Strawberry Shot Cakes

June means a lot of things to me.  It means the official beginning of summer.  It means the end of the school year in the northeast.  And it means the local Strawberry Festival is coming.  I couldn’t let June pass by without posting Strawberry Shot Cakes. 

This is actually the third time I’ve made them.  The first time, I used way too much vodka and they were more cocktail than dessert.  I think I found the key the second go round.  Each time, I’ve used the basic Strawberry Short Cake recipe off the back of a biscuit mix box for the glass.  I cook them in the silicone molds and then core out the insides once they are cool. 

The first go round, I soaked all the strawberries in both whipped cream vodka and sugar.  I’m pretty sure somehow the strawberries only absorbed the vodka.  They were lethal!  The second go around, I covered half the strawberries with sugar and the other half with vodka.  I then combined them just before I served.  This time they were syrupy sweet, with just the right kick!

Orange Cream Ice Pop Shot

The northeast has been slammed with a massive heat wave over the past few days, so there was absolutely no way I was baking this week.  So, I went the exact opposite direction and made my first frozen Shotible.  An orange cream ice pop seemed to be the perfect treat to cool down on a sweltering summer day. 

This pop was a bit more of a challenge than I had anticipated.   I chose to make this one a little bit inside out.  I wanted to make the outside (the glass, if you will) the spiked part.  I tried out three different bases; plain orange soda pop, diet orange soda pop and orange juice.  I was concerned that plain soda pop would be difficult to freeze because of all the sugar.  Adding alcohol, which has a lower freezing temperature than water, concerned me as well.  It turned out that the plain soda pop worked best, but I did learn that it’s best to get the carbonation out before you freeze.  I mixed in some whipped cream vodka to add the creamy flavor.

For the inside, I made my own version of ice cream.  I wanted something that would hold up well and support the Shotible on a stick.  I found a recipe that used my new favorite ingredient, sweetened condensed milk.  It was remarkable how much it tasted like real vanilla ice cream.  As a bonus, I had some ice cream left over.  Yum!

Watermelon Gelatin Shot

My cousin Cherise just moved to town, and Jeff and I had dinner with her on Wednesday.  On our way to her place we stopped to pick up an apartment warming gift, Pear Vodka.  While at the liquor store, we picked up watermelon vodka for ourselves because it was on sale.  For her dinner, Cherise ordered the Watermelon and Goat Cheese Salad.  I decided to take my inspiration from that.  (The Watermelon, not the Goat Cheese) 

I’ve been wanting to experiment with a gelatin Shotible.  It proved to be more challenging than I had expected.  While at the grocery store, I was quite surprised to find that they no longer make plain watermelon gelatin, but instead a mixed melon, which is green.

Since green and red are on opposite ends of the color wheel, I didn’t want the gelatin to be translucent.  For the glass, I used the mixed melon gelatin and cheese cake instant pudding.  After a disappointing first try, I divided the gelatin/pudding mixture into two parts and added green food coloring to one half.  I poured the light half of the mixture into each mold, and then the dark half on top.  I swirled the two in each mold in an attempt to emulate a watermelon rind.

For the inside, I used plain gelatin, the watermelon vodka, red food coloring and some sweetened condensed milk to add opacity.  At Cherise’s suggestion, I topped each with chocolate jimmies.