Fusion

"Coole" Cream






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We first tasted Coole Swan Irish Liqueur last year when we attended Fare Plate in New York City. It is a beautiful creamy white with a slightly lighter taste than Bailey’s. While I still love Bailey’s, try out a bottle of Coole Swan for a change up.

Our new ice cream maker has been an inspiration: I have made peppermint chip, “healthy” avocado dark chocolate, and now my own Coole Swan Ice Cream. This ice cream goes fast in our house, so be warned: it is highly addictive stuff!

Recipe
Note: recipe is formulated for a 1 ½ quart ice cream maker. We bought the inexpensive Cuisinart ICE-21, which we are pleased with so far.

Ingredients
• 1 cup of whole milk
• 2/3 cup of granulated sugar
• A scant 2 cups of heavy cream
• ½ cup chilled Irish cream liqueur (preferably Coole Swan)

Whisk the milk and sugar together in a medium sized bowl until the sugar dissolves. Add in the heavy cream and whisk gently (you do not want to thicken the cream at all). Cover and chill in the fridge for 2 hours or more.

After at least 2 hours, set up and turn on the ice cream maker (look at your ice cream maker instructions/ ours must be running before pouring in the mixture).

Gently pour in the milk, sugar, heavy cream mixture. Run the maker for 15-20 minutes. Add in the chilled Coole Swan during the last two minutes. Alcohol impedes the freezing process, so you need to add it towards the end. My ice cream was fairly soft and some of the liqueur did not mix in, so I poured it into a chilled glass container, stirred it and popped it quickly into the freezer for a few more hours. It was perfect!

Easy to eat on its own or try in one of the recipes below!


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Swan Sundae

• 2 scoops of Coole Swan Ice cream
• A dollop of hot fudge sauce
• A dollop of whipped cream (Using a handheld mixer, I whipped up the leftover heavy cream from the recipe and it worked great.)
• Sprinkle of chopped pistachio nuts

Arrange all of the ingredients in a bowl and serve immediately.



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Coole Swan Affogato

• Strong ice coffee (I made espresso, added cold filtered water and then chilled it. Cold brew would also work well)
• A scoop of Coole Swan Ice cream
• A dollop of whipped cream
• Generous sprinkle of cinnamon (delicious with the Coole Swan- amazing together!)

Scoop the ice cream into a glass and pour the coffee over it (works with hot espresso too). Put the whip cream on and sprinkle the cinnamon over it.


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Stone Wall

The ingredients you'll need

With spring well underway, we thought it was appropriate to celebrate with a refreshing, easily-made cocktail. This is a slightly different version than the classic Stone Fence, a colonial-era drink noted for being a favorite of Ethan Allen. Word has it that he and “the Green Mountain Boys” filled up on a mix of rum and hard cider the night before attacking the British-controlled Fort Ticonderoga.

We’ve added some orange bitters and a nice helping of cinnamon sugar around the rim of the glass, which makes it a sweet and tart treat. We also changed the name to Stone Wall in recognition of a song that Conor’s Uncle Jack used to sing, “the Old Stone Wall.”

Ingredients

  • Good quality rum
  • Hard cider
  • Orange bitters
  • Cinnamon sugar

Directions

Rim a rocks glass with cinnamon sugar by wetting the rim with water and dipping the glass rim into the cinnamon sugar. Drop in a few cubes of ice.

The ratio of cider to rum is 3-1. For a single glass, for example, use 2 ounces of rum and 6 ounces of cider. Add one or two dashes of orange bitters, stir and enjoy.

A Stone Wall cocktail

Cinnamon Cream Martini

Cinnamon Cream Martini

Nothing beats Irish Cream Liqueur and milk. However, we were looking for something that cut down on the milk (since it does not always agree with Libby), and we also wanted a bit of a twist on this classic combination. So we came up with the idea of using almond milk and some cinnamon. Turned out absolutely delicious we are happy to report.

Ingredients

  • 2 ounces of Irish Creme Liqueur (Baileys works, of course. I love Kerrygold Irish Creme and Coole Swan, but they are not as easy to come by).
  • 2 ounces of Vanilla Almond Cinnamon Milk (see instructions below)
  • 2 tsps of sugar
  • 1 1/2 Tbs of cinnamon
  • Splash of Irish Whiskey

Directions

1. You need to make the cinnamon milk about an hour ahead. Pour 2 cups of unsweetened vanilla almond milk into a small saucepan on medium heat. Stir in the cinnamon and sugar. As you heat, stir often and make sure not to boil. When the cinnamon has mostly dissolved and it is steaming, strain into a container using a fine sieve. Put in the fridge for 30-45 minutes to cool. Store the unused milk in an airtight container for up to 10 days.


2. In a shaker with ice, combine the Irish creme, 2 ounces of the cinnamon milk mixture, and the splash of whiskey. Shake and strain into a martini glass. Another way of enjoying is to keep the cinnamon milk warm and add in the other ingredients for a hot drink. The cinnamon milk is also great as a non-alcoholic beverage.




Guinness ketchup

Guinness ketchup put into action


Tired of the blasé condiments you pick up at the grocery store? Has it even dawned on you that there are other options you could choose to top off that burger or dip fries into? Irish Food Revolution has added the rich smoothness of Guinness Stout into a sweet and spicy ketchup that is a perfect complement to anything you’d eat with regular ketchup. The results are full-flavored, sweet and spicy and you probably have most of what you need already on hand.

Ingredients

  • 1 tablespoon olive oil
  • ½ onion, diced
  • ⅓ cup granulated sugar
  • ¼ cup brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 2 tablespoons dijon mustard
  • ¼ teaspoon ground pepper
  • ¼ cup malt vinegar
  • ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper (reduce or omit if you don’t like spicy heat)
  • 1 teaspoon garlic powder
  • ½ teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1 16 oz. can fire roasted diced tomatoes
  • ¾ cup Guinness Stout

In a large saucepan, heat the olive oil over medium, then add onions and cook until softened and translucent. Add the remaining ingredients, bring to a boil and simmer for about an hour until thickened. Let cool for a few minutes and add to blender, or simply use an immersion blender. The ketchup should last a few weeks in the fridge.

Ingredients
Everything you need to make Guinness Ketchup

All of the ingredients cooking
All of the ingredients beginning to simmer

Ready to blend
Ready to blend

Guinness Ketchup

Dublin French Toast

Dublin French Toast


Tired of limp French toast? Can you power through a day without the sausage and bacon? You bet you can. And our version is hearty enough that you won’t even miss the meat. We used our own brown soda bread rather than the pale white excuse for bread that passes the muster most elsewhere. Throw on your favorite toppings and you’ll have a breakfast fit for a marathoner.

Ingredients
2-4 slices thick cut brown soda bread
2-3 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon cinnamon
teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon brown sugar
½ cup milk
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
2 eggs

Pictured toppings
Real maple syrup
Strawberries (optional)
Banana slices (optional)
Powdered sugar (optional)

Place a frying pan on medium heat.

Whisk two eggs until frothy. Stir milk, vanilla, cinnamon, brown sugar and salt into egg mixture. Stir or whisk well to combine.

Soak bread slices in egg mixture, flipping with tongs until bread is pretty well saturated — a minute or so per slice. Set soaked bread on a plate.

Spoon 2 tablespoons of butter into the frying pan and heat until melted, tilting the pan or using a spatula to coat the bottom of the pan. Place soaked bread in pan and cook until underside is browned, flipping and repeating with the second side. Add more butter if desired or if you’re making more than two slices.

Serve warm with plenty of real maple syrup and/or any combination of powdered sugar, fruit, berries or jam.


Egg mix
The egg mix ready to combine

Ready to dip
Ready to soak

Soda bread soaking
Soaking the brown soda bread

Dublin French Toast frying
Frying the soaked bread

Dublin French Toast

Strawberry shrub

Strawberry shrub

Under categories, I’ve labeled this Strawberry shrub as quick and easy. Though technically it takes several days, the prep is about as quick and easy as it gets, so I feel vindicated.

Let’s start with the definition of a shrub. Some of you might know a shrub as a mix of fruit juice and liquor, but vinegar is a fine substitute and it’s what I’m using here. I like to have some around at parties so teetotalers have something interesting from which to choose. It not only makes a refreshing soda type beverage, but it can also be an ingredient in alcoholic drinks as well (sangria, gin fizz) or in salad dressings, desserts or even sweet and savory dishes.

Shrubs have been around for centuries and were originally a way of preserving summer flavors through the winter. The two mainstays of this basic shrub syrup are sugar and vinegar. Obviously the type of vinegar you choose will affect the end results, but for me, the fun comes in choosing the flavor. For ease I’ve chosen fresh strawberries. You can try substituting other flavors as well, like citrus - lemon/orange (avoid lime); peach; apple, berries, or combinations thereof. Then try to pare a vinegar to match your flavor, apple cider vinegar for apple shrub, for example.

Keeping a ratio of 1-1-1 is the trick. I’ve used 2 cups of strawberries, 2 cups of sugar and 2 cups of vinegar - simple. And you won’t believe the results - unique and delicious. You can vary the strength by adding it to seltzer, which is my favorite way to use this. You can have anything from mildly flavored to strong and sweet with a hint of tart. The vinegar indeed comes through, but it is remarkably refreshing with the sugar to balance things out.

The acid in the vinegar helps to preserve the syrup, but it should still be kept in the fridge nonetheless.

Ingredients

  • 2 cups strawberries (I used frozen for convenience. They’re generally picked at their peak and frozen soon afterward.)
  • 2 cups raw sugar (Feel free to use refined, but the hint of molasses gives it a little more interest for me.)
  • 1¼ cup balsamic vinegar
  • ¾ cup apple cider vinegar

If frozen, thaw the strawberries enough to be able to slice. Slice or mash the strawberries a little bit (quartering them is enough). Mix the strawberries and sugar in a bowl, cover and place in the fridge for two days, stirring a couple times along the way. Stirring will help to mix the sugar into the berries as the whole concoction “melts.”

Remove the bowl from the fridge, strain out the strawberries, making sure to push down on them to extract as much syrup as you can. Discard the remaining berries. They will be fairly broken down. This will leave a syrup. Stir in the apple cider vinegar and balsamic vinegar and place the mix in a jar or sealable bottle. Store in the fridge for two more days or until the sugar is fully dissolved.

Mix into seltzer at whatever ratio you like, top with ice and enjoy. Then try variations of the recipe: red wine vinegar, ginger, peaches, plums, pomegranates. Experimentation with such a simple recipe is a fun way to try new flavors. One of my favorites is 2 cups of blueberries, 2 cups of sugar, 1 cup of apple cider vinegar and 1 cup of red wine vinegar - fruity and smooth.

Strawberries and sugar
Strawberries mixed with sugar

Strawberries and sugar after two days
What strawberries and sugar look like after two days

Ready to mix
Ready to mix the syrup with the vinegar

Bottled strawberry shrub
Bottled and ready to add flavor at a moment’s notice

Overloaded Potato and Garlic pizza

Overloaded Potato and Garlic Pizza closeup


One of the golden guidelines of making pizzas is not to overload them. But you have to know when to throw the rules out the window. Case in point: our overloaded potato and garlic pizza. This isn’t your cookie cutter, corner store pizza. It’s a savory sweet concoction unlike anything you’ve tasted. It comes topped with crispy potatoes, sautéed red onions, sharp cheddar cheese, plenty of garlic and a drizzle of balsamic vinegar glaze.

The secret to the potatoes is to grate and soak them to reduce the amount of sticky starch. Grating allows you to take only what you bite from a slice and not half the toppings, while their color adds to the pizza’s visual pop. Sautéing the onions also creates a sweet base for the potatoes to play off, as does the balsamic glaze. The cheddar cheese? Well, what better to complement potatoes?

Ingredients

  • 2 medium/large red potatoes
  • 1 large red onion
  • Extra virgin olive oil
  • 6 cloves minced garlic
  • 1 package prepared pizza dough (store bought works fine, but remove from fridge a half hour before you use so it has a chance to warm up a bit)
  • 3 oz. grated sharp cheddar cheese (Please grate your own. The pre-packaged stuff just isn’t the same.)
  • Balsamic glaze (available in most vinegar sections)

Preheat oven to 500° Fahrenheit.

Scrub the potatoes under running water, then grate them, leaving skin intact for color, into a bowl of water using a large grater. Soak the potatoes for at least a half hour, but preferably an hour, changing the water a few times while stirring the potatoes to clear out the starch. Meanwhile slice one red onion into small pieces. No need to dice. In a pan over medium heat, drop a tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil and heat for a few seconds before adding the onion and adding a dash of salt. Sauté until the onions turn brown and sweet, 20-30 minutes. Add 2 cloves minced garlic in the last minute and remove from heat.

Drain the potatoes in a colander and squeeze them as dry as you can. I usually squeeze them out for several minutes before employing paper towels. This is an important step as they will be saturated with water which otherwise could prevent browning and make the pizza soggy. While still in the colander sprinkle the potatoes with a pinch or two of salt and stir to distribute (which will further help extract water) and pepper.

Flatten the pizza dough and place on a well oiled pizza pan (the holes in the pan help to crisp the crust). Drizzle extra virgin olive oil onto the crust and brush to spread a think coat evenly. Spread 4 cloves minced garlic on top of the oil, then spread the onion mixture evenly on top of that.

Add 1 tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil to the potatoes and pile evenly on the top of the pizza. As a recommendation, start on the outside of the pizza and work your way in making sure not to center load. This is more topping than I would normally put on a pizza, but it works. Sprinkle grated cheddar cheese on top of that, once again starting around the rim and working inward.

Bake at 500° Fahrenheit for 15-20 minutes or until cheese and crust are golden brown and bits of potatoes have crisped up. Remove from the oven and drizzle balsamic glaze on top. Slice and serve with more balsamic glaze for dipping and/or chopped chives sprinkled on top for a little color and freshness. C
utting this pizza into smaller slices will give you a unique appetizer sure to impress.


Soaking the potatoes
Soaking the potatoes

Raw onions
Small slices, but no need to dice the onions

Sauteed onions
These are looking ready

Shredded soaked potatoes
Make sure the soaked potatoes are as dry as you can get them

Onions and garlic added
Extra virgin olive oil, garlic and onions added

Ready to bake
Ready to bake

Pizza fresh from the oven
Hot out of the oven

Fresh chives sprinkled on top
Fresh chives sprinkled on top

A slice of potato pizza