Bush liqueurs in cooking

[Shalem]

I bought a number of liqueurs for cooking from a store out west who specialise in making their own liqueurs. Their website recipes and their verbal advice on how their liqueurs could be used in cooking influenced me to buy their liqueurs. Since then, I'm finding these liqueurs interesting and enjoyable to use. But being a bushfood cook, I'd be interested to try Australian native liqueurs (hope that's the right terminology) in cooking. I'm not very experienced yet in tasting various native fruits, other than muntries, quandongs and rosellas so I'm not familiar with the taste and strength of these native liqueurs. I've learnt about how a couple of these bush liqueurs can be used in fruitcakes. Please share any other ideas. I've come across 3 stores/suppliers that sell these liqueurs: One in Cairns, Tamborine Mountain and Bunya Mountain/SE Qld. Any others, please advise. As I don't drink alcohol except a very occasional cocktail, I'm hesitant to spend the money on these liqueurs if I'm not confident I can make good use of them in cooking. I welcome any cocktail recipes for these liqueurs in this topic, but would like to concentrate on the dishes if possible.

[eataust]

There's a commercially available quandong liqueur called "Jaggard" which is best treated as a tangy and sticky sort of dark rum.

My problem is I've got all these interesting things, but I don't cook with alcohol a lot so don't think of way to use them except in the very occasional cocktail!!

On the whole, if they're described as a "liqueur", it means they're fairly sweet, and best suited to dessert dishes. However, tangy-sharp-sweet can be used as a meat marinade or to make sauces; again, think of the American use of rum in a true southern BBQ. You could use Jaggard as a base for a sparerib. emu, or kangaroo marinade and/or sauce/gravy, for eg.

You can make wines from bushfruits, but I don't at this stage know of anyone who is - I'll have a little look, however.

You can also infuse existing alcohols, such as vodka, with bush flavours - one of the myrtles, for eg (lemon, aniseed, or cinnamon), native pepperleaf AND berry (it would make it wonderfully pink), mintbush (minty-strong), or any of the fruits and berries (lillypilly, muntries, or riberry would be lovely).

[Shalem]

how would this go used in a bushfood trifle I wonder?

Say this trifle was put together like this:

a wattleseed or lemon myrtle or lemon ironbark sponge cake with rosella jam;
then soaked in a bush liqueur (what flavour?);
topped with normal blocks of set jelly;
topped with lemon myrtle custard;
topped with wattleseed cream.

I haven't checked out any bushfood trifles (if any) from anyone else yet, will do that later. Thought I get the ball rolling on this one in the meantime.

Any other suggestions for the trifle?

[Shalem]

I meant to say also that I add fruits to a conventional trifle, like canned peaches. Perhaps in this bush trifle, one could add some quandong confit, rosella confit, or quandong shells soaked in apple juice, in which case the quanitity of rosella jam might need to be reduced or the trifle could be too rich.

I probably shouldn't have said "soak" the cake in the liqueur, maybe sprinkle or as to taste, but I'm sure you know what I mean if you've made trifle before.

[eataust]

Unfortunately I don't like trifle - don't like alcohol in my cake at ALL - so I can't comment. It sounds good from a purely intellectual POV though :)

[Shalem]

* Macadamia Nut Liqueur * from Castle Glen Liqueurs near Stanthorpe,Qld plus couple other outlets.

I haven't bought this but have purchased some of their other liqueurs for my cooking & drinks for my husband. They are very high quality liqueurs made by the store owners, and I think all natural (double check it if need).

Tamborine Mountain Distillery

*Lemon Myrtle Liqueur*

*Australian Herbal Liqueur*

*Macadamia Nut Liqueur*

*Vodkas - Lemon Myrtle leaf/Eucalyptus gum leaf/Native Peppermint*

www.tamborinemountaindistillery.com.au

(I have not bought from them yet).

RECIPES & USES

Some time back I enquired Tamborine Mtn D'ry for recipe ideas using their bush liqueurs. Unfortunately, none was provided.

So far, the main ways I've been using all natural liqueurs in cooking are in chocolate mudcakes, sponge cakes, buttercream icing, sauces (eg I added banana creme liqueur into a banana sauce to go with barramundi), home made icecreams and fruitcakes.

If I have more opportunities with time & money, I'd like to attempt more with bush liqueurs.

Any cooking ideas would be welcomed in this topic.

[eataust]

The best trick is to taste the liqueurs yourself, and sort of mentally catalogue the flavour. Then read standard recipes that use liqueurs, and try out your new native flavour catalogue against the recipe, to see what fits .. that's basically what I do, and the results can be very good indeed!!

[Shalem]

Thanks Eataust

=================

Came across an old message in my inbox for the time I was making enquiries about bush liqueurs in fruitcakes and cooking.

The following came to me from JohnRFL of Rainforest Liqueurs:

"Lilly Pilly, Kandertal, and Gidneywallum would be best for fruit cake from your list as they have the most intense flavour.

Kandertal for the mud cake - chocolate and lime might mix well together and Kandertal is versatile enough for other desserts although strong in flavour.

I prefer my Liqueurs in a glass, but do use Kandertal or Lilly Pilly to marinate Kangaroo and other meats."

Well I'm glad I stumbled across this again, as I still have half a bottle of my Lilly Pilly liqueur left from making my bush fruitcake, and was wondering just the other day what I could cook with it finish it off.

===============
thanks John

[Shalem]

I was thinking the other day "I wonder if there's a Wattleseed Liqueur on the market".

Well, to my surprise, I came across one today in the Tukka book.

Has anyone bought this liqueur before and is it still available on the market?

Oh well, in the meantime I'm happy to keep using my Wattleseed Extract from Cherikoff Dining Downunder as my "wattleseed liqueur".

I was pleased with the results of this extract in my wattleseed creme caramel I tried today (pics later).

What I would normally have done with the creme liqueur is add some in a creme caramel depending on the flavour (eg I had a Chocolate Caramel Coffee creme liqueur).

I'm also keen to know if there's a Wattleseed Creme Liqueur on the market. The photo of the liqueur in the Tukka book didn't look "creamy" so I assume it's not a creme liqueur.

All the creme liqueurs I bought from Castle Glen Liqueurs were excellent in my cooking and the very occasional drink. (Hhmm...now that gets me thinking whether I should suggest a wattleseed creme liqueur to Castle Glen Liqueurs as I don't think they have one! Yummo).

[Shalem]

The following 3 uses Lilly Pilly Liqueur from www.rainforestliqueurs.com.au



Babas.......more info Breads & Dessert topics.



Fruitcake.......more info Bush Fruitcake topic.



Riberry in syrup.......more info Desserts topic.

[Shalem]

*CASTLE GLEN LIQUEURS TO TRIAL WATTLESEED LIQUEUR*

Well this week, I was delighted to hear from Castle Glen Liqueurs, advising me that they'd be interested in making a small batch of Wattleseed Liqueur.

They asked me where to purchase wattleseed from, so they sound serious about doing this. (I directed them to a couple of stores.)

If they keep us up-to-date with it on their newsletters, I'll post back.

[Shalem]

LILLY PILLY LIQUEUR

[Shalem]

CASTLE GLEN OORAY PLUM LIQUEUR

(Davidson Plum Liqueur)


Castle Glen Liqueur's Ooray Fermented Plum Liqueur wins Highly Commended in Food Magazine's 2010 Food Challenge Award in Sydney.

An extract from Castle Glen's recent newsletter reads:

"Castle Glen's Ooray Plum Liqueur is perhaps the first true product to originate from the endangered variety of Native Plum, "Davidsonia Jerseyana" (the Davidson Plum). This endangered Indigenous Australian fruit is sourced only from organic, sustainable growing resources with plantings increasing each year."

For more information or to order online, refer to:

www.castleglenliqueurs.com or

www.auragoldfarms.com.au

Note 1: Others can correct me here, but I think there are 2 main varieties of Davidson Plums that are commercialised: The Queensland & NSW. This is the NSW plum.

Note 2: There's a good photo of NSW Davidson Plums growing on tree trunks in www.rainforestfoods.com.au. How interesting.