This is awesome!!!
I took another Glencairn of the Raspberry XO Marnier and my impressions are still the same. High heat, high acidity, bursting with raspberry flavor. Very potent stuff. While doing that, I couldn’t help but notice that sediment was forming at the bottom of the mango infusion. Now this definitely wasn’t micro-dried fruit. Could it actually be ready?
Yep, it sure was. It’s been very hot these last few days, maybe the extra heat has been helping the infusions along. At any rate, time to get back to work. You know the dril by now. Filtering, decanting, sealing, putting away the brandied fruit.
So what’s interesting is that after the least infusion time of the standard dried fruit infusions, the mango XO Marnier has by far the most sediment in the mix that needs to settle out. Look at how cloudy the finished bottled brandy is in the decanter:
And how does this last one taste? Bright golden yellow in the Glencairn glass. Surprisingly, heat is rather low on the nose as is the mango aroma but this also allows the nose to be very well integrated. In the mouth, creamy sweet mango flavors integrate really REALLY well with the brandy. Heat is very mellow. No real acidity to speak of until a slight dose of it on the finish. You know how I said the pineapple XO Marnier was the closest to the actual Grand Marnier XO Cuvée du Centenaire? This has got it beat by a mile and is shockingly close especially in the sweet brandied finish.
And that’s it, Boozehounds. This summer’s infused XO brandy project is now finished. Time to drink up. Thanks for following along and let me know how your own infusions turned out and if you used different flavors than I did. Anybody out there used dried cranberries? Or pears? Strawberries? I was tempted at times to do a dried banana chip and a dried kiwi infusion myself at times.
This thread has inspired me to do a triple sec. Will try a citrus/vodka/sugar mixture in a hot water bath.
