Homemade Marshmallow Creme

Sticky, fluffy marshmallow creme — sometimes dubbed marshmallow topping or "cream" — can be whipped together in less time than it takes to make a decent cup of hot chocolate. And then, hey, boom, spike that drink with a little whiskey or something stronger and you've got something to put on top of it.

We've discussed real marshmallow syrup before, using actual and esoteric marshmallow plant, but spooning globs of this fake stuff onto hot chocolate, ice cream, milkshakes, or Sundaes is a lot more familiar to...well, nearly everyone.  Legions of American children grew up eating fluffernutter sandwiches, a combination of peanut butter and marshmallow creme, in their school lunches. Some home cooks deploy it as a binder in puffed rice squares and popcorn balls, to add bulk and sweetness in sauces and fudge, and as the base for cake frostings and whoopie pies.

Here's what most home cooks don't do, though: make it themselves and change the base flavor. Vanilla extract is the common flavoring, but why not use mint extract, rosewater, or orange flower water? Pomegranate molasses adds a bit of color and a pleasant bitter note to the sweetness of the glossy white confection. And don't forget liquor: bourbon, absinthe, apple brandy, and dark rums are just the beginning. Admittedly, absinthe-flavored marshmallow creme may have limited uses, but that cup of hot chocolate is a good place to start.

This marshmallow topping can be cobbled together from just a few ingredients common to both bartenders and moms; syrup, egg whites, confectioners' sugar, a pinch of salt, and some kind of flavoring. If you happen to be making ice cream, you may well have those egg whites on hand already. Some confectioners cook a syrup that's a mix of sugar, water, corn syrup, and cream of tartar. You could tie your shoes with gloves on, too, but why make this harder than it needs to be? Let's drop any pretense of this being at all healthy and use straight corn syrup. See below for notes on flavorings.

Homemade Marshmallow Creme 

2 egg whites
1 cup corn syrup (310g)
1 cup confectioners'/powdered/10x sugar (110g)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract (or other flavoring: see note below)
a knifepoint of salt — no more than 1/8 tsp

In an electric stand mixer (such as a KitchenAid) beat the egg whites and corn syrup with the ballon ship attatchment for a few minutes until the mixture is stiff and white. Stop the mixer. 

Add the powdered sugar in three stages. Add the first third, turn the mixer on low, then increase gradually to the highest speed until all the sugar is incorporated. Turn off the mixer. Add the second third of sugar and repeat until all the sugar is fully incorporated and the mixture is solid white, glossy, and thick enough to hold thick ribbons that plop off a spoon or spatula.

Add vanilla (or other flavoring) and salt and mix until well blended. Transfer to a one-quart container and store covered in the refridgerator; it will keep for up to three days.

A note on flavorings: A half to a full ounce (1-2 tablespoons) of most spirits should suffice (unless they are strongly flavored — use your judgement), a teaspoon of most baking extracts or cocktail bitters, and just a few drops for strong essential oils such as mint or neroli.

Goes well with:

• Chartreuse Hot Chocolate. When you don't feel like mucking about with flavorings and just want to dollop flops of this stuff on hot cocoa, why not this stuff?
• Smith & Cross pot-still rum-flavored marshmallows. Because they're easier to make than you think they are.
• Still on a marshmallow kick? Try a boozy marshmallow collins (no, not with this stuff — with real marshmallow syrup).
• Want more candy recipes? Try three variations of the classic Philadelphia springtime candy, Irish Potatoes (note: most Irish Potato recipes lack actual potatoes).

Nutella-Filled Chocolate Death Star

We at the Whiskey Forge are familiar with Kotobukiya's Death Star silicone tray. Ostensibly for making Death Star-shaped ice, its appeal is twofold. Whiskey geeks understand that large, spherical pieces of ice keep our whiskey cocktails cool without undue melting (hence dilution) while Star Wars obsessives get to make all the groaners, in-jokes, and puns a bartender could stand. But its uses don't stop with simple ice spheres.

Don't try to frighten us with your confectioner's ways, Lord Vader.

Now, you could go all super-cocktologist by freezing fresh flower buds or petals in the space station-shaped ice ball and floating the finished spheres in a bowl of punch. Or take the blogger mom approach and freeze fresh, healthy orange juice for your kid's birthday breakfast. Give it a swirl of Angostura bitters for extra tastiness. Maybe even go full Ferran Adrià and spike the pre-frozen water with squid ink to create a darker, more realistic-seeming Death Star...and then make a drink recipe incorporating that flavor. Call it, oh I dunno, Headed for that Small Moon.

Or you could ditch the drinks concept entirely as Imgurian echoflight did recently and make Nutella-filled chocolate Death Stars. It's true that earlier this Autumn photos of Bombom de Death Star, a maraschino cherry-filled chocolate Death Star from Brazilian company ZeeK Confeitaria began circulating, but they don't ship to Southern California. Besides, who wants cherries when delicious chocolate-and-hazelnut spread is as close as your grocery store?

Eat with care, however; the more you tighten your grip, the more Nutella will slip through your fingers.

Goes well with:

• For echoflight's easy step-by-step directions, check out the post on Imgur. 
• Didn't get a silicone Death Star mold for Christmas? Well, bucko, that's easy to fix. Online vendors sell them. 
• I like silicone molds a lot. I use them for ice, forming flavored pats of butter, baking and other things around the Forge. But sometimes an odd white film appears on the surface of those I use exclusively for ice. The details on that (with plenty of reader comments) are at What is that White Film on My Silicone Ice Trays? 

Smith & Cross Pot-Stilled Marshmallows

We have discussed that great accompaniment to gin before, real marshmallow syrup, made with actual marshmallow plant, Althaea officinalis. Today, it's the more familiar, fluffy candy kind of marshmallow...with funky, old school, overproof rum.

The thing about marshmallows recipes is that they can seem long and intimidating, what with stand mixers and thermometers and whatnot. Know what else sounds intimidating? Detailed instructions for tying your shoes. Don't mistake precise, however, for difficult; these are in fact quite easy to make.  Once you know how to make marshmallows, you may wonder why you never tried them before now.

Perhaps you'll get a warmer reception than I did.

When I mentioned at home this morning that I'd made a batch of Smith & Cross marshmallows, the flash of stinkeye was instant. "I seem to remember," I was scolded, "that you sat on that couch a week and a half ago and said that you were going to start eating better." I didn't mention the multiple 1,200-calorie tiki drinks my accuser served me on that same couch not ten hours earlier. I did, however, explain that I hadn't said that I was going to eat them — only that I had made them.

It's true; I have been looking into joining a Crossfit cult gym and reading up on the so-called paleo diet (equal parts revisionist anthropology and sly marketing). It's also true that, like Jeff Goldblum's Mr. Frost, I enjoy making desserts more than I do eating them. For years, I've given away the bulk of the sweets I do make. Rum-spiked marshmallows, though, were too tempting to pass.

The idea for them came from Shauna Sever's recent book Marshmallow Madness! Sever recommends 80-proof Myer's dark rum for her Buttered Rum Marshmallows. Myer's is fine. I buy it by the handle for mixed drinks.  But I wanted something with a bit more funk, so switched at the last minute for the 114-proof Smith & Cross, a  Jamaican pot-stilled rum which New Orleans bartender Chris Hannah put to such good use one Mardi Gras in his cooler full of Chief Lapu Lapu cocktail. Drinks writer David Wondrich lumps it in his "pirate juice" category of recommended rums (see below). Except for that one improvement, the recipe below is Sever's. She notes:

These addictive confections have deep notes of brown sugar, a rich butter flavor, and just a hint of booziness. Perfect for adult s'mores or, freshly prepared and unset, this mallow batter makes for a dangerously delicious ice-cream topping.

These actually do make tasty s'mores, but be aware that homemade marshmallows get very gooey very fast over direct flame; if you want to make s'mores, I recommend ditching the sticks and instead heat them either with a kitchen torch or under a broiler. My biggest regret in making these came as I was pouring the whipped confection into the small baking pan to set up overnight. At that moment, I realized the sticky mass easily could have been the base for rummy Rice Krispie Treats. 

Smith & Cross Pot-Stilled Marshmallows

The Bloom
4 ½ tsp unflavored powdered gelatin
⅓ cup cold water
I Tbl Smith & Cross (or other dark rum)

The Syrup
½ cup lightly packed dark brown sugar
½ cup granulated sugar
½ cup light can syrup, divided
¼ cup water
3 Tbl Smith & Cross rum

½ tsp salt

The Mallowing
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 Tbl unsalted butter, soft and well-stirred

½ cup Classic Coating (below), plus more for dusting

Lightly coat an 8-by-8-inch bolting pan with cooking spray.

Whisk together the gelatin, cold water, and rum in a small bowl. Let it soften for 10 minutes.

Stir together the sugars, ¼ cup of the corn syrup, water, rum, and salt in a large saucepan over high heat. Boil, stirring occasionally, until it reaches 242°F to 245°F. Be prepared to monitor the heat: the syrup will bubble up suddenly around 190F as the alcohol starts to boil. Meanwhile, pour the remaining ¼ cup corn syrup into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment. Place the softened butter in a medium bowl. Microwave the gelatin on high until completely melted, about 30 seconds, and pour it into the corn syrup. Set the mixer to low and keep it running.

When the syrup reaches 242°F to 245°F, slowly pour it into the mixer bowl. Increase the speed to medium and beat for 5 minutes. Beat for 5 minutes more at medium-high speed. Beat on the highest speed for I to 2 more minutes, adding the vanilla. The finished marshmallow will be doubled in volume. Quickly scoop about a quarter of the batter into the bowl with the softened butter and whisk to blend. Scrape the buttered batter into the rest of the better and fold to blend well. Pour the marshmallow into the prepared pan. Sift coating evenly over top. Let set for 8 hours in a cool, dry place.

Use a knife to loosen the marshmallow from the edges of the pan. Invert the slab onto a coating-dusted work surface. Cut into pieces, dusting the sticky edges with more coating

Classic Coating

The coating that keeps the confections from sticking to the pan, each other, your fingers, and everything in between is made of 3 parts confectioner's (aka 10-X) sugar to 2 parts cornstarch. The batch below makes more than this recipe uses, but it keeps in an airtight container and is worth making in a bulk if you intend to crank out marshmallows. It can also be flavored with a 1-2 drops of essential oils or colored with food coloring and run through a food processor.

1 ½ cup confectioners’ sugar

1 cup cornstarch or potato starch

Whisk together.

Shauna Sever (2012)
Marshmallow Madness!
96 pages (hardback)
Quirk Books
ISBN: 1594745722
$16.95

Goes well with:

• Sever also has a recipe for margarita marshmallows here.
• Why do I give away the sweet things I make? Because I've no willpower; I'll eat it all otherwise. See I Blew the Ass out of My Jeans This Week for insight into how my tendency to devour anything in sight decimated at least one part of my wardrobe.
• Regarding Wondrich's "pirate juice" — in Punch: The Delights (and Dangers) of the Flowing Bowl, Wondrich uses the term to refer to an older style of strong, and strongly flavored, rums characterized by "hogo," a word derived from the French haut goût. He writes in Esquire: 

Derived from the French phrase for the "high taste" game meats develop when they're hung up to mature before cooking — and by "mature," we mean "rot" — hogo used to be a term of art in the rum trade to describe the sulfurous, funky tang that raw-sugarcane spirits throw off. For 300 years, rum distillers have sought ways first to tame and then to eliminate it: high-proof distillation (more alcohol equals less hogo), filtering, tweaking the fermentation, long aging in barrels — all very effective, particularly when used in combination. Perhaps too effective.

Candied Buddha's Hand Citron

Drinking down the liquor cabinets continues. Frankly, our goal is not to drink away the hooch entirely, but to kill off the heels — those few ounces sloshing around nearly empty bottles — so that we don't schlep a lot of heavy glass to the new digs. You'd think, given the imperative to jettison dead weight, that I would refrain as well from canning, pickling, preserving, making ice cream, and like that.

You'd be right. Well, mostly. Old habits die hard.

When I stumbled across a stash of the bizarre Buddha's hand citron last week, though, I seized on the opportunity to crank out one last batch. Unlike citrus fruit with which we are most familiar, Buddha's hand citron is not even vaguely spherical. It has color you'd expect in a lemon, but the shape is more like a cuttlefish or squid. Those with a penchant for old horror stories might find it resembles the tentacled head of HP Lovecraft's monstrous Cthulhu rather than the hand of anyone, but there you go.

Known more properly as Citrus medica, the Buddha's hand or fingered citron, is striking not just for its bizarre appearance, but its strongly fragrant zest. Unlike the pith of lemons, grapefruit, or oranges which can add a distinct bitterness some dishes, this variety is edible pretty much as-is.

But it also takes to candying very well and, since plum pudding season approaches, I wanted a stash of candied citron so that if I catch a wild hare and decide to make plum puddings this year, I'll have the  most elusive ingredient. It will also undoubtedly find its way into breakfast scones and accompany the occasional afternoon tea.

I started with 2 pounds of fruit but the directions below are easily adaptable for whatever amount you may have. Don't be surprised if you don't find any pulp inside. In fact, there probably won't be any at all. If you do happen to find some, simply slice away for this recipe.

Candied Buddha's Hand Citron

One large or two small Buddha's hand citron (about 2lb/1k)
sugar (about 6.75 cups)
water (about 3 cups)

Wash the fruit well, trim any greenish or brown spots, and cut into half-inch cubes — including all of the pith and all of the zest. Place them in a large pot and cover with cold water. Bring the water to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook about 30 to 45 minutes until the cubes become translucent. Drain the blanched fruit and return it to the pot.

Add 2 ¼ cups of sugar and 1 cup of water. Repeat until the cubes are completely submerged.* Bring the mixture to a boil over high heat, then reduce it to a low simmer. Cook, without stirring, about one hour. You're looking again for translucency. Turn off the heat and let the poached citron cubes remain in the syrup covered overnight until cool.

The next day, strain them from the syrup (don't throw out the syrup) and arrange on a cookie rack set over a lipped tray to catch any syrup that drains from the pieces. Allow to dry at room temperature for 2 to 3 days until the pieces are dry to the touch. Toss them with granulated sugar and seal in an airtight container.

Notes:

*For 2 pounds of diced fruit, I used 6 ¾ cup of sugar and 3 cups of water.

You can, if you want to speed the drying a bit, train a fan on the candied cubes. Do avoid drying them, however, in the oven since this may result in something more leathery than tender and supple.

I haven't yet decided what I want to do with it (except, obviously in, cocktails and perhaps desserts) but this recipe yields about 5 cups of fragrant citron syrup. Gingered citron lemonade is as good a place to start as any...

Irish Potatoes Three Ways

It is often asked of me:

“ When did you first begin making candy?”
And I am obliged to say
I cannot honestly remember,
for as children we were allowed
all the candy we wished,
provided we made it ourselves
—and thus made sure of its purity.

~ Mary Elizabeth
My Candy Secrets (1919)

It’s St. Patrick’s Day this week, and—regardless of background—for mid-Atlantic sweet-tooths that means Irish Potatoes.














Though some home confectioners do make mashed-potato candies, there isn’t a spud to be found in this Pennsylvania candy. Turns out, it’s not all that Irish, either. But this time of year, Philadelphia is besotted with little round coconut candies that, once rolled in cinnamon, do look a bit like tiny taters.

For those Philadelphia expats who treasure the faux little tubers but don’t have access to them, I’ve put together two recipes that use common ingredients and one for more professional kitchens. See? It’s not all about beer and whiskey for St. Patrick’s Day (though if you poured a wee drop of spirits while making them, who’s to know?).

Rowley’s Irish Potatoes

A recipe from the days I lived in Philadelphia and worked behind the scenes at the Mütter Museum. How can I tell? Well, two ways: Irish potatoes are a solidly—though not exclusively—a Philadelphia-area confection, probably a relic from the days when the city’s sugar refineries pumped out a third of the sugar used in the US.* Though rum is not strictly a traditional ingredient, it doesn’t make a hateful addition.

8 oz cream cheese, room temperature
4 oz unsalted butter, room temperature (Plugra)
2 lbs confectioners’ sugar, sifted
1 tsp vanilla extract
14 oz shredded coconut
1 Tbl rum (Mount Gay Eclipse), optional
Powdered cinnamon

Cream the butter and cream cheese in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment. Add half the sugar, mix, scrape down the bowl, then add the rest and beat until smooth. Add the vanilla extract, coconut, and rum (if using). Mix to blend. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate one hour to stiffen the mass. Roll into small balls about ¾” across. Roll in cinnamon, shake off excess, and store in an airtight container.

Note that these benefit from a day’s rest at room temperature to allow the flavors to merge and the raw taste of the butter to mellow.

* How else can I tell? The Mütter is a museum of medical history and pathological anatomy. I spent a great deal of time analyzing skeletal remains as part of a repatriation program to determine which remains in the collections were Native American and which were not. My original notes for forming the sweetmeats called for rolling them into small balls, “slightly smaller than a defleshed distal thumb phalanx.” Work, clearly, was on my mind.

Irish Potatoes #2

This is a recipe from a Philadelphia friend who uses fresh cream in her version, though she advises storing them in the refrigerator until an hour before serving.

Dusting
1 tsp powdered cocoa
2 Tbl ground cinnamon
2 Tbl confectioners’ sugar

Center
1 ½ cups unsweetened coconut flakes
1 ½ cups confectioners’ sugar
3 Tbl heavy cream
½ tsp vanilla extract

Mix all dusting ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.

Finely chop the coconut in a food processor. Add the other ingredients and pulse until it forms a mass. Roll out 1” balls of the mixture and set aside for an hour in the refrigerator to firm. Roll each small white center in the dusting, shake off excess, cover, and store in the fridge.

Candy Irish Potatoes for St. Patrick’s Day

W.O. Rigby has an unusual take. Most recipes and commercial examples call for coconut as de rigeur and the small size is taken for granted. His 1920 recipe calls for almond and bon bon cream and are substantially larger, suggesting something more similar to the Christmastime marzipan confections we see in German and French confection traditions.

Take five pounds of bon bon cream and into knead one pound of almond paste, stiffening it with XXXX powdered sugar while working, if necessary. When thoroughly kneaded, shape into small spuds about the size of an ink bottle, and while moist rub with powdered cinnamon. Use almond paste or pignola nuts pressed in sides to represent eyes or sprouts, or simply make little dents for the eyes. Care must be taken to get the cinnamon to stick good.

Rigby’s Reliable Candy Teacher (13th edition, 1920)

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