Kaki!  So lovely to see you and Andrew and the pups this week.  I wore my new scarf today,  and it’s wonderful, the infinity-ness of it, the weight of it, the colors… Thank you!

I wanted to share this fun holiday drink with you, since I’d shared my winter pick-me-up last time.  This comes courtesy of one of my all-time favorite co-workers, Zoed.

Zoed is from Puerto Rico, and made little bottles of coquito (“koh-kee-toh”) for Christmas last year.  I was instantly hooked.  You could call it Puerto Rican eggnog, but without the eggs, and with some fabulous coconut business going on.  Oh and also cinnamon and rum.

Kaki, it is soooo goooood.

So if you’re in the mood for some sweet, sippable holiday goodness, get you some rum and cinnamon and coconut milk and let’s have us a night!

Coquito

makes about 1.5L

Ingredients

• 3 cinnamon sticks
• 1 cup water
• 1/2 to 3/4 of a 14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk
• 1 12 0z. can evaporated milk
• 1 13.5 oz. can coconut milk
• 1 15 oz. can cream of coconut
• 1 1/2 cups light rum
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon (plus more to garnish)

Add the water and cinnamon sticks to a small pot, and bring to a quick simmer over medium-high heat. Set aside until this cools down.

In a blender*, combine the 3 milks and coconut cream.  Blend for about a minute.**  Add the rum and ground cinnamon and blend to incorporate.  Add 1/4 cup of the cinnamon water and blend to incorporate.  If too thick for your liking, add another 1/4 cup cinnamon water.

Transfer the coquito to a bottle/container.  Drop the cinnamon sticks in the bottle and refrigerate.

To serve, fill a tumbler half full with ice, then pour coquito over ice.  Add ground cinnamon on top for garnish if desired.  Coquito should keep for about a month in the fridge, but it won’t last that long. 🙂

Merry Christmas, Kaki!  I finally got my “tree” up today.  Sure, it’s an art easel draped in lights and ornaments, perched over some boxes of dishes covered in a table cloth.  But heck, it looks festive, and I like it.

Good luck with the interviews, my dear!

–Caitlin

*Or a high sided-bowl in which you can use your immersion blender would also work, that’s what I used.

**You want to really blend in the coconut that separated in the coconut milk; the last batch I made I didn’t do this long enough and there were some coconut bits floating around in the finished product.  It didn’t affect the taste, but certainly made for an odd texture.