Soak Your Summer Fruits In Booze Because Life Is Short 

There’s no arguing that pie is the most noble form any summer fruit can assume, but there are times I want a fruity dessert that doesn’t require the heating of my oven (or kitchen). In such moments, I turn (once again) to booze and make some stupid-easy but still sophisticated-tasting wine-soaked fruit.

Photo by Roco Julie.

Making this dessert is so simple, you barely need a recipe, but The Kitchn has one anyway (and it’s good). To make boozy and sweet strawberries, they combine about a half a kilo of hulled strawberries, two cups of dry, fruity red wine, 1/4 cup of brown sugar and a couple of teaspoons of vanilla.

Just sprinkle the berries with the sugar, toss to coat, and pour in the wine and vanilla, stirring once more to combine. Cover that dish up and stick it in the fridge for a couple of hours to let the flavours meld. Dollop it over ice cream, spoon it over cake, or just eat it out of a bowl with some creme fraîche.

But don’t stop with strawberries, or even wine. There are many summer fruits that benefit from a booze bath, and there are many boozes you can chooses. Some combinations I enjoy:

• Cherries + off-dry rosé: Make sure to halve the cherries, and swap the above brown sugar for white.
• Peaches + a nice tart, lambic or other sour beer: Brown sugar would be nice in this one.
• Blackberries + port (get something cheap): Maybe grate in some fresh pepper to make it very adult.
• Figs + tempranillo: Keep the brown sugar and vanilla, but finish it all off with some fresh lemon zest.

If you want to be the real hero of your summer barbecue, just bring a whole boozy fruit buffet and let everyone get their five-a-day while also getting their buzz on.