Holiday Cocktail Recipes: Edible Gold Leaf Champagne

Posted on December 21, 2015 by Mary Hood | 0 Comments

Holiday Cocktail Recipes: Edible Gold Leaf Champagne | Barbara Michelle Jacobs Jewelry

Looking for that special cocktail to wow your holiday party guests? Try the Golden Barbotage—a perfect choice for New Years Eve festivities. The Golden Barbotage is an adaptation of the classic Barbotage cocktail. Our version is simply dressed up with edible gold leaf. (With any gold leaf cocktail, I recommend sticking to translucent mixed drinks. Anything cloudy, like a mimosa, for example, won't show off the glam gold leaf in quite the same way.)

Yes, you heard that correctly—gold leaf can be edible! Gold leaf is basically gold that's been hammered into very thin sheets. It's delicate and easily bent and crumbled, so handle it gently! Because gold is biologically inert, it simply travels through the body, leaving nary a trace (talk about calorie-free luxury!).

Unless you are allergic to gold (a rare misfortune), it’s perfectly safe to eat as long as you’re dining on gold leaf designed for consumption. This means that the gold leaf should be between 22-24 karats (i.e. quite pure) and contain no colloidal gold or gold salts, which may alter skin pigmentation among other unhealthy things. Sometimes gold leaf is mixed with a bit of silver, but like gold, pure silver is also okay to consume.

In addition to fancy cocktails, you can also adorn desserts with edible gold leaf. Decadent truffles make especially good specimens for gold-leafing. Edible gold leaf comes in a variety of sizes ranging from dust (which has the same particle size as fine grain sand) to larger flakes, pictured below. Edible gold leaf costs between $120 and $160 per gram.

Holiday Cocktail Recipes: Edible Gold Leaf Champagne | Barbara Michelle Jacobs Jewelry