Submitted by: Richard Hammond
Servings: Makes two stiff drinks, repeat as needed
Ingredients: 3 large pink grapefruits, chilled
5 Valencia oranges
2 lbs. fresh cranberries, washed and drained
4 tbsp. raw honey
4 jiggers Chopin potato vodka
2 star anise
1 – 2 eyedroppers liquid stevia
½ tsp. orange oil
¼ tsp. of sea salt
Mint sprigs for garnish
Instructions: MAKING A PALEO CRANBERRY RELISH:
You may want to start this prep several days before you serve these drinks:
Use an electric citrus juicer to squeeze the four oranges, strain out any seeds and place this juice in a 4 qt. stainless saucepan over low heat. Add the star anise and warm the juice to about 160° F for one hour and then allow it to cool. Cover the saucepan and refrigerate overnight.
The next day, pick out the pieces of anise; add the salt and the cranberries to the pan. Return the saucepan to medium heat and bring the cranberries up to a boil, adjust the heat and simmer the cranberries for 45 to 50 minutes until they all burst.
Take the pan off the heat and let it cool to room temp. Stir in the raw honey, the orange oil and add the liquid stevia to taste. Of course this will become your holiday cranberry relish but when you want to make these drinks, use some of this relish to make “grenadine” syrup:
MAKING THE “CHRISTMAS” CRANBERRY COCKTAIL:
You will need an immersion blender, two tall chilled glasses, cracked ice, a jigger and a cocktail shaker.
Use the electric citrus juicer again to squeeze the grapefruit juice, strain out any seeds and pour the juice into a pitcher.
If you don’t have a blender cup, use another tall glass that fits the immersion blender and put about ½ cup of the relish in the bottom. Pour in some of the grapefruit juice to thin it out and use the stick blender to purée it.
Transfer the fake grenadine syrup to a small measuring cup straining it through a medium sieve to remove any cranberry skins. This should be enough syrup to make several rounds of these cocktails…
Add the ice to the shaker, measure in the vodka, cover the cocktail shaker and shake vigorously for 30 seconds. Remove the cover cap and pour the contents into the tall glasses, dividing up the liquor evenly or as you like.
Add the grapefruit juice to top up each glass and then use a long spoon to stir each drink a few times as you drizzle in a couple tablespoons of the cranberry syrup. Stop stirring so that the syrup creates long red swirls throughout the cocktail. Garnish with a mint sprig and serve.
OK I put 5 oranges in the ingredient list, so use the 5th orange to make slices, slit them and decorate the drink glass with a slice on the rim (I meant to do that!).
BTW on reading this over perhaps the assembly is not perfectly clear; 4 to 5 jiggers of vodka is about right for two of these drinks and by tall glasses I mean a 16 oz. tumbler which you’re not going to fill to the brim. So per drink about 2 to 2 1/2 shots of vodka and fill the glass with juice up to about 14 oz. or so…