The Year of Pie

 The Year of Pie

    2023 is going to be the Year of Pie. The plan? I will make two pies every month. There will be a mixture of savory and sweet pies. Meat, fruit, cream, custard, chiffon, chocolate and maybe veggie. In my collection of cookbooks, a lot of books have pie recipes, but, I also have several "pie only" cookbooks.  I'm interested in making lesser known varieties of pies, which brings me to the first pie. Tomorrow, I'll be making Peanut Pie. It's pretty much like Pecan Pie, only peanuts.  

    It should be interesting, because I also started Weight Watches earlier this year. I'm doing really well so far. Doing Weight Watchers is not going to stop me from making pies. And, it's not going to stop me from taste testing my pies. I just have to be good and save up points, so I can enjoy a piece, guilt free. 

    So, I hope you all join me on this Year of Pie and I hope you see some you'd like to try.  

Grasshopper Cocktail

 Grasshopper Cocktail

Recipe 52 of 52

Drink #7

    The final recipe of Fifty-two In Twenty-two is the last drink recipe. This recipe was made on NYE 2022, the 32nd anniversary of my mother's passing at only forty-eight years old. My mom didn't drink alcohol much, but she liked these and when I was thinking of a recipe to make for the last drink, I could think of nothing better than to make a drink which she liked. And, mom liked Grasshoppers. Granted, since I was a kid, I don't have a clear memory of these. All I remember is the Creme de Menthe. Like maybe she just made milkshakes with Creme de Menthe and called it a Grasshopper? However she made them, this one was for my mom and I drank it during my watching of the movie Beaches (my tradition is to watch this movie an this anniversary date). This Grasshopper recipe comes from the Pocket Guide To Cocktails - The Essential Pocket Book of Cocktail Recipes, published in 2006.  This is a great little book. It has 216 cocktail recipes. There is a great introduction at the beginning and the recipes are sorted into Sophisticated Classics, Contemporary Favorites, Sparkling Cocktails, Liqueur Cocktails and Mocktini's. In the index, the cocktails are helpfully sorted by type of liquor/ingredient (Brandy, Champagne/Sparkling Wine, Cider, Gin, Liqueurs, Non-Alcoholic, Rum, Tequila, Vodka, Wine/Sherry/Fortified Wines and Whiskey.  I highly recommend this book!

    I used a tall glass (a pilsner glass is the best I can come up with, that my glass looked like) and one complete recipe only filled the glass half-way, so I made another, just to fill up the glass.  I used green sugar sprinkles to "frost" the rim and shaved chocolate sprinkles to decorate. If you like mint, you should try this out. 

Ingredients:

2 measures green creme de menthe

2 measures white creme de cacao

2 measures single cream  (I used the only cream I could find, which was a heavy whipping cream and it worked great)

4-6 cracked ice cubes (I just used regular ice cubes in my cocktail shaker)

Green sugar sprinkles (optional)

Shaved chocolate (Honestly, I just used a Hershey's kiss)

Directions:

Into a cocktail shaker, pour all ingredients over ice cubes and shake until a froth forms (I just shook for about a minute). Strain into a chilled goblet (or really, whatever glass you have). You can "frost" the rim of your glass by wetting the rim of your glass and running it through a plate with the sugar sprinkles on it. Decorate your drink with chocolate shavings are additional green sugar sprinkled on top.

Grasshopper Cocktail