October 10, 2012

Shot Week, Day 2, The Carthusian Shrub

If you didn’t read Shot Week, Day 1, then go do that now, so you know where I (and the shots) am coming from. In short, from Andrew Bohrer’s bubbly new book The Best Shots You’ve Never Tried, but go get the full backstory in the below post—I’ll wait.

Great, now that we’re all on the same shot page (so to speak), I’m going jump right into Shot Week’s second shot, one with history and cooking. But hey, to give you a better feel for the book’s personality—which is wonderful—I’m gonna back out of the way and let Andrew talk, via the headnote from the book:

“The Carthusian Shrub

Plums and cocktails don’t really mix. Even the ripest plums must be mashed into oblivion to get any play into a cocktail. The Carthusian Shrub takes fresh plums and roasts out their sweet juices into, well, a shrub. What is a shrub? A type of colonial era, prebottled cocktail consisting of cooked fruit and vinegar. It may sound crazy, but this type of boozy gastrique was a mainstay of drinking culture long before the cocktail was invented.”

Makes 2 Shots

1 de-stoned plum

2 ounces Green Chartreuse

1 ounce water

.25 ounce balsamic vinegar

1. Preheat oven to 350 ° F.

2. Cover the de-stoned plum with Green Chartreuse, water, and balsamic vinegar in a roasting pan.

3. Roast uncovered for 30 minutes.

4 . Allow mixture to cool and strain into a separate vessel.

5. Serve in 1½-ounce shots.

6. Enjoy eating the roasted plum.

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