Every summer, my favorite 4th of July activity in the Keweenaw is the Gay Parade in Gay Michigan, which is not to be missed. Be sure to get to Gay early so you can partake in the Fire Department Ladies Auxiliary Bazaar and Rummage Sale where you can get hand crocheted dish towels, home preserved thimbleberry jam and other exotic flavors like fireweed jelly. The fire department has a refreshment tent and raffle, and there are tours of the old Gay School House which is really neat. The Gay Bar opens early for the event, and they even turn their whole parking lot into a bar, which pretty much makes the whole thing start to feel like New Orleans on Mardi Gras. Last year, Andy road his bike from our place by Calumet Water Works to Gay and I met him there with the truck. While I was waiting for him to arrive, I sat inside at the bar with the locals and noticed that the ladies were all raving about a featured special called "pudding shots". I'm not the kind of person that would drink a pudding shot, but the Yooper ladies love them, but I filed the idea away in my mind for a potential tailgate party idea.
I'm also not the kind of person that would go on a bus trip to a casino, but anything is possible and yesterday, I found myself going along on one for a fundraiser, I figured I needed to bring a dish to pass, so why not pudding shots? A quick googling around showed rampant use of instant pudding, Bailey's Irish Cream and Cool Whip, but I decided to go a different path. First, I am okay with using instant pudding mix, but I wanted my shots to be drinkable, so I ditched the Cool Whip. Second, I wanted my shots to pack a punch, so vodka was going to be added. Lastly, I wanted to find recipe to use up some airplane size bottles I had of Rum Chata in the liquor cabinet. Have you tried Rum Chata before? It kind of reminds me of the milk left over in your cereal bowl after eating Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal. I like it better than Baileys but I am not a big fan of creamy liqueurs. But I know lots of the ladies like it. For example, everyone was drinking it at a scrapbooking weekend I once attended. While touring the instant pudding shelf area at Meijer (which I never looked at before) I found they had cheesecake flavor! Who knew? So I got it.
Raspberry Cheesecake Rum Chata Pudding Shots
1 box Jello Instant Pudding Cheesecake flavor
1 1/2 c. Rum Chata
1/2 c. Vodka
Fresh raspberries, for garnish
Mix up everything except the raspberries in a bowl, and pour into condiment cups. You can get these at GFS. Top with 3 or 4 berries and chill. These will not set up like pudding, they are drinkable.
For tailgating (or a bus trip to a casino) I highly recommend transporting them in the Pampered Chef Cool and Serve tray I am always a sucker for Pampered Chef parties. (like a scrapbooking party, they are also likely to feature Rum Chata!) If you wanted to make these with less alcohol, I suppose you could sub in a cup of milk for a cup of the more potent potables, I guess.