Guess what I made last night? Cherry-infused bourbon.

It turns out that the jar I was planning to use wasn’t actually going to work (you would think, given that I have at least some experience with canning, that I would understand the importance of a screw top, but apparently no). So instead of making the whole thing in one big jar, I split it across four pint-sized canning jars. It seems to have worked out.

The process was shockingly easy. I washed and stemmed the cherries. I added 1/4 pound cherries, 1/4 cup sugar, and 1 1/4 cups Maker’s Mark to each jar and screwed on the lid. I shook the jars vigorously until the sugar dissolved. I let them sit overnight. I took pictures with my phone. I will now put them away in the back of the cabinet and forget about them until November.

I’m still kind of blown away by a canning-type process that doesn’t involve a ton of boiling water and hours of menial food prep. It’s kind of awesome.

Now let’s go back and look again at the cherries in the bourbon:

So pretty!