Marinated Cherry Recipes... Show Us Yours!

Looking for some recipes to make cherries for Manhattans... Ran across this:

Chocolate-Bourbon Cocktail Cherries

Chocolate cherry juice

1 cup  100% cherry juice
1 tbsp cocoa powder
1 pcs  cinnamon stick
1 tsp  vanilla extract
3 tbsp sugar
pinch of salt

Bring these ingredients to a boil in a small sauce pan. Allow to cool enough to fish out the cinnamon stick (or leave it in if you want more cinnamon influence).

Cherries

1 pint Cherries

I used tart cherries because I like tart cherries, if you don't you might want to try sweet. Pit the cherries while the Chocolate Cherry Juice cools. Pack them into a wide-mouth one pint mason jar.

Alcohol

1 cup Bourbon or Rye (I used a 50-50 mixture of Buffalo Trace and Sazerac Rye)
1 splash of Luxardo Maraschino liqueur

Once the Chocolate Cherry Juice has cooled to below 160° or so add the spirits. Mix well and pour over the cherries. You will have too much, reserve the rest for topping up the jar after the Cherries start to absorb it. Store in the refrigerator, shaking occasionally.

These get better with time. I found that after a month the tartness had mellowed and the chocolate and cinnamon had a more subtle influence that integrated better with the other flavors.

Comments

  • edited May 2015

    The worst part is the blisters on your hands from pitting all the damn cherries.

    They never seem to taste correct without some sort of prevalent almond flavor in the mix (probably the point of the Luxardo, although a splash just doesn't seem like enough). That's just my preference though.

  • I used hand tool similar to an olive pitter for removing my cherry pits. I'm part way through my recipe. I'll post it if it's any good.

  • great info, but I don't see a recipe, brother ;-)

  • edited May 2015

    I never measured…

    Barrel-strength Bourbon, Way more sugar (like 1/2 to 2/3 the liquid amount), Almond and Vanilla flavors, but more weighted towards almond, a little bit of Orange Peel (for zing, to cut the sweet). I've always aimed for an overpowering flavor if eaten right out of the jar, mainly to stand up to an assertive cocktail without getting lost. For an extra special treat, use the white rainier cherries. I think they do better whole, with the stem, but I'm always freaked out about someone breaking a tooth on the pit.

  • @grim said: ..... I've always aimed for an overpowering flavor if eaten right out of the jar,

    serves another purpose too, they don't disappear as quick

    I found that recipe when searching for the Wisconsin 'Door County Cherries', but the white cherries sound good...

  • edited May 2015

    Raniers are too expensive for everyone else, they are for your own stash. We are about a month before peak Ranier season I believe, so you should start seeing them in your local specialty grocery. If you never looked for them before, don't fall over when you see the price.

  • If I can get a qt jar made for around $10, I will be happy....

    off topic - when I get my whiskey going, FL law does not allow selling of drinks, but does not limit sample sizes in places without a 'COP' (consumption on premises), so 'pay for a tour, get a cocktail' seems to be acceptable for breweries and distilleries alike here... I want the cocktail to be memorable... and for people to come get a $10 tour every friday evening to start their night...

  • edited May 2015

    How attractive is your bartender?

    I may have violated 6 laws just by posting that question.

  • Why she is the most beautiful woman in the world!

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    800 x 600 - 77K
  • Attractive indeed, you are a lucky man (unless she is your sister, in which case she clearly got the good looks).

  • lucky beyond compare, so help me come up with some more good cherry recipes!

    In Louisville, at the haymarker, the bartender cracked the seal on what looked to be a home-canned jar of cherries to put one in our manhattans... (This was after @Smaug bought a round of four roses shots that went down like the roses still had the thorns in them...)

  • edited May 2015

    I had a very interesting cherry in a Manhattan last time I was down in Dallas. The bartender smoked them, yes, smoked. They were low and slow hickory smoked, almost dehydrated, and then rehydrated in whiskey. Incredible smoke, almost too much on their own (I wasn't a fan of the smoke). But, what was more interesting was the concentrated cherry flavor. Always stuck out in my mind to try dehydrating and then rehydrating, but it's one of a thousand things on a list somewhere. Also interested to know if anyone has tried a recipe that involved cooking or blanching them.

    Anyhow, the problem is that there are a good many people that expect the flavor of a bright red maraschino, go too far from that and you might disappoint. That's why I go heavy on the sugar and almond, the flavor profile is close (you'll know when you go too far when they taste like marzipan).

    By the way, Old Smoky Moonshine Cherries are a good example of seriously missing expectations.

  • edited December 2015

    @TheMechWarrior said: :)

  • No idea what that was about. My cherry was ordinary and I just haven't had time to try and dress it up.

  • I've eaten a lot of Griottines in my time.
    The base ingredients are the most important factor. The recipe itself is quite basic.
    Great for cooking too (black forest cake, wild duck sauce etc.)

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