It's not just a bad picture.

This really just doesn't look that appetizing. But, I'm filing it under "holidays" because in theory that's about the time it should be ready.  I've been wanting make this green walnut liquor for a few years but never got around to finding a source for the green walnuts.

It's called Nocino and it's either French or Italian and it's supposedly tasty and wonderful. There's a bunch of green walnuts, a bottle of vodka, sugar, lemon zest, and some spices.

Ideally, it would have been made with younger walnuts but this is what I happened to find on the street outside an amazing breakfast place in Portland last week.


My brother helped me gather the nuts then actually quartered them for me because he was completely convinced I was going to slice the hell out of my fingers. I protested that I could probably handle it but, didn't protest too hard because I'd seen multiple posts (I got the idea from a food blog) about wearing gloves because the nuts stained your hands.... better him than me.

Right now it just looks like dark mess. The directions say to let it sit for at least two months, then strain it, then let it sit some more. It's supposed to get really dark with all sorts of complicated flavors. I figure it's worth a shot.