Orange Julius

There is nothing special about my recipe. I'm just posting it so I can find the recipe easily. Love me a Julius on a hot day.

Orange Julius
Yield 2 drinks on one giant one.

INGREDIENTS
3 0z OJ concentrate
1/2 c water
1/2 c milk
1/4 c powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
6-7 ice cubes

Add all ingredients in the blender. Blend. Add ice cubes one at a time with the motor running. Blend until smooth.

The not quite Ultimate Butterbeer

If you are a fan of Harry Potter, you know what butterbeer is. I had this plan to have a recipe posted for the ultimate butterbeer before the new movie came out. (which was yesterday) Why? I love Harry Potter and I love butterscotch. I didn't come up with the ultimate butterbeer. It would take lots of tinkering to get this recipe just right. I honestly don't have the patience for that. Also, I'm getting a bit sick of this recipe. What have I learned so far? It takes way more butterscotch then you think it should. Once I started adding more, the recipe got better. It might be even better with even more butterscotch. Frankly, at this point I'm sick of this recipe. I bored with butterscotch. I have thus far failed to produce the butterscotch soda float of my dreams. It's good like this, but that's about all I can say for it.

Butterbeer
1/4 c butterscotch sauce (0r possibly a bit more)
1/2 c milk (or maybe a bit less)
dash of nutmeg
dash of cinnamon
1- 2 scoops burnt sugar ice cream
Club soda

Warm up the butterscotch until it is very runny in the microwave. Measure 1/4 c butterscotch sauce into a glass. Pour an equal amount of milk into the glass with the butterscotch and stir vigorously. If the butterscotch does not dissolve, you may need to heat the milk/butterscotch mixture slightly in the microwave. Pour in enough milk to reach halfway (or less) up the side of your glass. Stir in the nutmeg and cinnamon. Add your scoops of ice cream. With a spoon that reaches to the bottom of the glass, stir vigorously while adding the club soda. Do this for the first part of the club soda. Then pour in the remaining club soda. Stirring insures that the club soda gets incorporated. If you do not do this, the top of the drinks tastes only like oddly flavored club soda.
This can also be served warm. Heat the butterscotch and milk together until warm. Then continue with the rest of the recipe the same as with cold butterbeer.

I haven't tried it, but you could add butterscotch schnapps for the adults.

Watermelon Slushy (with a little vodka)

Rain came at dinner time and my grilling plans changed to enchiladas. If you make mexican food, you "need" a fruity drink. I was inspired by this post about a blender killing frozen watermelon experiment at Rhubarb and Venison. I loved the idea of freezing watermelon. If you have a normal sized family you can make it through a whole watermelon pretty easily. This is epically true if you, like my sister, have a year old baby who is currently in love with watermelon. No watermelon eatin' baby? No problem. Just dice up your watermelon. Place in a single layer on a cookie sheet and stash in the freezer. Once it's frozen, move to a Ziploc bag in your freezer. Here is my first experiment with frozen watermelon. In a blender combine:

Frozen watermelon (I didn't measure)
Shot of Vodka
tablespoon-ish of lime juice
1 tsp sugar (or to taste)
a fair amount of water. I added maybe as much as 1/2 c.

You'll need lots of water to get the blender moving. You can use tequila or rum or no alcohol if you prefer. Beth at R & V also recommends freezing any fruit you have that is about to go bad. You can turn it into a smoothie later. I need to start doing this. I can be a grown up and admit my fruit will go bad next day and that I'm actually not going to get it eaten in that time.

Ginger Ale

A few days ago I saw the Good Eats show on Ginger. I was totally fascinated. Ginger Ale and candied ginger. I made the ginger ale. It's pretty good, but not great. An easier way to make your own ginger ale would be to add the ginger syrup to club soda. I think making ginger ale is fun however and will make it again. When I make it again I will
1) Be sure to follow the directions and cover the syrup while it steeps. Woops. I think that's why my ginger ale doesn't have enough ginger flavor.
2) I will open the ginger ale with extreme caution. I sprayed about one cup around my kitchen in a huge fountain. It looked like someone dropped an Altoids into a bottle of pop.
In the spring, I'm going to try replacing the ginger with rhubarb and to make rhubarb ale.

Ginger Ale
INGREDIENTS
1 1/2 oz finely grated ginger (I used a micro-plane zester)
6 oz sugar
7 1/2 c filtered water (I used tap water)
1/8 tsp yeast
2 T freshly squeezed lemon juice (I used bottled)

Place ginger, sugar and 1/2 c water in a 2 quart saucepan over medium high heat. Stir until sugar has dissolved. Remove from the heat, cover and allow to steep for one hour.
Pour the ginger syrup through a fine mesh strainer set over a bowl, pressing down to get all the juice out of the ginger. Chill quickly but putting the bowl in another bowl with ice in it or by setting it uncovered in the refrigerator until it reaches room temperature.
Using a funnel, pour syrup into a clean 2 litter pop bottle. Add the yeast, lemon juice and 7 cups of water. Cover and shake gently. Leave at room temperature for 48 hours. After 48 hours open the bottle with EXTREME CAUTION to check for carbonation. If it is as carbonated as you would like, place it in the refrigerator. If you would like more carbonation, let it sit at room temperature later. Store for up to two weeks. Open the bottle at least once a day (very cautiously) to let out excess carbonation.

Kristy's Hot Chocolate (Cocoa)

In October, when my sister was visiting, she perfected this recipe. It's great when you have a crowd for cocoa. In fact, we had one yesterday when all the kids were playing in the snow. This is decadent and delicious despite a relatively small amount of sugar. Dutch cocoa would work best for this, but regular old Hershey's cocoa works well. As a side note I've been saying on my blog that Hershey's Special Dark Cocoa is dutch cocoa. Turns out it's a blend of natural and dutch cocoas. I recently tried it and it's flavor is weird. It's not terrible, but I wouldn't recommend it.

Kristy's Hot Chocolate

INGREDIENTS
3/8 c (6T) sugar
3 T natural (regular) cocoa
heaping T dutch cocoa
1/3 c water
good pinch of salt

4 c milk (I use 1%, but whole milk would be even better.)

1 1/2 tsp vanilla

1. Combine the first four ingredients in a sauce pan. Bring to a boil and cook until dissolved.
2. Add milk and heat to temperature. I'd suggest just below a boil.
3. Stir in vanilla just before serving.

Martini's (All sorts)

Sorry pregnant and nursing friends and family. I don't mean to taunt you. This can be what you drink in a few months.

Martini’s

Blue Ocean

2 shots Malibu rum (or other coconut rum)

1 shot blue caraco

3 shots pineapple juice

splash of sprite (or 7-up)

Skake all ingredients (except sprite) in a martini shaker. Pour into a martini glass and add a splash of Sprite or 7-up.

In the summer blend all of the ingredients except the 7-up in a blender with ice. Add a splash of 7-up after you pour into a glass.

Chocolate martini

1 shot vanilla vodka

½ shot cream de cocao

1 ½ shot Irish cream

chocolate syrup for garnish

Appletini

1 shot vodka

1 shot apple pucker

1 shot apple juice

Watermelon Martini

1 shot vodka

1 shot watermelon pucker

1 shot cranberry juice (or Juicy Juice Watermelon Juice)

Butterscotch Martini

1 shot butter shots

1 shot vanilla vodka

1 shot Irish cream

1 shot milk