Alas, home distillation of alcohol without a federal permit is illegal in the United States. And those permits are not easy to come by. Therefore, there will be no discussion here of distilling spirits from foraged materials. If this is something that interests you, look toward more enlightened countries like New Zealand and the Netherlands, where home distillation of alcohol for personal use is legal, even without a license.
Even though you can’t legally distill your own spirits in the United States, you can flavor distilled spirits with foraged ingredients, thanks to the processes of maceration and infusion. Maceration is the term used to describe soaking a solid object in a liquid. It’s often used interchangeably with infusion, although there is a small difference. You macerate your mulberries in vodka; you infuse the vodka with mulberries. The process may be exactly the same, but the word you use depends on how you view the final product. If you’re looking to create boozy berries, you’re macerating. If you’re making a fruity booze, you’re infusing. But that’s a technicality. In the real world, people use the words interchangeably.
You can make macerations and infusions with several kinds of liquids, including water, vinegar, and spirits. To make a shrub, you macerate wild fruit in vinegar. To make a foraged aperitif or liqueur, you infuse a wine or spirit with one or more wild ingredients.
Liqueur is a general term used to describe a spirit-based beverage flavored with fruits, spices, or nuts. Liqueurs are often sweet and may have a silky or syrupy consistency. In the US they are sometimes also called cordials, but in the UK a cordial is a nonalcoholic concentrated syrup (often fruit based) that is diluted and drunk as a soft drink. I find the dual use of the word to be confusing. In this book, I decree that a liqueur shall hereafter be known as a boozy concoction and a cordial as a nonalcoholic beverage.
Technically speaking, an aperitif is served to whet the appetite and a digestif is intended to aid digestion. Modern-day drinkers often use the terms interchangeably, but if you’re interested in the where and how of cocktail evolution, here are the facts.
The root of the word aperitif is the Latin aperire, meaning “to open.” Aperitifs should be dry and not too sweet. A sweet drink may dull your appetite rather than stimulate it. It should also not be very high in alcohol, which might dull the taste buds. Aperitifs generally have an ABV of 15 to 25 percent. Classic aperitifs include dry vermouth, Campari, and champagne.
Digestifs were originally concocted with medicinal herbs that acted as tonics. They may be higher in alcohol than aperitifs and may be sweet, bitter, or both. Popular digestifs include cognac, sherry, and Fernet-Branca (although why I do not know, since it tastes terrible).
You may be surprised by the range of wild edibles you can use to infuse various spirits. Fruits, leaves, roots, mushrooms, and nuts can all be macerated in alcohol to create unique, spiritous flavor combinations. Harvest dates will vary according to where you live and forage.
Makes approximately 3 / 4 cup
Play against the natural sweetness of bourbon by infusing the spirit with acorns.
Combine the acorn meal and bourbon in a jar with a tight lid. Shake to combine, then let it sit for 1 day. Taste the bourbon. The flavor should be slightly bitter (to balance the sweetness of the bourbon) but not astringent. If you can’t taste the acorn bitterness, leave the bourbon to infuse for another day and continue to taste-test. Overinfusing will give you an undrinkable spirit; you probably won’t need to infuse for more than 2 days. Once you’re happy with the flavor, strain the bourbon and seal it in a jar.
The bourbon will last indefinitely. No refrigeration necessary.
Leach your acorns according to the instructions, but instead of making a slurry, dry them in a dehydrator until they are brittle and can be snapped in two. It will probably take 18 to 24 hours.
Store the leached, dried acorns in the refrigerator until needed, then grind them into a coarse meal using either a hand grinder, a spice grinder, or the dry grains pitcher of a Vitamix.
Makes 1–1 1 / 2 cups
Acorn liqueur is rich and sweet. The flavor is more concentrated (and boozy) than that of acorn orgeat.
Combine the acorn meal and the vodka in a jar with a tight lid. Shake well and let it sit for 1 day. Then taste the vodka. If it tastes slightly bitter and nutty, you’re ready to move on to the next step. If not, let the acorns sit for one more day. You won’t need more than 48 hours for this infusion. Overinfusing the vodka will leave you with an unpleasantly bitter brew.
Strain off the acorn meal and set the infused vodka aside.
Combine the acorn meal, water, and sugar in a saucepan. Whisk the ingredients together over medium heat, until the sugar dissolves, and then allow them to simmer gently for about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and let the syrup sit for 4 to 5 hours. Strain the syrup through a jelly bag, letting it drip overnight. (Save the leftover acorn solids. They’ve been infused with both vodka and sugar and now taste very much like a dense sticky pudding. Bonus! You’ve got dessert.)
To make your liqueur, combine equal amounts of acorn syrup and acorn vodka in a bottle or jar. Shake well and enjoy.
Guest Mixologist: Colleen Graham
Colleen Graham is a mixologist with a passion for creating and sharing cocktails that enrich everyday life. She has more than a decade’s experience writing about mixing great drinks, both as the cocktail expert for About.com and on her own website, SCDrinkStudio.com. Colleen is also the regular drinks columnist for Maximum Yield’s HydroLife.
Colleen combines a deep knowledge of classic cocktails and their history with the creativity to experiment with new and interesting flavors. Her inspiration for the Squirrel’s Delight came from thinking about bourbon and how it’s aged in oak barrels. Since acorns come from oak trees, Colleen wondered what infusing bourbon with acorns would do for the flavor.
She says that steeping the acorns in bourbon is like giving the spirit more time in the barrel; it ages and mellows the bourbon and adds a touch of bitterness to the finish. To balance that bitterness, Colleen made a light cinnamon syrup and used a sweet vermouth to create the Squirrel’s Delight. Try this cocktail with a sweeter bourbon like Maker’s Mark.
Combine the cinnamon stick, sugar, and water in a saucepan. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove the syrup from the heat and let it sit for at least 4 hours and up to overnight. Remove the cinnamon stick and transfer the syrup to a bottle or jar. It will keep in the refrigerator for at least a month.
Combine all the ingredients in a chilled shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a rocks glass. Do not share with any squirrels, no matter how much they beg.
Guest Mixologist: Duane Sylvestre
Duane Sylvestre, who claims he’s been bartending since he was two years old, is equally comfortable behind the bar and in front of an audience. He loves to educate his customers and always aims to give them a wonderful overall experience, as well as a tasty beverage. While his years of experience may be a slight exaggeration, Duane is certainly well established on the DC mixology scene. He’s an award-winning mixologist, a member of the DC Craft Bartenders Guild, vice president of the United States Bartenders’ Guild (DC chapter), a certified spirits specialist, and a certified sommelier.
What does he like best about bartending? “I tell people it’s much more than the drink-making aspect of bartending that I enjoy. I love teaching and entertaining, and the bar is the stage that provides that opportunity for me.”
Duane chose Mount Gay Black Barrel rum because of the unique influence of wood on its flavor. Black Barrel is a blend of pot still and column still rums, aged separately, then blended and finished in new charred bourbon barrels. The oak wood of the barrel imparts extra flavor to the rum. The candy cap mushrooms add a hint of maple.
Duane’s original recipe called for oloroso sherry, but I decided to try it with mulberry liqueur. Like oloroso sherry, mulberry liqueur has a caramel, almost raisinlike flavor. It works wonderfully in this recipe.
Combine 1⁄2 cup dried candy cap mushrooms and 1 cup of spirit (try it with bourbon as an alternative) in a jar, seal tightly, and let steep for at least 2 days. Taste the spirit, and if you’re pleased with the strength of flavor, strain off the mushrooms and save them to use in something else, like a mushroom soup. If you’d like a stronger infusion, let it sit for a few more days.
Combine all three ingredients in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds, then strain into a coupe.
Makes 3–4 cups
Horchata is a Spanish and Latin American beverage traditionally made from ground nuts or seeds, sugar, and water. In this recipe we’re infusing milk with carob powder to make carob horchata. There are as many horchata recipes out there as there are horchata makers, which means I didn’t feel too guilty about messing with culinary tradition to create this foraged carob horchata. Some use milk, others don’t. Some use only rice, some only almonds, others use a combination of both. The amount of sugar varies greatly; I cut it way down, but I’ve listed a range below in case you like your horchata on the sweet side.
The sole constant seems to be the use of cinnamon as a flavoring. I backed off the cinnamon and vanilla in order to bring the carob flavor to the front.
Combine the hot water, rice, cinnamon stick, and carob powder in a blender and pulverize. Let the mixture sit for 4 to 8 hours, then strain through a jelly bag, squeezing every last drop of liquid out of the bag. You’ll get 1 to 11⁄2 cups of liquid.
Pour the liquid into a quart jar and add the milk, vanilla, and sugar to taste. Shake well.
Store in the refrigerator, where the horchata will keep for 2 or 3 days. The solids settle out after a few hours, so be sure to stir it up before mixing your cocktail.
Recipes from different countries use a variety of nuts and seeds, including barley, as the basis for horchata. Mexican horchata is traditionally made from rice and/or almonds and flavored with vanilla and cinnamon. It is a cousin of orgeat. Note the similarity of the names?
I struggled with the name for this cocktail but was ultimately inspired by the idea of traveling to forage for the carob and sailors pulling into foreign ports. Mixing homemade horchata with tawny port and a touch of vodka makes it extra special and just a little bit boozy.
Combine all the ingredients in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a rocks glass.
Makes approximately 2 quarts
Ratafia can mean several things, from a specific kind of biscuit dipped in wine to an alcoholic beverage made from the grape juice left over from making champagne. Most often, ratafia refers to a fortified wine made from stone fruits like plums, peaches, and apricots. It’s simple, requiring only a few ingredients: wine, fruit, sugar, and brandy.
Most people plant cherry plums for their foliage and flowers, never thinking of them as true fruit trees. In fact, many modern cultivars are sterile, because some people are annoyed by dropping fruit. (Those people are not my people.)
When I discovered a cherry plum tree laden with fruit in an abandoned parking lot, I harvested all I could carry and went back for more. After making enough chutney, jam, and jelly to last several years, I discovered a ratafia recipe and I may never make a jar of plum preserves again. Cherry plum ratafia is one of my new favorite wild beverages. It’s a superb aperitif and adds unusual flavor to cocktails that call for vermouth.
Most recipes call for an inexpensive wine to make ratafia, and this makes sense, since you’re going to be adding flavors, not preserving the exquisite taste of a fine vintage. I chose homemade wild elderberry wine to go with my wild plums.
Roughly chop the plums and put them in a half-gallon jar with a tight lid. Include the pits for extra flavor.
Combine the wine, sugar, and brandy in a large bowl and whisk to dissolve the sugar. Many ratafia recipes call for more sugar and extra spices, but I prefer mine on the dry side and I don’t want to obscure the flavor of the wild fruit with too many spices. Feel free to play around to reach your own perfect balance.
Pour the liquid into the half-gallon jar and shake to combine. Put the jar in the refrigerator and let steep for 2 to 3 weeks, shaking it once a day. Then strain out the solids and bottle the liquid. (If you can’t bear to throw away the boozy plums, you can use them for a very tasty jam.)
Ratafia keeps in the refrigerator for months (the brandy acts as a preservative), but it’s hard to make it last that long.
The small fruits of cherry plums (Prunus cerasifera), also called purple leaf plums, ripen in early to midsummer. They’re often hard to spot, since the color of the fruit is similar to that of the purple foliage. Cherry plums are tart and flavorful with firm flesh. They can be used any way that regular plums are used, although they may require more sugar to balance their tartness
Note: The kernels of stone fruits (inside the shells) contain amygdalin, which is a cyanide compound. (Remember when you were a kid and your friends told you not to swallow apple seeds or you’d die? Apple seeds also contain amygdalin, which is how that nasty rumor got started.) However, both apple seeds and the kernels of stone fruits must be crushed to release the amygdalin. If the shell of the seed remains intact, there is no danger of cyanide poisoning. If this worries you even a little bit, do not include the pits in your recipe.
I don’t know why so few people use single-malt Scotch in cocktails. Perhaps they think it’s too precious. I’m not suggesting you use a $200 bottle for cocktails. That’s probably a whisky that deserves to be sipped on its own. But many single malts make excellent cocktail ingredients, and you shouldn’t be afraid to play around with them. It’s a worthy spirit, and one that mixes as well as its fellow whiskies: bourbon and rye.
The first basic choice you need to make is between a peated and an unpeated whisky. Scotch is made from malted barley, and the peat flavor in Scotch comes from the process of drying the grain. Barley is usually dried for about 30 hours and may be done over peated heat, unpeated heat, or a combination. The amount of peat flavor in the whisky is determined by how much time the grain is dried over peat smoke. But even unpeated whiskies may have a whisper of smoke in their flavor profile; malted barley itself has a slightly smoky flavor.
Both peated and unpeated whiskies are worth experimenting with. Try this recipe in a side-by-side comparison: one glass made with a peated Scotch and one with an unpeated Scotch. The fruitiness of the ratafia, mulberry liqueur, and verjuice maintains the sweet/sour balance with both types of whisky, but the resulting drinks are very different. Both are spirit-forward drinks, but the peated whisky mutes the sharpness of the fruits while the unpeated Scotch is a brighter drink. This kind of comparison is a great way to educate your taste buds.
My personal favorite is the lightly peated whisky. If you don’t have a single malt on hand, try Johnnie Walker Black. It’s an excellent blended whiskey.
Combine the whisky, ratafia, mulberry liqueur, and verjuice in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a coupe. Add the seltzer and give it a gentle stir.
Tart crab apples balance the sweetness of bourbon when infused in the spirit for several weeks. To infuse the bourbon with crab apples, you’ll need to soften the apples; breaking down the structure of the fruit makes it easier for the alcohol to extract flavor. The easiest way to soften the fruit is to freeze and then thaw the crab apples.
I like a traditional bourbon like Jim Beam, Knob Creek, or Wild Turkey for this recipe. Traditional bourbon uses about 70 percent corn and approximately equal amounts of rye and barley.
Fill a half-gallon jar or pitcher with softened crabapples, and add a full bottle of bourbon. (Save the bottle.) Stir in the spicebush berries, then seal the container tightly. Let sit for 3 weeks, shaking the mixture each day. Strain through cheesecloth or a jelly bag, then return the strained bourbon to its original bottle. It won’t be full, because the crab apples will have absorbed some of the bourbon. You can toss the fruit or save it to make a boozy jelly.
Store the infused bourbon in its original bottle; it will keep indefinitely without refrigeration.
Makes 1 cup
The delicate flavor of chanterelle mushrooms requires a delicate spirit. White rum has a hint of sweetness but still allows the taste of the chanterelle to shine through.
Combine the rum and chanterelles in a jar and seal tightly. Let sit for about 1 week, shaking every day. After a week, taste the rum. The mushroom flavor should be subtle but noticeable, and the rum should have taken on the color and fragrance of the mushrooms. If it hasn’t, continue to infuse the rum, taste-testing every day.
When the flavor pleases you (probably after no more than 2 weeks), strain out the mushrooms and thank them for their service. Or save them to use in soup; I can’t bear to throw them away.
Store the infused rum in a bottle or jar with a tight-fitting lid; it will keep indefinitely without refrigeration.
This liqueur takes months to make, but it is so worth it. The finished liqueur is thick, silky, sweet, and highly alcoholic. It is liquid gold, and it should be savored over one clear cube of ice. You can also use it in combination with seltzer or club soda, if you can stand to dilute its perfection.
I usually make a big batch of this liqueur because I'm lucky enough to have lots of foraged flowering quince nearby. The recipe below is for a 1-gallon jar, but if you can only fill a quart jar with the topped fruit, the instructions remain the same. You'll simply need less sugar and less vodka as you move from step to step.
Wash the quince fruits and cut them into approximately 2-inch pieces, removing the cores and seeds. Leave the skins on. Fill a gallon jar with the fruit, then add as much sugar as possible, filling all the spaces in between the pieces. Cover the jar and put it in a warm (not hot) place. Let sit for 4 weeks, shaking the jar every day to help the sugar dissolve. You’ll notice the sugar pulling the juices out of the fruit, much as it does in a cold-processed shrub.
After 4 weeks, strain the juice, reserving the fruit pieces, and measure it. From a gallon of fruit, you should get just over 1 quart of juice. Pour the juice into a bottle or jar and refrigerate it.
Return the quince pieces to the gallon jar and add 4 cups of the vodka. Let the jar sit someplace cool for 6 weeks. Strain off the vodka and combine it with the refrigerated juice.
Once again, return the fruit pieces to the gallon jar and pour 4 cups of vodka over them. Return the jar to its cool spot and let sit for 4 weeks. Then strain out and discard the fruit, thanking it for its service. Combine the final vodka with the juice-vodka combination and pour into bottles. At this point, I was told, you should let the liqueur sit for several more months, but that proved to be impossible. I sampled the liqueur and was floored by its rich, floral taste and mouthfeel. Does it get even better with time? Yes. But how much deliciousness can a forager take?
Flowering quince (Chaenomeles japonica, C. speciosa) fruit ripens from early to late fall, depending on where you live. Be careful as you harvest; the fruit is protected by sharp thorns on crisscrossing branches. You may pick newly ripened fruit from the plant, but don’t forget to check any fruit that’s already fallen from the shrub. Flowering quince is a hard fruit and stays ripe for months, even after falling to the ground.
There are a lot of different flavors in this cocktail, but in the right proportions they come together to make a balanced, delicious libation. It’s also pretty darn potent. A hint of smoky mezcal provides subtle flavor, which contrasts nicely with the sweetness of the quince liqueur.
Creating this cocktail was a learning experience. Sometimes you have an idea that comes together in a flash. Other times you need to tinker and tweak, getting the balance just right. This was one of those times. I was so close, I knew the flavors were there, but I couldn’t get it exactly right.
I started out with equal parts mezcal and tequila, but that covered up the floral quince liqueur. So I backed off the mezcal in increments until it was a supporting player and the sweetness of the quince came through. Still, the finished product needed something else to tie it all together. The ginger syrup did the trick, deepening the sharpness of the blanco tequila and adding a rich flash of spice.
It was worth the trouble.
Combine all the ingredients in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a coupe or flute.
Most people think of lavender as a scent rather than a flavor, but it’s a very tasty culinary herb. The secret is not to overdo it. Too much lavender yields a bitter, soapy flavor. A light touch is all you need.
Combine the gin and lavender buds in a quart jar. After 4 hours start tasting the gin; when you like the flavor, strain out the lavender and rebottle the gin. It’s easy to overdo this, so keep close tabs on your time. You won’t need to infuse the gin for more than 8 hours total; more than that and the infused gin can be bitter.
Native American tribes in the Pacific Northwest used the rhizomes of licorice fern as medicine for treating colds and sore throats. But I’m not a doctor. I appreciate licorice fern for its culinary uses, and it doesn’t hurt that it’s a good-looking plant.
Chop the rhizomes into small pieces, 1⁄4 to 1⁄2 inch long. Measure the chopped rhizomes and combine with an equal amount of vodka in a jar. Place the jar somewhere out of direct sun and let steep for 3 weeks, shaking it once a day. Strain the vodka and discard the solids.
Measure the infused vodka and pour into a bottle or jar. Add half as much simple syrup as you have vodka. Shake well. Drink it alone, over ice, or in a Tree-Tini.
In the landscape, licorice fern (Polypodium glycyrrhiza) takes root in mats of moss that grow on trees in the cool, humid climate of the Pacific Northwest. If you happen upon a big clump of licorice fern, break off a piece of rhizome and give it a chew. The flavor is sweet and bitter at the same time.
Licorice fern often grows in big clumps, but since you’re taking the root of this plant, harvest conscientiously and don’t remove more than 10 percent of the root mass at a time.
Prickly ash is sometimes called the toothache tree. One chew on a prickly ash fruit will tell you why. Your mouth will go numb and stay that way for several minutes. It’s a little disconcerting, but temporary. Prickly ash is in the citrus family, a cousin of Sichuan pepper, which has a similar mouth-numbing effect.
Macerating the small prickly ash fruits in vodka gives you an infusion with the flavor and scent of prickly ash, but with 95 percent of the numbing power removed.
The flavor of licorice fern is both sweet and bitter. In a liqueur the sweetness dominates, but the underlying bitter is still there . . . lurking in the background, all mysterious and dressed in black, smoking a cigarette.
Licorice fern liqueur is mostly vodka, so this is a potent drink. Think of it as a licorice-flavored vodka martini with an aftertaste of numb.
To infuse the vodka, combine 1⁄4 cup dried or 1 cup fresh prickly ash fruits with 2 cups vodka in a jar with a tight lid. Let it infuse for 3 days and then start tasting daily. When the tip of your tongue goes just a little numb a minute after you’ve taken a sip, you’re there. Fascinating.
Combine the ingredients in a shaker full of ice and stir for 30 seconds. Strain into a martini glass.
Prickly ash trees (Zanthoxylum spp.) produce red berries in the fall. Pick the ripe berries and dry them in a dehydrator at 95°F until they split open. Remove the seeds and save the dried fruit to use as a spice. The prickly ash tree is well armed with sharp spines on its bark. Harvest with care!
Limoncello is a classic Italian liqueur traditionally served icy cold as a digestif. The recipe comes from southern Italy and calls for true lemons (Citrus × limon), but I use Meyer lemons because I like the way they taste and I have access to a Meyer lemon tree. I’ve come up with two recipes that produce very different liqueurs. Both versions are vodka based, although you may use any neutral spirit. Keep the ABV under 50 percent; spirits that are more than 100 proof will overwhelm the flavor of the lemons.
The traditional method calls for using only the zest of the lemons. This is the fragrant, oily, yellow outer part of the lemon skin. The virtue of this method is that you can use the lemon flesh and juice for another recipe. The virtue of the nontraditional method, which calls for using the whole lemon, is that it’s a lot less work, and who doesn’t appreciate a time-saving recipe? In both methods, make sure your lemons are clean; wash them with a little mild soap and rinse very well.
As for which method is better, you’ll have to decide that for yourself. The traditional method yields a prettier, clearer beverage. The lazy woman’s method gives you a sweeter, less spirit-forward flavor, but the pectin from the seeds and pith make it more opaque. You can’t go wrong with either one, because both are delicious: sweet, sour, and zingy.
Use a zester to remove the zest of the lemons, discarding the bitter white pith. Combine the lemon zest with the vodka in a jar, seal tightly, shake, and store in a dark place for about 2 weeks, shaking the jar once a day. Then taste. If the flavor isn’t to your liking, let it go a little longer.
After the flavor meets with your approval, make a light syrup by combining the water and sugar in a saucepan over medium heat, whisking until the sugar dissolves; let it cool. Strain the vodka off the zest and combine it with the light syrup. (Store the zest in the freezer and use it to garnish various beverages or to flavor nocino). Pour the liquid through a coffee filter into bottles. Seal and store for 2 more weeks before drinking.
Fill a large jar with the lemon pieces (as many as you can fit in) and pour the vodka over them. Close the jar, shake, and store in a dark place for about 2 weeks, shaking the jar once a day. Then taste. If the flavor isn’t to your liking, let it go a little longer.
Combine the water and sugar in a saucepan over medium heat, whisking until the sugar dissolves. Strain the lemons from the vodka and set the vodka aside. Put the lemons in the saucepan with the light syrup; bring to a boil, then reduce the heat and let simmer for 5 minutes, occasionally pressing on the lemons to release the last bit of juice. Remove from the heat and let the syrup cool, then combine with the vodka. Pour through a coffee filter into bottles. Seal and store for 2 more weeks before drinking.
Store limoncello in the freezer so it can be served ice cold without requiring actual ice, which would dilute the taste and silky texture of the beverage. The high alcohol content prevents it from freezing.
Technically, a Meyer lemon is not a true lemon; it’s a hybrid of a lemon and a mandarin orange (Citrus × meyeri). As a result, the skin is thinner than that of a true lemon and the fruit is sweeter and less acidic. The ripe fruit is juicier and slightly rounder than true lemons, and when left to mature on the tree it takes on a rosy/orange tint.
Meyer lemons are hardy to USDA zone 9, but because the tree is relatively small and grows well in containers, it’s a popular houseplant where winter temperatures get too low for it to overwinter outdoors. Fruit ripens year-round, but the heaviest harvest time is in winter.
Sangria is traditionally composed of red wine, fruit, sweetener, and brandy. Its origins are in Spain and Portugal, but all the world loves a nice glass of sangria. Served cold in pitchers or punch bowls, sangria is a great party drink, especially in summer when the fruit flavors and low alcohol content offer welcome refreshment.
Homemade blueberry wine gives this sangria a fruity base, and the limoncello gives the wine a boost of booze. (Despite the limoncello, the alcohol content of this punch is low relative to that of most cocktails.) Sweeten your sangria with a foraged simple syrup rather than plain sugar for an extra layer of flavor. Milkweed flower syrup, schisandra syrup, and sassafras twig syrup would all be tasty here.
I realize that not everyone will have blueberry wine on hand; it’s fine to substitute a fruity red wine. The carbonated beverage is optional, but I like what the bubbles do for the punch. Use a flavored seltzer or a complementary fruit soda. Citrus goes well with blueberry; consider the San Pellegrino grapefruit, lemon, and orange flavors. Or perhaps a bottle of elderflower champagne.
Combine the wine, limoncello, and simple syrup in a 2-quart pitcher and stir well. Add the fruit, cover, and refrigerate for several hours. Immediately before serving, pour the wine mixture into a bowl or decorative pitcher, add the carbonated beverage, and stir gently to combine.
Maywine is an infusion made by steeping sweet woodruff in white wine. Once used as a mattress stuffing, this plant is sometimes called lady’s bedstraw. In Germany maywine is served to celebrate May Day. Maywine punch includes champagne and strawberries, which is tasty, but I suggest making a simple infusion to enjoy the herb on its own. Drying the herb before infusing it will concentrate the flavor of the woodruff and accentuate its lovely haylike scent, full of sweetness and vanilla.
To dry the sweet woodruff stems, place them between two layers of paper towels. Heat them at full power in a microwave for 30 seconds, then check and continue to heat in 15-second intervals until the leaves are entirely dry. If you don’t have a microwave, bake them in the oven at 250°F (120°C) for 5 minutes, or dry them in a dehydrator at 95°F (35°C) until they are brittle.
Pour off about 4 ounces of the wine to prevent spillage. Stuff the dried sweet woodruff down into the bottle, fully submerging it. Recork the bottle and let sit overnight. After 24 hours, refrigerate the bottle to chill the wine. When it’s nicely chilled, strain out the herbs and serve the wine.
Often grown as a dainty ground cover in shady places, sweet woodruff (Galium odoratum) has escaped cultivation and can be found in moist, slightly acidic soils. It can be gathered all season long, and while the flowers are also safe to use, they’re not as flavorful as the leaves. Harvest sweet woodruff by snipping off the top few leaves, leaving the base of the plant in place to continue growing.
Makes 3–4 cups
Mulberries are an underappreciated fruit. I’ve read many descriptions of the flavor as mildly sweet and insipid — perhaps that’s why so few people pick them — but I enjoy the flavor of mulberries, both fresh and dried. Drying concentrates the flavor and sweetness; I recommend using dried fruit in this recipe.
Combine the mulberries and the vodka in a jar with a tight lid. Shake well and let steep for 1 week. Then start tasting. The vodka should take on the color and flavor of the fruit. When you can taste the mulberries in the vodka, strain off the vodka and set it aside.
Measure the fruit and combine it with the water and sugar in a saucepan using a 1:1:1 ratio. Bring to a boil, whisking to dissolve the sugar. Reduce the heat and simmer for a minute or two, then turn off the heat, cover the syrup, and let it sit for 3 to 4 hours. Strain the syrup, measure, and combine with an equal amount of mulberry vodka. There you have it: mulberry liqueur!
Mulberries (Morus) ripen in early summer, and they’ll let you know when they’re ready to be harvested. If you have to pull a mulberry off the tree, it isn’t ripe. Watch the ground for splattered berries, then look up. A ripe mulberry will fall into your hand at the slightest touch. Only then is it fully sweet, juicy, and ready to be eaten.
I confess, I have really wanted to feature my mulberry liqueur in a cocktail. I’ve used it as a supporting player in place of oloroso sherry, but it deserves its very own drink. In this concoction, the sweetness of the bourbon and that of the mulberry liqueur differ in depth and intensity, and the verjuice brings them together nicely. A smidge of Benedictine weaves in and out, adding a light herbal touch.
Combine all the ingredients in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a coupe.
Makes approximately 1 gallon
Nocino, a traditional Italian digestif made from unripe walnuts, has a pagan association with the summer solstice. Despite its Italian name, the liqueur originated among the Picts (a Celtic tribe from Scotland), who were known to become euphoric after drinking it. They harvested their green walnuts at the solstice and celebrated summer by drinking the previous year’s brew. Legend has it that the Romans took the recipe for nocino back to Italy when they left Britain behind.
As the recipe became an Italian specialty, spices like cinnamon, vanilla, and cloves were added, but for this foraged version I suggest using a combination of wild spices. What you use will depend on what grows near you; feel free to experiment. Once it’s ready, nocino can be served straight up or over ice, used in marinades, or poured over ice cream.
Put all the foraged ingredients in a 1-gallon jar, stir to combine, and cover with the alcohol. Let steep for 40 days in a cool, dark place.
Strain out and discard the solids. Measure the liquid and combine with an equal amount of simple syrup. Let steep for 3 months.
Strain the alcohol through a fine coffee filter and pour into bottles. The dark brown nocino is ready to drink now, but its flavor will improve over the next 6 months.
Black walnuts (Juglans nigra) are most plentiful near me, but you can use any kind of walnuts, as long as they are young enough not to have developed a hard shell beneath the green husk. They need to be soft enough that you can slice through them with a sharp knife. To test your walnuts for the right degree of ripeness, use a metal skewer or knitting needle. If you can push it through the entire nut with little or no resistance, you’re good to go. Depending on where you live, the walnuts will be at the right stage in May or June.
Black walnut juice stains your hands, and the young nuts are quite juicy. Stains last for about a week, so wear latex gloves if you want to avoid the mark of the black walnut.
Even though nocino isn’t the primary ingredient in this cocktail, its strong flavor makes it the headliner. Nocino is herbal and slightly bitter; it is balanced by the sweetness in the brandy and the mulberry liqueur. Don’t be fooled by the sugar in each of these ingredients; this is a highly alcoholic cocktail.
I started out with more verjuice, thinking extra sour was required to balance all that boozy sweetness, but I was wrong. Balance isn’t the same as equilibrium, and a balanced cocktail can be primarily sweet or primarily sour. The important thing is the relationship among the ingredients. Can you taste all the flavors, including the supporting players? Do you like it? If so, you’ve done it right. If not, you can tinker with the amounts. This is your cocktail, after all.
This drink reminded me of a sidecar, another brandy cocktail. Motorcycles have sidecars. Nocino sounds Italian. Ducati is an Italian motorcycle. Done.
Combine all the ingredients in a shaker full of ice and stir for 30 seconds. Strain into a coupe.
Don’t be fooled by the name of this cocktail. Yes, there’s ice cream in it, and that gives the drink some sweetness, but the primary flavors here are spicy, in a dark, mysterious, you-think-you-know-who-I-am-but-you-really-have-no-idea kind of way. That comes from both the rye and the nocino.
Rye is the base spirit, providing the treble notes. Think of it as the soprano in the chorale that is your cocktail. Nocino is a darkly spicy liqueur — I think of it as singing bass — and my foraged version has an extra boost of sassafras that broadens and brightens the bitterness of the black walnuts.
Folded into cream, the peppery flavor of spicebush shines through, and the ice cream sings the middle notes of this cocktail concert.
If you have an ice cream maker, use your favorite vanilla ice cream recipe and add a tablespoon of ground spicebush berries for every pint of ice cream. If you don’t have an ice cream maker, you can add the ground spicebush to already-made vanilla ice cream by scooping the ice cream out onto a cutting board, sprinkling on the ground spicebush, and folding the spice into the ice cream with two large spoons or paddles.
Combine the rye and nocino in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a glass. Top with the spicebush ice cream. Wait before taking your first sip. As the ice cream begins to melt, the combination of spiced cream and differently spiced booze is divine.
Makes about 1 quart
I originally made this liqueur with the intention of using it as a mixer, but I can rarely bring myself to combine it with anything; it’s superb on its own. As you lift the glass, the enticing scent of pineapple weed wafts up to your nose, helping you anticipate just how wonderful the flavor will be.
The depth of flavor in this liqueur comes from combining two infused liquids: a flower-infused spirit and a flower-infused syrup. Use in this double infusion technique for any delicate flower liqueur. The first time you taste this luscious liqueur, try it in a small glass with a single cube of ice; it’s delicious enough to be dessert. Once you get to know the flavor, you may be inspired to play around with it in a cocktail or two.
Combine the chopped pineapple weed and the vodka in a glass jar, cover tightly, and shake well. Let steep in a cool, dark place for 2 to 3 days. Then open the jar and take a whiff. When the vodka smells strongly of pineapple, strain the liquid and measure it. Stir an equal amount of pineapple weed syrup into the flavored vodka to make liqueur.
Store this liqueur in a jar with a tight lid in the refrigerator. It will keep for 6 months.
Pineapple weed (Matricaria discoidea) is a common weed of poor soils, and it grows in a wide range of climates. Pineapple weed flowers aren’t especially beautiful to look at. They are small, yellow-green, and have no petals. But who cares what they look like when they smell and taste this good? Crush a flower between your fingers, and you’ll know immediately why this plant got its common name: the scent of pineapple is enticing.
Pineapple weed can be used in tea, fresh or dried, but sugar intensifies the pineapple flavor, making syrup the best way to preserve it. While some foragers suggest that you use only the flowers, the delicate foliage also has a pineapple flavor and scent. Using the entire stem also makes it easier to harvest, so why not?
I have nothing against the piña colada. In fact, I’ve enjoyed many a piña colada on many a tropical beach and I kind of wish I were doing that right now, instead of huddling in front of a space heater writing about tropical flavors. But I digress.
Pineapple weed liqueur is one of my very favorite wild drinks, and that’s saying something. As delicious as it is by itself, I kept thinking there might be a way to mix it up, literally. But the flavor of pineapple weed is so much more subtle and less acidic than that of true pineapple. I wouldn’t want it to be trampled by a heavy coconut cream or an assertive whiskey. So what’s light and tropical and goes with pineapple weed? Coconut water, of course.
This recipe is almost too simple to be called a recipe. But once you’ve tried it, I bet you’ll keep coming back for more.
Combine the ingredients in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a coupe and enjoy, wondering how you lived this long without it.
Makes approximately 2 cups
Cinnamon and nutmeg are the spices most commonly used in cocktails. Both have strong, warm flavors, and both grow in tropical climates, so many of us can’t forage for them. Fortunately, there’s an equally delicious and not dissimilar spice that grows in temperate climates: spicebush berry, which has a flavor that’s equal parts sweetness and piquancy. It’s tasty in a syrup or infused directly in alcohol. Spicebush dram is a great way to introduce just a hint of warm spiciness (along with some rum) into a cocktail.
In bar lingo, a “dram” can mean several things. It may refer specifically to 1⁄8 fluid ounce or, more likely, to a shot of whiskey. It’s also sometimes used to refer generally to a small drink, as in “Shall we have a wee dram?” (To which the answer is always yes.)
Spicebush dram is my foraged take on allspice dram, a highly spiced, rum-based liqueur originally made in Jamaica. It is traditionally used in tiki drinks to add depth and complexity to the fruit base. Frankly, I think spicebush dram is tasty enough to be appreciated on its own, with a wee splash of seltzer.
Using a mortar and pestle or a spice grinder, roughly grind the berries. You don’t want a fine powder; you want little chunks of dried spice. Pour the ground berries into a pint-size mason jar or other container that can be sealed tightly. Add the rum and close the jar tightly. Set the brew aside to macerate for 2 weeks; shake it daily.
Strain the rum through a mesh strainer and then again through a coffee filter. This gives you a clear dram.
Combine the brown sugar and the water in a saucepan. Bring to a simmer and whisk to dissolve the sugar. Let the syrup cool, then combine with the rum and pour into bottles. Set the bottles aside for at least 1 week before tasting; 2 weeks is even better.
Try a sip (or two) over ice to get a feel for the flavor of the spicebush and rum. Then feel free to play around with using the dram to flavor whatever combination appeals to your palate.
Spicebush (Lindera benzoin) is a generous plant. In early spring it delights us with plentiful, delicate yellow flowers, before the leaves emerge. In fall the leaves turn a bright, rich yellow . . . again, a feast for the eyes. When the leaves fall, they reveal the best part of this plant: bright red berries that can be used fresh or dried.
Spicebush is a dioecious plant, which means male and female flowers are borne on separate plants. Needless to say, the females are the moneymakers in the spicebush community. Although at least a few males are necessary. I suppose.
This cocktail is named after Elizabeth Swann, of Pirates of the Caribbean fame. Beautiful, strong, and brave, Elizabeth ruled as the pirate king, despite her undeniable femininity. While pirates are traditionally associated with rum, this cocktail is built around a single-malt Scotch whisky that is finished in a rum cask, after its initial aging in a traditional bourbon cask. The remnants of the rum add just an edge of spice and sweetness to the whisky.
In keeping with the Caribbean theme, I’ve also used spicebush dram, a foraged version of allspice dram. Allspice dram is sometimes called pimento dram, but it’s not named after the olive stuffing. That would be ridiculous. Pimento and Jamaican pepper are alternate names for allspice.
Combine the whisky, spicebush dram, and ginger syrup in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into an old-fashioned glass. Squeeze the lime into the drink and give it a stir. Lime garnish is optional.
I’m someone who drinks her whisky neat, and I prefer this cocktail sans seltzer. If that’s too strong for your taste, top off with the seltzer.
Let’s all toast the Pirate King!
Makes 1 quart
Vin de pêche is French for “peach wine,” but this isn’t peach wine in the obvious sense. It’s a wine infused with peach leaf, a tradition that originated in Provence, where people appreciate a refreshing beverage. The tender young leaves add an irresistible almond flavor. I like to sip it over ice as a cool summer aperitif. Peach leaf wine will keep for a year in the refrigerator.
Rinse off the leaves, put them in a quart jar, and add the rest of the ingredients. Mix it all together and let steep on the counter for 2 weeks, shaking daily. By this time the wine should have a strong almond flavor. If you’re satisfied with it, strain out the leaves and discard them. If the almond flavor isn’t strong enough, let the leaves sit in the wine for a few more days, until you’re happy with the taste.
Leaves from peach trees (Prunus persica) should be harvested in late spring to early summer. They should be full sized but flexible, rather than leathery. Of course, you must be sure your peach leaves haven’t been sprayed with anything toxic. If you’re foraging in the wild, this is probably a safe bet, but wash them anyway.
Makes 1 quart
Spruce tips are full of vitamin C, and macerated in vodka they give the spirit a light, citrus flavor. Be sure to check the flavor regularly as it develops. Left too long, the resulting infusion tastes more like Pine-Sol than a cocktail.
Place the spruce tips in a blender and add just enough vodka to cover them. Blend on high until the spruce is completely pulverized, then pour the green liquid into a quart jar and top off with the rest of the vodka.
Seal the jar, shake the vodka, and put it somewhere dark to steep. Taste it after 2 days. You want a nice lemony taste, and depending on how old your spruce tips are, this may take 2 to 4 days.
When you like the flavor, strain off the vodka, throw away the spruce tips (thank you, spruce tips), and reseal the vodka in the quart jar.
Back when transatlantic travel involved months at sea (rather than a TSA pat down), sailors often got scurvy due to a lack of vitamin C in their diet. I hesitate to outline scurvy’s symptoms here since this is supposed to be appetizing. Let’s just say it ends with death.
Native Americans used local evergreen foliage, which contains vitamin C, to prevent scurvy during winter months without fresh food. They shared this knowledge with European sailors, who added spruce tips to their beer for medicinal value.
I appreciate the evergreen needles more for their bright, citrusy flavor than their preventative properties. In this cocktail, their tartness is balanced by the sweetness of elderflowers and the spiciness of wild ginger. The Merry Woodsman captures the essence of a woodland spring, when a walk through the woods reveals all three plants at their flavorful best.
Combine the vodka, spruce tip syrup, elderflower liqueur, and ginger syrup in a shaker full of ice and shake hard for 30 seconds. Strain into a highball glass, top with seltzer, and garnish with a young spruce tip, if desired.
Makes 1 1 / 2–2 cups
In terms of beverages, a shrub is a vinegar-based drink that can be enjoyed on its own or used in cocktails. In colonial days shrubs were a popular way to preserve fruit. Combining fruit with sugar and vinegar creates an environment that’s hostile to bacteria, so the fruit could be enjoyed well after its season even in an era when mechanical refrigeration didn’t exist.
Before you wrinkle up your nose in distaste at the idea of drinking vinegar (you know who you are), give shrubs a chance. You’ll probably be pleasantly surprised. Mix a few tablespoons with seltzer (or something stronger!) for a refreshing beverage, use it in a glaze for meat or fish, or swirl it into yogurt.
Wild strawberry shrub is a great way to preserve the harvest and enjoy the bright, sweet, deep flavor of wild strawberries all year long. Let your shrub age for at least 6 months before using it in a cocktail. The mellowing makes it a more versatile ingredient.
While you can easily make a shrub in an hour on the stove top, a cold-processed shrub better preserves the bright colors and flavors of the fruit. It’s actually less work on your part, but it takes a little more time.
Mash the strawberries in a nonreactive bowl. (This recipe works well for many fruits; if you use a fruit with a protective skin — plums, peaches, cherries — cut the fruit into rough chunks and remove the pits.) Add the sugar and mix well. Cover the bowl and refrigerate.
Check the bowl the next day, and you’ll see strawberries swimming in juice. The sugar draws the juice out of the fruit without the application of heat. (Both sugar and water are polar molecules, and their opposite attractions bind the sugar to the water in the fruit, drawing the water out of the fruit’s flesh.) Give the mixture a stir and refrigerate for another 24 hours.
The next day, strain the fruit from the liquid. Press the fruit against the inside of the strainer to remove as much juice as possible. Combine the juice with the vinegar and whisk it together well to dissolve any sugar. Pour the resulting liquid into a glass bottle or canning jar, cover, and refrigerate.
A freshly made shrub will be both strongly tart and strongly sweet. You can use it right away or let it mellow over the next few weeks. If this is your first shrub experiment, I suggest you taste it at intervals, to become familiar with how the flavor changes over time.
A tightly sealed jar of shrub will keep for 6 to 12 months in the refrigerator.
On the East Coast the season for wild strawberries (Fragaria vesca, F. virginiana) is woefully short. You’ll see them in May or June, depending on where you forage, and you’re lucky if you find a handful to eat on the spot. (Humans aren’t the only animals who appreciate a ripe wild strawberry.)
In the Rocky Mountains, however, wild strawberry season is astonishingly long and extends into August. That alone increases the possibility of a good harvest, but for some reason I’ve also found much greater quantities of wild strawberries in the Rockies. Chalk it up to the altitude or the sunlight, I don’t really care. All I know is that wild strawberries make store-bought berries taste like an entirely different (and inferior) fruit. And yes, a wild strawberry is even better than a warm, perfectly ripe fruit plucked from your own backyard. No disrespect intended.
I tested this recipe with varying amounts of shrub and rum, then both with and without the acorn orgeat. There’s no doubt that the orgeat makes this drink. Without it, the vinegar is too sharp and not integrated with the sweet rum. For someone just beginning to use orgeat, this recipe shows exactly what it can do for a cocktail. More than plain simple syrup, the nuttiness of the acorn syrup provides support and balance for the drink.
Combine all the ingredients in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into a champagne coupe.
Fermentation (as far as alcohol production is concerned) is the process whereby yeasts break down sugars into alcohol. Beer brewers and winemakers usually add commercial yeasts to their recipes for controlled results. Foragers, however, are more inclined to make use of naturally occurring yeasts, since we appreciate the spontaneity, risk, and excitement of the natural world. You never know exactly how it’s going to turn out, and that’s part of the fun.
Wild yeasts can be found in many places: on the skins of fruits, in flower pollens, and in flower nectars. Until recently, fruit growers believed the white bloom on many fruits (like grapes, plums, and elderberries) was wild yeast. It is now understood that the bloom is a natural waxy coating that prevents moisture loss. If you don’t believe me (or if you’ve seen all the outdated, inaccurate information on the Internet), perhaps you’ll believe the University of California at Davis’s viticulture program. I do.
Most fruit skins are covered with yeast — we just can’t see them. There are also wild yeasts in the air around us. So chopping up fruit, adding a little sugar, and exposing it to the air is often enough to get fermentation started.
Foragers are inclined to make use of naturally occurring yeasts, since we appreciate the spontaneity, risk, and excitement of the natural world.
Makes 1 gallon
Elderflower champagne ferments naturally, thanks to the yeasts in the elderflower pollen. There’s no need to add commercial yeast, although you can if your brew doesn’t start fermenting on its own within a few days. Since rain washes away pollen, it’s best to harvest elderflowers after several days of dry weather. Flowers harvested during a rainy season may not have enough pollen or yeast for fermentation.
I love the light, bubbly flavor of elderflower champagne all on its own or mixed with a floral gin in a Happy Birthday, Leda. I wish I could drink this all year round, but since it contains no preservatives that isn’t possible. And perhaps that’s one reason it’s so very special.
Bring 3 quarts of water to a rolling boil in a large pot, then remove from the heat and let cool to room temperature. Bring the remaining quart of water to a boil in a saucepan, then remove from the heat, add the sugar, and stir to dissolve. Pour the liquid into a clean, nonreactive bucket (e.g., plastic or stainless steel) and let cool to room temperature.
Slice the lemons very thinly and add them to the cooled sugar syrup, along with the 3 quarts of cooled water, the elderflower clusters, and the vinegar. Stir well, then drape a clean dishcloth over the bucket and set it in a warm spot to ferment for 4 to 5 days, stirring once a day. After several days you should notice little bubbles on the surface of the brew and fizziness when you stir.
Collect four 1-liter plastic soda bottles and rinse and sterilize them. To sterilize, you can use a commercial sanitizer like One Step (if you’re a homebrewer), or you can use bleach: pour 2 teaspoons of bleach into each bottle, fill the bottle halfway with water, shake it around a lot, empty, and rinse thoroughly.
After 4 to 5 days, strain the fermented elderflower liquid through a jelly bag, then pour it into the sterilized bottles. Leave a few inches of headspace at the top of each bottle and screw on the tops firmly. Squeeze the bottles to get a sense of how much give they have and then store them in a cool, dark place for 1 week.
As the liquid ferments in the bottle, it produces carbon dioxide, which builds up pressure in the bottles and forces the gas to dissolve in the liquid. The pressurized gas will be released as champagne-like fizzy bubbles when the bottle is opened. Check the bottles every day or so, gently squeezing their sides. After 3 to 7 days (depending on the temperature where the champagne is stored) the bottles will feel rock hard, with no give at all beneath your fingers. Now they are ready to be drunk! You can either move them to the refrigerator to stop the fermentation (and this beverage is best chilled) or store them in a cool, dry location if you don’t have room in your fridge.
Elderflower champagne lasts for about 2 months in the refrigerator. Unrefrigerated bottles need to be checked every few days, as pressure will continue to build as the bottles sit. Since the fateful day when a couple of exploding bottles jolted me out of a sound sleep, I loosen the caps of my elderflower champagne bottles once a week to let a little gas bleed out — just a crack so I can hear the gas escape for about 3 seconds. After I tighten the cap, I can once again feel a little give in the bottle. After a week the bottle is rock hard again and I repeat the process.
Elderflowers (Sambucus spp.) ripen in late spring to early summer, and the more pollen on the flowers, the tastier your flowers will be. Select umbels with fully opened flowers and snip off the flower umbels whole. Remove any insects by hand. Don’t shake or wash the flowers, or you’ll remove the pollen. Before using your elderflowers, discard the large stems and any brown blossoms. It’s fine to leave the tiny little stems attached to each flower, but larger stems and dead flowers may produce an off flavor.
Sometimes you open the refrigerator door and realize that you have exactly what you need to make a perfect seasonal cocktail. My friend Leda’s birthday is in early August, and back when we both lived in NYC I made her this cocktail to celebrate. The elderflower champagne I had bottled in June was nice and bubbly, and the wineberries were just starting to ripen in Central Park.
You can substitute any brambleberries in this recipe (black raspberries, raspberries, and blackberries are all delicious). I love how the vibrant color of the berries shines through the pale yellow combination of gin, elderflower champagne, and elderflower liqueur. The lime garnish intensifies the slightly tangy flavor of the berries and adds some nice color contrast.
If you’d like to make your own elderflower liqueur rather than use a commercial brand like St-Germain, fill a quart jar with ripe elderflower clusters and cover them with 80 proof vodka. Flowers exposed to the air will oxidize, which won’t affect the flavor but will make a darker liqueur. Tightly close the jar and leave the flowers to infuse for a month, out of direct sun. After 30 days, strain out and discard the solids. Measure the vodka, and set it aside.
Most elderflower liqueur is 40 proof, so to turn your infused vodka into a lower alcohol liqueur, combine equal parts 80 proof vodka infusion and simple syrup. To estimate how much simple syrup you'll need, remember that one cup of sugar and one cup of water make approximately 11⁄2 cups simple syrup. If you have 2 cups of infused vodka, make a syrup with 11⁄2 cups sugar and 11⁄2 cups water. That should work out just about right.
Gently muddle the berries in a pint glass, then fill the glass with ice. Add the gin and elderflower liqueur and stir with a bar spoon for 30 seconds. Top with champagne and garnish with a wedge of lime.
Makes 1 1 / 2 –2 quarts
Sana Ashraf (who created The Primitive Paloma cocktail recipe that follows) began her cocktail experiment with a homemade soda. The flavors of the soda led her to riff on the paloma cocktail, and the results are delicious.
This soda should be allowed to just begin to ferment; you’re doing it for the carbonation, not for the alcohol. Combine the sugar, warm water, and grapefruit juice in a half-gallon jar. Stir or shake to dissolve the sugar. Add the mugwort leaves and poke them under the liquid so they are completely submerged. Cover the jar with a clean dish towel and set it on your counter to ferment, stirring once a day.
After 3 to 5 days you should notice bubbles when you stir. This is the beginning of fermentation. Continue to stir once a day and start tasting. When the soda is nice and bubbly, strain out the solids and set them aside. Pour the soda into sterilized 1-liter plastic bottles, leaving several inches of headspace at the top. Leave the bottles at room temperature for 2 days, checking the carbonation level once a day by giving them a quick burp (see Elderflower Champagne). When they are fully carbonated, move the bottles to the refrigerator to stop fermentation.
Spread the solids (grapefruit pulp and mugwort leaves) on a dehydrator sheet and dry until they’re brittle. These can be ground as needed and combined with salt to rim a Primitive Paloma.
In the refrigerator, the soda will keep fresh for a few weeks.
Mugwort (Artemesia vulgaris) may well be one of the most hated weeds in the landscape. It’s an aggressive grower, so feel free to harvest in quantity. You couldn’t eradicate this plant if you tried. Young, tender leaves are best for this recipe, and both the leaves and the roots are a useful bitters ingredient.
Sana Ashraf, a transplant from the United Arab Emirates by way of Pakistan, has spent the last few years exploring her lifelong love of gastronomy and mixology, along with her newfound passion for aromatherapy, foraging, and herbalism. She finds inspiration both in tradition and in the chaos of the world around her.
Sana lives on a large, relatively untended property on Long Island where she has enjoyed discovering a range of wild edibles. Her first experiment with foraged mixology was making nocino from unripe black walnuts. She devised this clever take on the traditional paloma when her landlord’s landscapers showed up to mow and blow. She rushed ahead of their machines, grabbing great handfuls of mugwort, a weed they disparaged but that she knew had value.
Mugwort has a deep, earthy flavor. Asian cultures have long appreciated it in both savory (soups and noodles) and sweet (filled mochi pastries) dishes. Here it adds a strong herbal taste that balances the tart grapefruit and sharp blanco tequila. As a forager, herbalist, and all around DIY-er, Sana made her own grapefruit-mugwort soda to replace the commercial grapefruit soda (Fresca or Squirt, for example) used in a traditional paloma. She also used mugwort in the special salt blend, combining it with dehydrated boozy grapefruit pulp and rimming the glass.
Coat half the rim of a collins glass with lime juice and the mugwort/grapefruit-infused salt. Combine the tequila and lime juice in a shaker full of ice and shake for 30 seconds. Strain into the collins glass and add the grapefruit soda, then garnish with a lime wedge.
I strongly recommend fermenting your own soda, but as an alternative, you can infuse blanco tequila with mugwort, then use a commercial grapefruit soda to bring in the citrus flavor. To infuse the tequila, combine 1⁄4 cup dried or 1 cup fresh mugwort leaves with 2 cups tequila. The strength of your herb will determine how long you let the tequila steep, but it will be somewhere between 2 and 5 days. When the tequila has taken on a noticeable mugwort flavor, strain and bottle the liquid. It will last indefinitely; no refrigeration required.
Sana’s favorite thing about this cocktail is making the herb salt blend for the rim by dehydrating the fermentation scraps, mixing them with salt, and using the final product to rim the glass, resulting in zero waste. If you’ve fermented your own grapefruit-mugwort soda, pulse one part fermentation scraps, including the dried grapefruit solids, with two parts salt in a spice grinder to combine.
If you’re using commercial grapefruit soda, combine one part dried mugwort leaves with two parts salt. I recommend splurging on a high-quality brand like San Pellegrino, but if you love the flavor combination, try making your own. It’s even more delicious that way.
Makes 2–2 1 / 2 cups
This liqueur is sweet and syrupy, with a concentrated berry flavor. It’s a delicious after-dinner drink served over ice or with a splash of seltzer. You might also drizzle it over some vanilla ice cream. Any brambleberry (blackberry, raspberry, wineberry) will work, but my favorite is black raspberry.
In a large bowl, use a potato masher to crush the berries. Add the boiling water and stir to combine. Cover the bowl with a dish towel and leave it on your kitchen counter for a day, stirring several times. The repeated stirring aerates the brew and also prevents unwanted, oxygen-dependent bacteria from colonizing the surface of your liquid.
Strain the juice through a jelly bag into a large bowl. Discard the pulp. Add the sugar to the juice and whisk to combine. Leave the bowl out on the counter, covered with a dish towel, for 2 days, stirring several times a day. The dish towel will keep solids out but allow air in. After a few days you should notice a slight fizzing when you stir the liquid. If you don’t, add a pinch of wine or bread yeast to get the fermentation started.
Once active fermentation has begun, strain the liquid through a jelly bag one more time and then pour into clean glass or plastic bottles. Fasten a latex glove to the top of each bottle with an elastic band and prick one pin hole in one finger of each glove. This allows gases to escape during fermentation while preventing anything from getting into the bottle, contaminating the liqueur. You’ll notice that the glove inflates during the most active part of fermentation. When the glove deflates, which may take up to 2 months, it’s safe to cap or cork your bottles. Premature corking can result in exploding bottles, so don’t rush it!
Brambleberry liqueur will last indefinitely; no refrigeration needed.
There is one foraged cocktail ingredient you can legally distill at home, even in the United States, and that’s flower petal water. Since no alcohol is involved and no still is required (because yes, merely possessing an unregistered still in the United States puts you at risk of paying a $10,000 fine and receiving a 5-year jail sentence), you can make your own flower waters.
Many essential oils are steam volatile, including those found in rose petals. That means that steam emanating from or passing through the petals carries with it the essential oils, which themselves carry the scent and flavor of the petals. This easy distillation method requires no special equipment. Be sure to use organically grown flowers and to collect the petals when they are absolutely fresh. If you’re foraging in the wild, it’s likely the petals you’ve gathered haven’t been sprayed with anything nasty. If you’re foraging from a friend’s backyard (with permission, of course), take a minute to confirm that no chemicals have been used on the flowers.
Set a large pasta pot or water bath canner on your stove top and place a small ovenproof dish upside down in the middle of the pot. Remove the petals from your roses and measure them, then spread them around the bottom of the pot, circling the small ovenproof dish. You’ll want 4 to 6 cups of rose petals.
Next, add water equal in volume to that of the rose petals to the pot. The water level should not be higher than the top of the inverted ovenproof dish at the center. Place a widemouth 2-cup measuring cup or other heat-proof bowl on top of the inverted dish. Cover the pot with the lid upside down. Turn on the heat. As soon as the water begins to boil, reduce the heat and keep the liquid at a low simmer. At this point, place a bag of ice cubes on top of the inverted pot lid.
Here’s how it works: As the water boils and turns to steam, it volatilizes the essential oils in the rose petals. That steam rises, and when it hits the ice-cooled, inverted lid of the pot, it condenses. The inverted lid funnels the water to the center, where it drips into the measuring cup. And the condensed water contains the fragrance and taste of the rose petals.
Check the rose petals every 15 minutes. The most concentrated fragrance and flavor will be gleaned during the first 20 to 40 minutes; the rose water will become more diluted over time. After 40 minutes the petals will have lost their color and it’s time to stop boiling. Let everything cool, then pour the rose water into a jar or bottle. You should be able to get about 1 cup of rose water from 4 to 6 cups of rose petals. The rose water will keep in the refrigerator for up to 6 months.
