Sunday 8 March 2009

Home made Cointreau

I have taken the photos for this post ages ago, and I would have waited a bit longer if I had not seen KyotoFoodie's blogpost about Quince liquor. I find it interesting that some recipes are rather universal. In France, sour cherries are commonly used for making liquor ('cerises a l'eau de vie', my favorite!), and although we had quince in the garden, we never made liquor with it, instead we made jelly and paste with it. However I have tasted some Quince eau de vie in Strasbourg, and I consider it my favorite alcohool, it is so tasty!!
So in this post, I'll give you a recipe to make your own cointrea. You need

- 1 ORGANIC orange (or a few kumkat or a few smaller citrus)
- 1 preserve jar
- strong alcohol (eau de vie)
- sugar (1/3rd of the volume of alcohol)
- 1 bit of kitchen string

Pour the alcohool in the jar with the sugar, then suspend the fruit(s) above the alcohol - without direct contact - then place in a dark place for 3 months, that's it!

You can use the fruit(s) cut in little pieces in crepes or pancakes, it is delicious!

6 comments:

Simones Kitchen said...

Wow, I never knew that making cointreau was this easy! Apart from the fact that you need to have a little patience! Thanks for the tips.

Maggie said...

How fabulous - making homemade Cointreau!

Rico said...

this is really good to know I must try...I suppose you'd make Limoncello lemon liquor de same way. thx for sharing

GunnarInLA said...

...I've just made Limoncello...it came out fabulous...
But what I REALLY want o make is...Cointreau
You suggest "organic" orange – as opposed to "inorganic"...? – ..but is there a "best" kind of oranges? (for Cointreau) – I'm in Southern Cal and oranges are everywhere (just not in my backyard) – but is there a preferred kind of orange for this purpose....
(For my Limoncello I used Meyer lemons and Everclear 75.5%)
...I grated my lemons and let the result sit in the alcohol for a month – some say it's not necessary to wait that long, but that's fine with me. I also made sure the end result had 40% alcohol content and not less...it really is important in my opinion...
Thanks for any info about "best oranges"...

PurpleSushi said...

How does the orange flavor get into the alcohol if they’re not in the alcohol???

Anonymous said...

Ive done it many times.
However, do not mix with water, it wil became white as milk