Thursday, April 16, 2009

The michael5000 Kitchen #10: Irish Cream

Provenance: The recipe card is in the handwriting of Mrs. DrSchnell, which places it from the later Lawrence years, 1994-1996. I have very vague memories of perhaps making this when I was rooming with occasional L&TM5K commenter Dug, which would mean in or around the spring of 1994. I could not have made it very often, however, or I would weigh 500 pounds.


The Recipe: “Bruidhean Irish Crème Liquer”

1 ¾ cup Brandy
14 ounce can Sweetened Condensed Milk
1 cup Cream or Half & Half
4 Eggs
2 tsp Instant Coffee
1 tsp Vanilla
4 Tbsp Chocolate Syrup
Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. Keeps refrigerated for 1 month.


The Results: All you have to do is glance at the ingredients to comprehend that this will taste good. Indeed, it tastes freaking wonderful. Hell, it would probably be a good way to wash down the Better Than Robert Redford Dessert, had you requested it as your last meal and were done worrying about consequences.

It did strike me as I left the liquor store with the brandy that I could have bought a bottle of commercially blended Irish Cream for roughly the same price and been done with. But if you are tired of drinking the same old brandy night after night from the dozens of barrels you have stashed away in your brandy vault, and you want to “jazz it up” a little, this might be a good way to do it!

The word “Bruidhean” makes the recipe sound all authentic and ethnic, but since the indigenous cultures of the Emerald Isle did not really have access to chocolate syrup, vanilla, or instant coffee, I’m thinking this recipe is a fairly recent invention in the grand scheme of things.

8 comments:

mrs.5000 said...

mmmmmmm...brandy milkshake...

You see how elegantly it is packaged. That was interesting to me, that an identical beverage brought home from the liquor store in a fauncy bottle might have lasted at least a couple months, but this lovingly homemade concoction, in the plastic bottle with the raw eggs and the sketchy expiration date, it just shouted DRINK ME in big block letters every time I opened the fridge...

DrSchnell said...

Funny how the two most notoriously un-healthy items thus far from your recipe file also are found in their original form in our recipe box....

gl. said...

you... you... can MAKE irish cream? in cyberspace, nobody can see your mouth gape.

(and more importantly, now i have a good way to use the remaining condensed milk i opened a few days ago!)

btw, it looks like you may have missed part of the instructions about "if using cream, do not overblend or it will separate."

Dug said...

I think I would have remembered you making this so it must be after I flew the coop. You were still working on those cans of Progresso soup as I remember it.
Four raw eggs? Is that bottle a salmonella death trap or what?

MJ said...

Chocolate and coffee? That's amazing, and probably very tasty.

Michael5000 said...

@Mrs.5000: Nothing quite like learning that your spouse thinks that the liquor bottles are shouting at her....

@DrSchnell: Yeah! What's the deal with that? If you're trying to kill me, let's just get it over with. Morbid obesity is a cruely drawn-out way to murder a man.

@gl.: I did not use cream, nor did it separate. That's just a little froth on top.

I'm glad that I could help with your condensed milk dilemma!

@Dug: Actually, I'm pretty much still working on those* cans of Progresso soup. It's so good! And cheap! And relatively nutritious! How could I NOT buy it by the case?

@MJ: VERY tasty! And the risk of salmonella is almost certainly below 20%!

* not those SAME cans, of course.

Elaine said...

I waited to comment, thinking that Time would soften the impact, the dread, the impression..... but NO.
This is horrifying.
We just got home from a conference where the banquet dessert was a layered composition of Cool Whip and graham cracker crumbs (I know, some would consider this Vegan), even though this was totally taste-free... but your Irish Cream drink would have matched perfectly.
And, sadly, I do not mean that as a compliment.
I think your recipe (as others have implied) qualifies as industrial waste.
But I am sure that a touch of real coffee, whipped cream, and some fine whiskey could redeem the recipe, which (if there is a God) should be burnt on a pyre. After an Exorcism.
God be with ye.

Michael5000 said...

@Elaine: Technically, the others all implied that it sounded really good, except for Dug and his little salmonella concern.