strawberry vodka

If you live in or around Manchester you will probably know that the city centre has a Christmas Market late Nov, early Dec.  Every year for the past few years I have bought strawberry vodka which is so lovely that I even ordered a few (harumph, maybe more) bottles through the summer.

I get/got my strawberry vodka from

http://www.strawberrybankliqueurs.co.uk/

However, someone gave me some damsons from their garden this week and after a bit of thinking I went out and bought x2 1 litre preserving jars, a punnet of strawberries, a large bag of caster sugar and I routed through the cupboards for the bottle of plain vodka someone got me for Christmas.

Now this is a 3 month recipe so bear with me.

Clean the fruit, throw away bruised or squashed fruit. Hull the strawberries (take off the green leafy part and white centre) and prick each a few times with a fork or cocktail stick. The damsons just need to be washed - easy.

Wash, rinse and sterilise your jars and lids - either with boiling water, in the dishwasher if they can go in one and you have one or put in the oven at 140 degrees centigrade (after washing and rinsing) for half an hour.

Fill each jar with the fruit, add sugar up to a third of the jar and fill just about to the top with the vodka. Do not leave a large gap between drink.

I can imagine for some people this might be an odd thing to do - almost like wasting good vodka but if you haven't tried strawberry vodka go and get some from a Christmas market or the site above and you will be trying this recipe out at some point in your life if you drink alcohol.

Anyhow, put the lid on after the air bubbles have stopped and you have topped up the vodka.

Turn the jar upside down a number of times to allow the sugar to dissolve into the vodka.

Now the hard part

Put it away in a dark cool place. Take out each day and swirl.

I've heard of people using the vodka after 7 days but that is a weak infusion in my books and I want a rich flavoured, thick liqueur like vodka so I'm leaving it until Christmas. I'd like to make it a year as suggested in many recipes but I don't think I can wait that long.

This drink is fantastic added to champagne as a Christmas day treat at the dinner table.

Now there is a possible gift idea that anyone will like - won't they?

Shall let you know how it goes!

If you try this out and use it after 7 days please let me know what it tastes like.