Milk Punch : Indian Spice

This is a specialty punch recipe I made for my darling friend and regular of mine, Ragini. She gave me a lovely medley of Indian spices and peppers. We decided that she wanted a scotch based punch with lemon as the citrus and a good amount of spice to it. That last part is tricky as the clarification process strips away a lot of the heat from peppers. 

Ingredients:

1 cup Demerara Sugar, peel of 3 lemons, 1 tsp Ancho Chili Powder, 1 Poblano pepper (stemmed, w/ seeds, dried), 10 dried red chili peppers (whole), 1 stick cinnamon, 1 tsp Garam Masala, 8 oz. water, 6 oz scotch, 8 oz lemon Juice, 3 oz. Ancho Reyes, 2 oz. Campari. 10 oz. Milk

Tools:

Mixing bowl, muddler, measuring spoons, measuring cup, at least 2 large pots buckets or bowls, a chinois, enough cheesecloth to line the chinois 3 times over (I used 28 x 24 thread count), and lastly a means of bottling the final product

As with any good punch, we start with some Oleo Saccharum. Peel 3 large lemons and all your dry ingredients. Muddle until well mixed and the spices are broken down. The oils and the flavors from the spices and peels will be pulled out by the sugars and other dried ingredients in a form of osmosis. For this batch I let it infuse for about 36 hours.

To make sure we pull as much flavor off these solid components we add 8 oz of boiling water to the bowl. Let this steep, covered, until it settles down to about room temperature. Strain the whole contents of the bowl to a large pot. Rinse the bowl with the scotch to collect any flavors or undissolved sugars. Add the remainder of the ingredients aside from the milk.

Now we start the clarification process. Start by heating the milk and bringing it to a near boil. If it starts to boil, take it off the heat immediately. Add the hot milk to the pot with all the other ingredients. The mixture will curdle. If it doesn't curdle well, add a little more citrus. Stir it around a little to let it all bind. Line the inside of the chinois with several layers of cheesecloth and clamp it to the rim. Pour the punch through the strainer over another pot or bowl.

The first part of the run will come out slightly cloudy. Once it starts running clear, start cycling the liquid back into the strainer. the more you keep cycling it the cleaner the product will be. I usually cycle through about 3 times. It takes ages to get those last few drops out. I tend to leave it overnight, just make sure it's wrapped in saran wrap or something to keep bugs out. Next, I just funneled the clear punch into a bottle and stuck it in the fridge to chill. Serve with ice and drink up. 

The final product is a clear liquid with a red tint. It is a nice spicy cocktail. There isn't quite as much smoke as I was hoping.

It's a very herbaceous cocktail. The rosemary and black pepper pop as flavors and it leaves the mouth feeling dry. The alcohol is not too dominant. The dryness does not make it a drink you could drink for hours on end like some of my other punch batches. but it is tasty. The infinite shelf life granted by this process is ideal for a fancy drink you'd have once in a while. Stick a bottle in the fridge and have some every now and then.

Photo Credit: Flickr