Author Notes
Inspired by my dear and now late friend, Lora, after she returned from a trip to New Orleans, I tried to recreate the flavors she excitedly described. She wasn't sure what was in the wonderful sauce she had there, but was thrilled to test my best efforts to create something like it. This is an amazingly versatile sauce which I enjoy serving warm over frozen desserts, more on the thin side. It can envelope and carve into ice cream as if you are creating a miniature bays filled with cherries. That is the world in which I want to live: I love cherries. I also like using a cold version of this sauce, on the thicker side, with warm roasted meats such as duck, pork, turkey, or chicken. You can, as well, use a warm version of this with cold sliced meats. In any case I like to contrast the temperatures. The photos show this on green tea and also vanilla ice cream. This probably can keep for quite a while, but we always use ours up pretty quickly. I am really glad that I was able to make this a few times to delight my friend. —Sagegreen
Ingredients
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1/2 pound
Montmorency cherries, pitted,and halved...if available, otherwise try any good fresh red cherry, even if it is sweet!
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1/2 cup
cane sugar
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1 cup
pinot noir (or malbec, or other red wine)
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1/2 teaspoon
fresh ground cinnamon
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1/2 teaspoon
fresh grated nutmeg
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2
juniper berries
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1
bay leaf
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1 tablespoon
basalmic vinegar
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1 teaspoon
orange zest
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1-2 tablespoons
arrowroot or cornstarch (depending upon how thick you desire the sauce)
Directions
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Gently bring all of the ingredients, excepting the thickener, to a simmer in a saucepan.
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Take out a few tablespoons of the liquid and dissolve the thickener in them before returning to the pan.
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Continue cooking until reduced to the desired thickness. I prefer to use a thinner version for ice cream and a thicker version for meat. I will upload some photos of this on ice cream.
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