ADVANCED MIXOLOGY
TRICKS OF THE TRADE
spirited floats By Anthony Caporale
There are lots of interesting flavored ice cream recipes incorporating spirits on the web these days, but unfortunately most of us don’t have the time to make fresh ice cream. Luckily, it’s not too complicated to enjoy frozen desserts with your cocktails. Using a good vanilla ice cream as your base, you can easily add many of your favorite beers, cordials, or even wines with minimal effort, then simply refreeze and enjoy.
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CHILLED MAGAZINE
Try serving ice cream versions of the most common liqueurs – Chambord, Bailey’s, Frangelico, Cointreau, Drambuie – and mix these into existing recipes to create refreshing and unique summer cocktails. A Rusty Nail made by floating a small quenelle of Drambuie ice cream in your favorite Scotch may seem like heresy…until you try one sitting out on your deck (and if you enjoy Bailey’s you surely won’t object to whisky and cream). Add some Cointreau to lemon sorbet, set a scoop adrift in a good Tequila mixed with fresh lime juice and a dash of agave nectar, and you have a Margarita Float that will make you turn your back on frozen daiquiris forever.
Any recipe that calls for cream or milk can easily be turned into a float by using ice cream instead. Look past the usual Mud Slides and Alexanders and you’ll find a world of flips, kisses, squirrels, and grasshoppers all waiting to swim around a scoop of vanilla. Try substituting chocolate ice cream for crème de cacao, mint chocolate chip for crème de menthe, or peach sorbet for peach schnapps. The beauty of this approach is that you don’t even need a blender – just grab a scoop and mix away!
