Day 77 — Irish Coffee Ice Pops

Happy Saint Paddy’s Day, Y’all! I hope everyone’s had fun celebrating in your own ways.

Over here, I decided that our largely family-friendly day needed to end with an adults-only treat. So:

Instant coffee, cream, brown sugar, whiskey.

Ok, so technically my “Irish Whiskey” is Kentucky bourbon. We’re more vodka people, so we don’t tend to keep whiskey in the house. And I didn’t want to buy a bottle of whiskey for the one teaspoon I needed. For today’s purposes, can we all agree that our bourbon was made by Irish Kentuckians?

Anyway, I started by making my instant coffee with 8 ounces of water and 1.5 tablespoons of brown sugar. I knew I’d have a lot of base left over, but I didn’t want to fuss with using only half of the packet of coffee.

Next, I sweetened about 2 tablespoons of the cream with a generous dash of sugar, for the cream layer to go on top of the coffee/whiskey layer.

As with any pop using alcohol, proportions are very important. I was actually only making one alcoholic pop and since the whiskey is a very strong flavor, I used barely a teaspoon of it (possibly closer to 2/3 teaspoon) for about 1.5 ounces of the coffee mixture.

I poured the cream layer into one of my pop molds, then got the coffee mixture ready for my non-alcoholic pops. I went to pour them…and totally forgot I had a layered pop started in my first mold. And that’s how I learned a second way to get a filled pop:

I totally meant to do that.

Luckily, the pop I messed up with the first one I poured, so I could go back immediately and fix my mistake. 10 minutes later, I had this:

Now, I have a confession — today’s pop was intended to be more of a “concept” pop. As I mentioned, I’m not much of a whiskey drinker, so I assumed I’d take one taste of this pop and then move on to the plain iced coffee pops I’d also made. But this pop surprised me — the brown sugar and the whiskey worked together to make an almost butterscotch flavor. I liked the pop so much I ate most of it.

Day 37 — Mocha Ice Pops

After about a month of popmaking, I think I can safely say that my favorite pops are the coffee-based ones. And today’s pop is, I think, my favorite of the coffee pops I’ve made so far.

The recipe is simple — equal parts coffee and half & half, plus a heaping teaspoon of Ovaltine for each pop. (No ingredients shot today. Y’all know what coffee looks like).

Coffee. Cream. Chocolate. How could it be anything but delicious?

Note to self -- don't forget to take the camera off the "kids & pets setting" when taking food photos.

 

Today’s pop was all mine.  Tomorrow I’m back to making pops for the kids.  First up, superfruits!

Day 13 — Coffee Ice Pops (with a twist!)

I was feeling lazy today, so I decided to make an easy pop. And since the kids had already had a snack, I didn’t have to make it kid-friendly. Clearly, it was the perfect chance for a coffee pop!

Now, I’ve mentioned before that coffee and cocktail pops were basically the two reasons I wanted the Zoku, so it’s kind of amazing that it took me this long to make a coffee pop. I kept putting it off because I kept forgetting to make coffee early enough in the day to chill for afternoon pops. Today, I decided the heck with it and pulled out a packet of VIA. The coffee mix was pre-sweetened and cream was a given, but I felt like my pops needed a little something extra:

Wait, are those what I think they are?

Yes, those little beige spheres are Munchkins. I figured there must be a reason why coffee and doughnuts are so often paired together, and decided to see what happened if I put chunks of them in an ice pop (I confess, this is not entirely my own idea. Apparently, there’s an ice cream shop nearby that sells coffee and doughnut ice cream. I haven’t ever had it, but I have a friend who swears it’s wonderful).

This was an easy pop — I mixed half the packet of Via with 1/2 cup each water and cream. I poured it into the molds, pausing periodically to drop morsels of doughnut in.

Is your mouth watering? My mouth is watering.

These pops were incredible. The coffee part was as expected, but the doughnuts took them to a whole different level. The chunks maintained a really nice texture and added an additional pop (no pun intended) of sweetness to the slightly intense coffee. My only regret is that I didn’t use more of them (I divided one munchkin among the three pops).

For once, I am so glad my husband doesn’t eat ice pops. These babies are all mine, and I ain’t sharing.