Homemade whisky liqueur, esp. for Christmas

For what it’s worth, here’s what I have in mind in some detail:

•A medium-sized mason jar. I don’t know how big those are—maybe around 16 oz?

•Unless I buy some cheap whisky just for this purpose, I’ll probably use Laddie 10. (Sorry to all the Laddie 10 lovers out there, but I find it boring and I’m working on finishing mine off.)

•I might add a dash of peaty whisky. If so, that’ll mean my least favorite open bottle, so probably Benriach 10 Curiositas.

•I’ll add a healthy dollop of honey, one broken-up cinnamon stick, plenty of cloves (10-20? I like cloves a lot), and any other whole (non-ground) spices we have in the house, like allspice.

•I’d like plenty of lemon too, but I’m not sure of the best way to get it in there. Just squirt in some lemon juice? Drop in whole slices? Shred some peel? Wait and add the lemon in the glass? I’d really like some advice here.

Unlike my usual mixed-in-the-mug punch, I won’t add any water to the jar. I want to be able to drink this neat like a malt ADD prepare it with hot water in a mug.

@OlJas

Why note just get a bottle of Forty Creek Spike?

@Nozinan: Well, that sounds less fun. I didn't know it existed. I don't want a whole bottle of this stuff. And my conception of anything flavored at a commercial level is typically unappealing.

Why, is it really good? I googled it to find out what that stuff is, and one of the first interesting results is actually your comment elsewhere here on Connosr: "It tastes like the bottom part of a cup of tea with honey that wasn't fully mixed. Or, a more seasonal reference, like the inside crust of a honeycake made in a bundt pan." That sounds neutral at best!

OIJas. I do a bit of this kind of stuff (home made liqeurs). Just a couple of pointers from my experience (some bad mostly good). Cloves will tend to dominate if your going to steep them for any length of time so use sparingly (two or three at most) otherwise it'll taste like mouthwash.
Avoid using crushed/powdered spices as you'll have a lot of filtering to do, whole spices given time will release more flavour, no need to even break the cinamon stick.
To get lemon flavour your best bet is to use lemon zest, just the surface layer (no pith) of one lemon should be enough.
Lastly there is no need to use good whisky on this, a neutral blend will do the job just as well. I'd be interested in hearing what you put in, and what the results are.

@OlJas

I guess you've never had a honey cake made in a Bundt pan! And when I was a kid, and home sick, the bottom of the cup was the best part.

But I agree, not what I want in a whisky. But the question wasn't what tastes best in a whisky, it was a whisky liqueur.

@OlJas, sorry to hear that you didn't like the Laddie Ten, I'm a fan. Personally I'll be making up several batches of eggnog within the coming weeks. I'd recommend the sun liquor aged eggnog, which is just beautiful after around a month in the fridge. Otherwise I've tried soaked apples, honey, and baking spices in Irish whiskey twice. For the most part it comes out decent, but a bit too sweetie and simple. This year I'll be playing more with garden herbs like lavender and rosemary. I'll use bourbon instead of Irish and skip adding honey altogether. Fingers crossed on that one...

@Nozinan, OK, yeah, the bundt pan business sounds pretty good. I was thrown off by the "bottom part of a cup of tea."

In any case, I made up my jar last night and tucked it under the bar until after Thanksgiving. It went pretty much according to plan, except I had no lemon in the house. That's just as good—I think I prefer to lemonify the final mixed hot drink with a slice of fresh lemon anyway.

So it's about 10 oz Laddie 10 + a splash of Benriach Curiositas soaking up the spicy goodness of one cracked cinnamon stick, a few whole cloves, and a few whole allspice "balls" (whatever-you-call-'ems). I probably put in more cloves than Uisgebetha would have, but if it's too much I'll just dilute it with more neutral whisky in the end.

I think this is going to make my hot drinks so much better—more taste of the spices—than in previous years, and it's way easier.

Plus, I'm now much closer to closing the book on my Laddie 10. There's absolutely nothing bad about it, but it failed to excite me. I'm fairly disciplined about opening new bottles, and I have a bottle of Charbay R5 (distilled from Racer 5 IPA) that I’ve been waiting to open until my non-peated slot opened up. Not far off now!

I have always liked this recipe, made it several times. I use inexpensive bourbon for it instead of irish whisky. Any whisky you use is going to be overpowered by the other elements obviously. You can drink as is, use it to flavor hot chocolate, pour over desserts, give away bottles as gifts and it is better than Baileys in a bottle filled with who knows what preservatives.

cupcakeproject.com/2009/12/…

Nice, @JeffC. If my spiced whisky business doesn't pay off, I'll probably try the "Bailey's" cream thing for Christmastime.

And I tasted my spiced whisky jar thing a couple night ago, after about a week soaking. I was wrong to think this would be enjoyable on its own, neat. It's kinda nasty. But, I can see it mixing well with some zippy lemon and some sweet honey, so I'm still optimistic about my Christmastime punch.