How to mix alcohol with cream

alcoholcreamdessert

I recently wanted to make a 100% Baileys panna cotta. The idea was that because Baileys has a significant amount of cream, I could just add gelatine.

I should note that my typical panna cotta has just thick cream, gelatine, vanilla and icing sugar.

I ended up having to use about 60% cream vs 40% irish cream, but it did set and was quite good, if strong.

Of course, I had to sieve the mixture to get the coagulated cream (I assume) caused by the alcohol out before setting it.

How could I get the mix to about 50/50 cream/baileys without the cream splitting?

Best Answer

There are a few tricks to get an alcohol-cream mix right:

  • Pour the alcohol into the cream and not the cream into the alcohol
  • Stir gently while pouring
  • Don't overdo it: don't pour more than 15% alcohol into the cream
    (yes, Baileys is 17% but they're professionals and you're not ;-) )
  • Don't forget that you're diluting your cream so if you normally use 33% fat cream, buy the 40% if you plan on adding 7 Volume% alcohol and 50% if planning on more.

Using the above, you don't have to stick with Baileys but you can use your own favourite brand of whiskey or raspberry liqueur or ...
(If you want authentic Baileys taste, use Jameson's Irish whiskey instead.)

Warning:

Keep these kinds of desserts away from kids and warn guests before serving them something like this.