Watermelon Two Ways

So on that same bonanza we made Watermelon Two ways. Both were awesome and exciting....kinda like bringing me back to the days of college where experimentation was key...not really taste :)

Vodka infused with Watermelon

750 ml of Vodka and about 4 lbs of Watermelon

Skin and cut up the watermelon into small bits, and toss them in the blender

Pour half the bottle Vodka into the melons.

Blend

Pour the rest of the bottle in.

Blend some more, until its fine.

Strain (for there will be bits of solid watermelon)

Put into a container and chill.

Pour a shot or two into cup*

Mix with sprite and/or water.

****WARNING: do be aware when you're pouring this drink you're basically pouring shots of vodka, don't let the taste fool you, this is potent! As we learned to our joy and sadness.

Watermelon infused with Vodka

750 ml Vodka and

Whole Watermelon (size not a big deal, the bigger it is the more Vodka can be infused though)

Cut a hole (the size of the mouth of the Vodka bottle) in the top of the watermelon so you can see the bright, beautiful redness inside.

Take the top off the vodka, then tightly place the watermelon on top of the bottle of vodka, so it sticks

Turn the watermelon over so the bottle is vertical (see picture) and let it infuse for about 24 hours or more.

You can tap the melon occasionally to spread the vodka more quickly. If the melon is small you won't finish the bottle (we used only half of the bottle)

Take out the bottle after 24 hours.

Chill the melon

Cut into it and enjoy the fruity alco-holy goodness inside.

The Drink Stays in your Cup ( a Saturday drink making bonanza)

So it's been awhile since we've written, but there has been a few changes to our line up. The Linden4 have become the Linden 5. As of a few days ago a new volunteer moved in with us name Cassie. Cassie spent these last months of her service out in the savannah of southern Guyana. She's learned all sorts of things that she is willing to share with us in the Linden house. The first of which are Fruit drinks. Well okay, fruit wines would be more appropriate. So on this election week where we're to stay near our house, we had a wine making party. It brings me back to those old brewing days...and we been brewing “Drink” as they say down south.

A lot of these recipes are simply fruit blended up with tons of suger then put into a bottle to ferment.

Cherry Wine

Cherry wine of all the wines we're talking about in this post is the one that ferments the quickest. Approximately 3 days.

Bag of Guyana Cherries

Sugar (hmm not sure the amount but it was a lot, 2 cups per bag of cherries)

Water

Rinse off the cherries, and pluck the stems off if you don't have a thin enough sieve.

Put the cherries in the blender, and add water (just enough to barely cover the cherries)

Add suger (when we used two bags of cherries, we filled the rest of the blender up with suger....basically after making 4 drinks we went through 2.5 kg of suger.)

Blend.

Pour into plastic bottles (skins and all) and put the bottle cap on. Let sit in the sun (if possible) for at least 3 days. The longer you leave it the more alcoholic it will become (that's for you Beat Attack Shackers)

Shake the bottles and release the built up gas at least twice a day. (release the gas by unscerewing the top a little bit then squeezing the bottle.)

When ready to drink, strain out the bits of skin and so on, and be left with the great juiciness that is cherry wine.

***for a little added flavor, pour in a splash of Sprite into the the cherry wine before you drink it.

Passion Fruit Wine

Passion Fruit wine has a few more steps and it takes longer to ferment (4-5 days), but we've been told its bomb...we'll find out soon enough.

Passion Fruit

Sugar

Water

Same rules apply the more sugar you add the more alcoholic it can become, we used lots of sugar.

Cut open all the passion fruits and spoon out the inside, seeds and all, of the fruit into a bowl. (You can toss the skins of the Passion Fruit into the compost)

Add water to the blender

Add Sugar

Blend up fairly fine.

Pour the blended juice with sugar into a bottle, cap bottle, and set to ferment for 5 days (again the longer you ferment the more alcoholic it becomes.

Shake the bottles at least twice a day and release the gasses.

Strain, chill, and drink when ready for a sweet, sweet, treat.

Pine Wine

Well we did a modified version of pine wine. In the bush they eat the fruit of the pineapple, but then use the skins and core to create pine wine. You can through the skins and core into some water, with sugar and lef it to sit for a week, or you can do what we did.

Can you guess the ingredients?

Pineapple

Sugar

Water

We skinned the pine, then cut up the fruit and put it in a blender.

Add Water

Add Suger (again don't be suger free on this guy)

Blend.

Lef it to ferment for at least 5 days (more, if necessary. Possibly 7 days? Pine takes the longest)

Strain, chill, and drink.

Those are some of the wines we tried out there are others as well, “Cane Wine” with cane sugar, Jamun (kinda plum like fruits) Guava, etc.