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muckefuckFinally, our Rumtopf is off and running. I know it seems ridiculously late, but I have really only one criterion for what fruit goes in and that is that it be good. By "good" I mean of course sweet, ripe, and fresh, and the supermarket strawberries from Mexico or wherever simply weren't cutting it. Thank Ceres for the farmers' market downtown. Last week ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
monshu was finally back to full days at work and managed to bring home some Michigan cherries (most of which ended up in clafoutis) and strawberries that passed the bar.
So when I came home today I found two trays of washed and tried fruit. First I cut the tops off the strawberries, tossed them in, and covered them with their weight in sugar. That ended up being all the granulated sugar we had in the house, so I had to go out for another four-pound bag in order to coat the cherries. It took about four cups of rum (equal amounts 80 proof and 151 in order to average down to above the magic number 108) to cover it all.
Actually, there's more to the delay than simply waiting for local fruit to come into season. Now that the blue-hot passions it ignited have cooled, our full Rumtopf saga can finally be spun. Click if you dare for...
As you may recall, I stem from German immigrants who have lived in the US long enough to have forgotten all the really cool customs and retained only such quaint traditions as modesty about one's own achievements and child abuse. So it was that I only discovered Rumtöpfe around the beginning of April this year. We did a quick search on eBay and uncovered the florid beauty pictured on the left, which I promptly bid on and won.
Unfortunately, I failed to read the fine print and got a bit of sticker shock when the bill arrived for shipping several kilos of crockery from the UK to Chicago, but my enthusiasm was undiminished. The days dragged on and on, and then just when monshu and I were in the depths of one of the crappiest weeks of the year, overripe for some uplift, it arrived...in the condition you see pictured on the right.
Lesser men would've given up at this point. They would've written off this urge to resurrect a folkloric farmer's practice as a passing whim and turned their DINK fancies to something shinier, like pasta-making or Slumdog Millionaire. But if you've read this far, then you know what kind of mettle we're made of. We went Right Back to eBay and sought out replacement crocks that could be sent from within North America.
It's too bad that Leftpondian dealers lack the Victorian sensibilities of their limey counterparts. The Rumtopf we settled on is as plain and serviceable as a polyester alb; I'd post a picture, but I don't think it would even be perceptible on the same page as the one above. But it's here, by damn, and fit to take in a small fortune in overproof rum. Let the steeping begin!
monshu was finally back to full days at work and managed to bring home some Michigan cherries (most of which ended up in clafoutis) and strawberries that passed the bar.So when I came home today I found two trays of washed and tried fruit. First I cut the tops off the strawberries, tossed them in, and covered them with their weight in sugar. That ended up being all the granulated sugar we had in the house, so I had to go out for another four-pound bag in order to coat the cherries. It took about four cups of rum (equal amounts 80 proof and 151 in order to average down to above the magic number 108) to cover it all.
Actually, there's more to the delay than simply waiting for local fruit to come into season. Now that the blue-hot passions it ignited have cooled, our full Rumtopf saga can finally be spun. Click if you dare for...
The Untold Story
As you may recall, I stem from German immigrants who have lived in the US long enough to have forgotten all the really cool customs and retained only such quaint traditions as modesty about one's own achievements and child abuse. So it was that I only discovered Rumtöpfe around the beginning of April this year. We did a quick search on eBay and uncovered the florid beauty pictured on the left, which I promptly bid on and won.
Unfortunately, I failed to read the fine print and got a bit of sticker shock when the bill arrived for shipping several kilos of crockery from the UK to Chicago, but my enthusiasm was undiminished. The days dragged on and on, and then just when monshu and I were in the depths of one of the crappiest weeks of the year, overripe for some uplift, it arrived...in the condition you see pictured on the right.Lesser men would've given up at this point. They would've written off this urge to resurrect a folkloric farmer's practice as a passing whim and turned their DINK fancies to something shinier, like pasta-making or Slumdog Millionaire. But if you've read this far, then you know what kind of mettle we're made of. We went Right Back to eBay and sought out replacement crocks that could be sent from within North America.
It's too bad that Leftpondian dealers lack the Victorian sensibilities of their limey counterparts. The Rumtopf we settled on is as plain and serviceable as a polyester alb; I'd post a picture, but I don't think it would even be perceptible on the same page as the one above. But it's here, by damn, and fit to take in a small fortune in overproof rum. Let the steeping begin!
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