Cherry Bombs- they just scream Christmas, don't they?

So yesterday, I made one of my annual Christmas give-aways: Cherry Bombs.  What makes them especially Christmassy you ask?  Well, they are red and they will get you wasted.  Sounds Christmassy enough for me.

Cherry Bombs
Makes 12- 8 ounces jars
3- 36 ounce jars of maraschino cherries(the only place I can get these is Costco- 2 jars for $6.99!  Let the Christmas cheer begin!)
Reserved cherry juice from 2 of the jars
1 1/2 cups of vanilla simple syrup (recipe below)
Bacardi 151- about 2 cups, but you can adjust the cherry juice and rum to your liking.  Me?  After 2 cups of rum, my nose hairs start to burn off.

Mix the cherry juice, simple syrup and rum.  Clean and sterilize the jars and fill each one to the top with cherries.  Add the cherry juice/napalm mixture 1/4" to the top.  Screw the lids on and wait 2 weeks.  You need sufficient time for the cherries to soak up the rum mixture- otherwise what's the point?

When ready, you can eat straight from the jar or use as a sundae topping!
Enjoy!

Vanilla simple syrup
2 cups sugar
1 cup water
2 vanilla beans- cut in half and scraped of the seeds

Slowly dissolve water and sugar over a low flame.  Once sugar is dissolved, add vanilla beans and seeds and simmer for about 15 minutes.  Slowly strain the bigger pieces of the bean out, but you definitely want to leave the seeds in- so pretty!  You can use this for a number of recipes, so don't be shy, it will keep in the fridge for almost ever.


-Jenny