Be, Cordial!

The making of fruit cordials operates on a principle of thrift analogous to ethanol production. Beyond their high alcohol contents, the two procedures share the same tendency toward hidden costs. Who knows what kinds of resources they consume in the name of "preservation." But the results? Is it all worth the trouble?

This is my second summer making fruit cordials, the bio-fuels of those who fancy a dram. Last year, inspired by a faint recollection of my father doing the same, I prepared four or five fruit cordials in mason jars.

Picture my father-- or anyone's father-- eagerly venturing down to the basement each afternoon to turn a glass bell he'd filled with raspberries and vodka. For him the dedication seemed to pay off: he spooned the berries over ice cream, and relished the liqueur for weeks. As for me, I started trotting out the cordials for guests a few weeks after my initial burst of activity. The results were, at first, uninspiring. And I subsequently became-- if not a laughing-stock-- then at least something of a pariah in the neighborhood. "Be careful," guests would warn each other, through sidelong glances. "He might try to foist some of those dreaded fruit cordials on you."

Hours of labor squandered. Pints of peak-season berries drowned in booze. And liters and liters of perfectly mediocre vodka and rum transformed into embalming fluid. Hidden costs indeed!

But then time (and, no doubt, chemistry) worked its magic. By November the same sundry neighbors and passers-by were clamoring for the stuff. "Any of the ginger one left?" "My favorite is the blueberry." "What do you mean, critical? I've always loved your cordials!" This wasn't hypocrisy; this was alchemy.

For the fact is that the classic "44 day method" for aging cordials is hooey. 44 days will make a fine limoncello-- and did, in fact. But limoncello is more an infusion than a cordial: the sugar is added later, so the effect is less about mellowing all the flavors than simply sweeting a well-infused pot of vodka. (The recipe is simple, though the internet is rife with tinkerers: place the peels (no pith) of 6 lemons in a one-quart mason jar and fill it with vodka. Wait 4 weeks, then strain out the peels. Add a simple syrup to fill the jar again, and place it in the freezer for another... oh, hell... drink it whenever).

Infusions, indeed, are quick: I recently experimented with a banana-infused rum, placing most of a ripe banana and a very small piece of vanilla in a jam jar filled with white rum. The banana almost instantaneously took on the aspect of a medical specimen. But after four or five days the rum was very flavorful, and before too long the experiment had come to an end: the rum had vanished.

Cordials take a wee bit longer. For the fruit cordials I've just made-- so far I've got one and a half jars of strawberry; one jar of black raspberry; one jar of blueberry with coriander; one jar of apricot (with honey); and one jar of limoncello-- the fruit and sugar go in at once. Indeed, I consider it best to macerate the fruit with sugar for a few hours before decanting it into the jar and adding the vodka. The fruit then stays in the jar for about two weeks or so. But then it needs time to mellow.

Does this mean that it evaporates? How does the aging process work? Part of me-- recalcitrant, obtuse-- refuses to understand the science.

Another part of me refuses to learn how to decant.

Yes, that was me-- not just another picture I stole from the internet.

Most of the fluid is young strawberry cordial. Some of it is tears.



***

Here is one of the first articles I read online about fruit cordials. Sadly, I don't own any books about cordial-making, although I hope soon to have something to say about the excellent Moonshine: Its History and Folklore, by Esther Kellner (New York, 1971).

Incidentally, another fluid currently waiting for consumption inside a mason jar is a bottle of farm-brewed Amish kombucha. A bacterial soda: literally. And quite refreshing, I might add. I'm about to pour a glass of it right now- - for unlike everything else, it's ready to drink.