
Finally, BBQ Pitmasters Gets It Right
Years ago, my friend's parents were cleaning out their liquor cabinet and gave me the above -- Ermita Ron Escarchado (translated to Ermita Frosty Rum). Holy crap, this stuff is good.
Ecarchado is liqueur enriched with sugar by putting an aniseed branch inside. Sugar than pulls itself out of the liqueur and crystallizes around the sprig and the base of the bottle, which ends up creating a thicker, more sugary liqueur. In the words of my friend, the rum becomes "viscous sh*t." (In the good way.)
The two main types of escarchado, after searching the web, seem to be the ron/rum variety and the anisette variety, although I've also seen brandy listed occasionally. It's not the easiest thing to find (if anyone finds it in Canada, please let me know), but can be scored in the states through sites like this, and much more readily in Europe.
Cherries Jublie is one of those foods that I've heard of but never had, like Baked Alaska or Pig's Feet or Mutton. Is Cherries Jubilee something that you set on fire, or is it the name of a stripper from some movie or TV show I once saw?
Wild Turkey American Honey Liqueur is 35.5% abv. / 71 proof and is made with honey and Wild Turkey bourbon. The color is a medium to dark gold. I am not a fan of most of the Wild Turkey products, but was intrigued by this bourbon and honey liqueur. So when I saw it on sale really cheap at the New Hampshire State liquor store I said "what the heck" and picked up a bottle.
J Winery Pear Liqueur is 30% abv. / 60 proof. When I was researching this liqueur I found out an interesting story about how it came about. In 1995 the present day Cellar Master of J Winery, Tom Meeker, was playing around with fermenting pears, on the grounds that would later become J Winery and Vineyard. This pear juice was slowly fermented to full dryness and then twice distilled in a copper alembic still, to produce a pear brandy that was 50% abv. / 100 proof. The pear brandy was then laid down in French Limousin oak barrels for ten years to age and was basically forgotten about. Then a couple of years ago J Winery's Winemaker, Oded Shakked, purchased the distilled pear brandy for the company J Wine to use. It was then blended with de-ionized (rain) water and liquid sugar to make the liqueur. The liqueur was then cold stabilized and aged for six more months before bottling earlier this year.
Zirbenz Stone Pine Liqueur of the Alps
