October 20, 2014

Butterbeer Recipe

Welcome to Harry Potter week on EPM! This week is all about Harry Potter, DIY’s, recipes, and we will share a fabulous party at the end of the week! Today I am sharing our family’s favorite Butterbeer Recipe. We recently visited the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal and to say we were in awe would be an understatement. Of course we had to have Butterbeer! The boys loved it, and I knew we would have to find a similar recipe to make at home for them. My entire family loves Harry Potter…my oldest used to insist on being called Harry when he was little and even drew the scar on his forehead with a red pen most days, my middle two are more than halfway through the series, and my youngest is just beginning the series.

[yumprint-recipe id=’13’]I found this recipe on NBC news via Mugglenet, but I made a few small changes to the recipe. The edits are found in the notes section of the printable recipe for you to reference. I am trying very hard to limit my family’s intake of weirdo food ingredients, and I found that rum extract is full of flavors and colors. Rather than add rum extract, I added vanilla extract made with rum. You could totally omit rum or rum extract if you choose. I always keep homemade vanilla extract on hand. It’s super simple to make, it’s takes a while to “cure”, and it’s immensely more flavorful (and probably better for you) than the store bought options. You will need vanilla beans…good ones. I order mine from France in bulk because I use them a lot! You will need empty bottles and alcohol. I use vodka, bourbon, and rum. Slice a full bean in half lengthwise. Scrape the seeds loose, and put into a clean glass bottle. Add the bean too. Then top off with alcohol of your choice. Finally, pop it in the pantry and forget about it for a few months. As you use it, top it off with your choice of alcohol, it will last for 7 years. I also decided to add far less syrup to the cream soda, and it tastes every bit as good as the Butterbeer from Universal!

That little bottle is the vanilla extract. I just upcycled a syrup bottle from Cracker Barrel.