Fruity Cereal Clarified Milk Punch Recipe

Perhaps the most adult way to enjoy sugary breakfast cereal, this recipe makes use of fruity cereal milk to create an elegant, complex cocktail that, in spite of its appearance, will bring you back to your childhood with its nostalgic flavor. As well as a favorite childhood treat left at the end of a bowl of sugary cereal, cereal milk has been all the rage ever since Christina Tosi brought it to the forefront — first as a panna cotta at David Chang's restaurant, Momofuku, and then at her own shop, Milk Bar. This recipe continues the culinary exploration she began, using fruity cereal milk to create a cocktail that is complex, interesting, and just plain fun.

This recipe involves first imbuing the milk and vodka with the flavors of your favorite fruity breakfast cereal. This is mixed with macerated raspberries and a bit of sugar to add sweetness, color, and another layer of fruity flavor. Finally, lemon juice is used to curdle the cereal milk, allowing you to strain out the proteins, leaving only a crystal clear, well-balanced, and delightfully creamy cocktail that will surprise everyone you serve it to with the underlying flavor of cereal milk.

To start this recipe you will need fruity cereal, milk, vodka, raspberries, and sugar. For the clarification you will need lemons and an orange. Once you have all of these ingredients together you are ready to start mixing.

Begin by macerating the raspberries with the sugar in a large mixing bowl.

Next add the cereal, milk, and vodka, and stir together.

Cover the bowl and place it in the refrigerator for 24 hours.

Remove the bowl from the refrigerator and skim off the cereal, leaving only the liquids.

Squeeze the lemons and orange into the bowl with the cereal milk.

Stir together and allow to curdle for 15 minutes.

Place a sieve over a large mixing bowl and line it with a coffee filter or several layers of cheesecloth. Pour the cereal milk mixture over and allow it to strain (this may take over an hour).

Once strained, for each drink pour 3 ounces of the clarified milk punch into a shaker full of ice and stir for 20-30 seconds.

Strain into a glass, rimmed with crushed cereal if desired, and serve immediately.

Clarifying milk is a bit like a chemistry experiment. You are working with a suspension (milk) and using an acid (lemon juice in this recipe) to denature the proteins in the milk, causing them to clump up or curdle so that they can be strained out. The result is a cocktail that carries the sweetness and creaminess of milk without the opaque appearance. However, because this recipe is as much a science experiment as it is a cocktail, it is a bit trickier to customize, particularly when it comes to the milk.

There are lots of great non-dairy milk alternatives on the market these days. In lieu of cow's milk you can stop by any grocery store and pick up a jug of soy milk, almond milk, oat milk, et cetera. They each have their unique characteristics and makeup, meaning that some non-dairy milks are more nutritious than others, and some will curdle better than others.

All of these non-dairy milk alternatives are also suspensions of fat and protein in water, just like cow's milk, so they can theoretically be curdled and clarified like the milk used in this recipe. The process however will not be the same. If you are willing to play around a bit, experimenting with adding heat while curdling or changing the quantity of acid, you can probably figure it out. But simply substituting non-dairy milk in this recipe is unlikely to work.

This recipe is developed for any sweet fruity breakfast cereal. We used Trix in the photos, but it would work equally well with Fruity Pebbles, Froot Loops, or whichever is your favorite. The fruity flavor of the cereal works well with the lemon juice, which is a necessary ingredient for the clarification process. Beyond the lemon juice, we also have the raspberries, which add their own touch of fruitiness as well as providing a beautiful pink color to the finished milk punch. For that reason, we would suggest that you stick to the fruity cereals if you are going to follow this recipe exactly. However, if you like to experiment, the base of this recipe can be taken in lots of interesting directions.

Milk punch is traditionally made with milk or half and half, sweetener, spices, and whiskey or brandy. It looks and tastes a bit like eggnog, though it is much lighter and simpler to make. If you wished to use a breakfast cereal outside the fruity favorites, be it something cinnamon-heavy, like Cinnamon Toast Crunch; chocolatey, like Cocoa Puffs; or just plain sweet, like Cap'n Crunch; you may wish to take the recipe closer to its origins. If you cut out the raspberries, and maybe changed the spirit to a more traditional brandy or whiskey, any of those other breakfast cereals should work just great.