Slimy Fruity Drinks (Kissel) : 7 Steps

KISSEL is an Eastern European dish made with fruit juice thickened with corn starch. It's very versatile. Can be cooked thin enough to drink, or thick enough to eat with a spoon. Can be eaten cold or hot, made with pure juice or juice mixed with fruit for more texture. This recipe makes a drinkable kissel, it's gel-like and similar to thin custard. It sounds off-putting, but give it a try, it's really good.

Best of all, it's vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free and dairy-free.

I made the green slime drink many times for kids' birthday parties and it never failed to freak them out. I also made a huge batch of cherry-vodka blood shots for a peculiar vampire-themed bachelorette party a few years ago and it was a huge hit. I have to admit, watching people take a shot they expect to be regular alcohol and freak out half-way through because of the slightly slimy consistency is extremely satisfying to my sadistic streak.

You will need:
Fruit
Corn starch (or potato starch)
Sweetener/ sugar
Alcohol for adult version

Step 1: Fruit Juice Preparation

There are a lot of fruits you can use, although berries and cherries work best. You can use fresh or frozen fruits. Fresh berries this time a year are always tasteless to me so I use frozen ones instead.

Begin by stewing fruit with water (for every 500g of fruit I used 1 cup of water), do it over the stove or in a microwave. Once fruit is soft mash it using a fork/potato masher or use a blender. Pass the fruit mash through a fine sieve. Taste your fruit juice, if it's too concentrated- add water.

Measure how much liquid you have (you need it to calculate how much corn starch to use).

Step 2: Thickening

For every 500ml (2cups) of berry juice you will need 1TBS corn starch and 60ml (1/4 cup) COLD water.

Pour the juice into a pot, and heat it up, sweeten it with sugar or sweetener to your taste. While your fruit juice is being heated, mix 1/4 cup cold water and corn starch in a separate container. Bring the fruit juice to a boil, add your corn starch mix and whisk it in. Keep stirring, bring the mixture to a boil and cook for 2-3 minutes. At this point you can add food dye. Once cooked, place it in a bowl, cover with cling film and let it cool down.

For alcoholic drinks you need to adjust the amount of corn starch. Add additional 1tsp of corn starch to make the liquid thicker. You will add the alcohol once the kissel is cool.

Step 3: Lime/ Lemon

For lime/lemon kissel mix 500ml COLD water and 50ml of lime/lemon juice (or more). Add sugar or sweetener to taste. Mix in 2TBS corn starch and bring to the boil. Cook for 2-3 min, add food dye, leave to cool.

Step 4: Cooled Kissel

Once the kissel is cooled, grab a whisk and mix the whole mixture. At this point you can add alcohol and/or additional water in case your mixture is too thick. I also used edible glitter and lustre dust.

The video shows different viscosities- thick enough, but still drinkable v too thick.