Forbidden Love Cocktail
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Forbidden rice is the star of this cocktail, coupled with fragrant baking spices, coconut and ube.
The base of this cocktail is a not so traditional horchata. Instead of doing a traditional Mexican horchata like I’ve done in the past, I’m leaning on some Asian ingredients to give this cocktail it’s flavor. To enhance the rice’s purple hue and to give this horchata some sweetness, I’m using ube condensed milk. Ube is a beautiful purple yam that’s from the Philippines. It has a vanilla like flavor and is used in a lot of Filipino desserts. I wanted to try and make the condensed milk on my own, but ube yams are really hard to find here. I’m also using black sesame, almonds, cinnamon and coconut- both shredded coconut and coconut milk.
First step is to toast all of the aromatics, including the rice. This rice has a really nice nutty flavor to it, and toasting it brings out that flavor more. First goes in the rice. Then the almonds, the cinnamon, the black sesame, and lastly the shredded coconut. Make sure each ingredient gets time with the pans surface by using a spatula or tossing. I’ll toast these over medium heat for 3-4 minutes until all the ingredients are fragrant and the coconut looks toasted.
I’ll let this cool off a bit. Now I will add all of this to a heat proof measuring glass for mix with the hot water. I’ll pour 3 and 1/2 cups of hot, but not boiling water to the rice mixture. You could also add cold water and let this sit for several hours up to overnight in the refrigerator. Soaking the rice in water releases the starch from the rice. As well as helping to release the flavors from the other aromatic ingredients. By adding hot water, you will only need to let this sit for 1-2 hours. You can stir it to help speed it along as well.
You’ll notice immediately the water darken. Once all the rice and aromatics have been soaked for at least 1 hour, I’ll blend it in a blender for 1 minute. Now I’ll just need to strain out the horchata using a nut milk bag to make sure no large particles get in there. I also don’t like to squeeze this out too much, because it can start to push out a thicker pastier rice milk- which can get a bit slimy in the final cocktail. This yielded about 1.5 cups. Which I will add back to the cleaned out blender along with 1 cup of coconut milk and 1/2 cup of ube condensed milk.
I’ll just blend this all together for a few seconds until the ingredients are well combined. The result is a beautiful rich purple horchata. This tastes amazing on its own, but I think it tastes even better in a cocktail.
For the Forbidden love cocktail, I’m going to add 3 oz of the purple horchata to my shaker tin, followed by 1 ounce of coffee infused vodka. After the vodka, I’ll add 3/4 oz of pineapple rum, and shake for 15 seconds. Then I’ll strain it into my coupe. I like the bit of light colored purple foam on the top, and the whole two toned effect that’s happening here, so I wont be garnishing this cocktail, it looks so pretty on it own!
Not only does it look great, it tastes even better. It’s has tropical notes from the coconut and pineapple rum, but the warm vanilla notes from the ube and the nuttiness from the rice and almonds make this a perfect winter cocktail. The coffee vodka adds just a hint of bitterness to it. The texture is also so silky smooth.
I really hope you guys give this one a try- its a very unique combination of flavors, but really delicous and interesting.
Ingredients:
1/2 cup Ube Condensed Milk
1 cup Coconut Milk
1 cup Forbidden Rice
1/3 cup Almonds
1/4 cup Shredded Coconut
1/4 cup Black Sesame Seeds
1/4 cup Cinnamon
3/4 oz Pineapple Rum
1 oz Coffee Flavored Vodka
Method:
Toast rice in a pan for a minute, then add almonds, toast for another minute, then add sesame seeds, cinnamon and coconut. Toast until fragrant and coconut looks toasted (4- 5 minutes).
Soak the rice mixture in 3.5 cups of hot, but not boiling water for 1-2 hours. Blend in a blender for 1 minute and strain the mixture through a nut milk bag.
Add rice milk back to a clean blender then add coconut milk and ube condensed milk and blend until combined.
For the cocktail: add 3 oz of the purple horchata to a shaker. Add 1 oz of coffee flavored vodka and 3/4 oz of pineapple rum. shake vigorously for 15 seconds and double strain into a coupe.
Equipment:
Vitamix Blender
