Many years ago I was asked to submit an article on summer beverages to a magazine. This summer, in the intense heat, I’ve been making more cordials and tweaking some of the recipes, so I thought I would bring the article to my blog audience.
When I was a child, on one hot day each year, my mother would make real lemonade from sliced lemons marinated overnight in a sugar solution and chilled. Summer was the busiest time of the farming year, so we rarely went on holiday. Instead we were left to our own devices while our parents brought in the harvest and looked after livestock.
The lemonade tasted so different from our normal commercial blackcurrant cordial. We were never allowed fizzy drinks because my grandmother once worked for a grocer as a governess. The business made their own carbonated cordials and having seen the process, she disapproved of paying for carbon dioxide piped into flavoured sugar water.
Now we ae subjected to flavoured water with many, questionable additives, sometimes forgetting we have the knowledge and resources to make our own. Yes, they include sugar, but sugar is a natural preservative and you only ingest a very small amount with lots of water.
Last weekend, we helped with a fundraising weekend for a primary school in Mali. I provided a table full of herb and vegetable plants and a box of elderflower and ginger cordial. The cordial was offered as a taster and all the bottles sold.
Elderflower and ginger cordial
10-20
heads of fresh, creamy elderflowers
4
lemons
2
oranges
A
large chunk of ginger root (approx. 1-1.5 inches/3.8cm)
2pints/1.2
litres water
2lbs/0.9kgs
granulated sugar (or use 1kgsugar:1litre water)
Place the sugar in the
water in a saucepan and bring to the boil, stirring until all the sugar is
dissolved. While the water is heating, place the elderflowers in a large bowl
and cut the zest off the oranges and lemons and add to elderflowers. Cut the ends
off the citrus fruit and discard, then slice and add to contents of bowl. Peel
the ginger root and dice into small pieces before adding to the bowl.
Pour the boiling sugar syrup over the elderflowers and citrus fruits. Cover the bowl and place in a cool place for 24 hours. I put a plate on the top of the bowl to keep the citrus fruit submerged in the syrup. After 24 hours strain (eat the orange slices – they are amazing!). Strain twice more using either muslin or kitchen paper. Makes 4 pints of cordial. Pour into sterilized glass jars or plastic jars and freeze. Keep in the fridge and dilute to taste. It tastes good with fizzy water. Serve diluted in glass jugs with slices of lemon and a sprig of mint.
To extract the maximum from your flowers and fruit, pour boiling water over the discarded solids in a bowl to cover and place in the fridge until cold. Strain the contents and drink the now diluted cordial.
Below, I have used my childhood memory of lemonade but perfected it by adding some of the sun-drenched herbs in my garden and hedgerows.
Rose and lemon balm cordial
5-6
strongly scented roses (I used a mixture of Apothecary’s Rose, William
Shakespeare and Gertrude Jekyll)
20
lemon balm stems
4
flowering stems of self-heal
4
lemons
2
lbs of sugar
2
UK pints (20fl oz) of water
Remove
the leaves from the lemon balm stems and the leaves and flower stalks from the self-heal
and place in a large bowl. Chop into small pieces with scissors. Add all the
rose petals and mix. Remove the ends of the lemon and cut into slices. Add
these slices to the herbs. Measure the sugar and cold water and place in a
saucepan on the heat. Bring to the boil stirring all the time with a long
wooden spoon. Pour the sugar syrup carefully into the bowl. Cover with a
suitably sized dinner plate so all the plant material is submerged under the
syrup. Place the bowl in a cool larder or fridge overnight. You will see that
the syrup has turned pink by the following morning. Remove the dinner plate and
strain the syrup into a jug. Squeeze the plant material well to remove as much
syrup as possible. If you want to maximise your syrup, return the squeezed
plant matter to the bowl and cover with cold water. Mix well then strain again
and drink. (This should provide your first taste of the cordial at a strength
ready for imbibing.)
Pour your rose syrup either into sterilized glass bottles or clean plastic bottles and immediately freeze. The glass bottles should be sealed, labelled and dated and kept in the fridge once open. Dilute to taste with still or sparkling water.
One of my garden beds is overrun with Swiss mint. The flavour is too strong and metallic for mint sauce but it makes a wonderful mint vinegar and mint and lemon honey which can be combined for an oxymel. I thought I would experiment to see what a Swiss mint cordial would taste like. It was a great success!
Mint and lemon balm cordial
20-30
long stems of mint picked before flowering
10
stems of lemon balm
4
lemons
2lbs
sugar
2
UK pints (20fl oz) of water
Remove
leaves from mint and lemon balm, place in a large bowl and chop into small pieces
with scissors. Remove the ends of the lemon and cut into slices. Add these
slices to the herbs. Measure the sugar and cold water and place in a saucepan
on the heat. Bring to the boil stirring all the time with a long wooden spoon.
Pour the sugar syrup carefully into the bowl. Cover with a suitably sized
dinner plate so all the plant material is submerged under the syrup. Place the
bowl in a cool larder or fridge overnight. Remove the dinner plate and strain
the syrup into a jug. Squeeze the plant material well to remove as much syrup
as possible. If you want to maximise your syrup, return the squeezed plant
matter to the bowl and cover with cold water. Mix well then strain again and
drink. (This should provide your first taste of the cordial at a strength ready
for imbibing.)
Pour
your mint syrup either into sterilized glass bottles or clean plastic bottles
and immediately freeze. The glass bottles should be sealed, labelled and dated
and kept in the fridge once open. Dilute to taste with still or sparkling
water.
One
of the strangest summer recipes I came across was for a 1947 cough/throat
remedy made from roses and nettles served with milk. I was dubious fresh
nettles could be found at the same time roses were blooming but if you keep
your nettle patch well harvested, there will be young growth available when you
pick your roses.
The syrup can also be made from dried nettles and rose petals if you need a fix in the dead of winter.
If you want to maximise the mineral content of your syrup, macerate the nettles in cold water overnight maybe adding red clover and/or sweet violet leaves or heartsease aerial parts. If you’re looking for a soothing cough remedy, then try adding marshmallow leaves to the maceration. If you want to enhance the nervine/spirit lifting effect of the roses, add Ashwaganda roots to the maceration. (Basically, the possibilities are endless!)
Nettle rose milkshake syrup
A
large bowlful of young nettles/nettle tops
Other
medicinal herbs suitable for cold maceration (see above)
Cold
water
7
deeply scented red roses
2lbs
sugar
Place
the nettles in a bowl (and other herbs) and cover with cold water. Cover and
leave overnight in a cool place. The next morning tip the entire contents of
the bowl into a large saucepan. Cover and bring to the boil. Simmer for twenty
minutes then strain the liquid into a jug, discard the herbal matter and wash
the saucepan thoroughly. Measure the liquid, return it to the saucepan, bring
to the boil and simmer uncovered on a low heat until the liquid measures 2 UK
pints (20 fl.ozs). Add the sugar and all the rose petals. Bring back to the
boil simmering and stirring for approximately 15 minutes until the sugar has
dissolved and the rose petals have given up their colour to the syrup. Strain
off the rose petals and pour the hot syrup into hot, sterilized bottles. Seal,
label and date. Allow to cool. Add to a glass of cold milk an amount to give
your desired level of sweetness. (The original recipe says 1 tsp per glass but
I like 1 tblsp!) Store opened bottles of syrup in the fridge. Unopened bottles
should be ok in the larder or a cool cupboard.
When you have a garden or open space full of herbs, there is nothing better than wandering around with your gathering basket and a pair of scissors in the cool of the evening collecting flowers from different plants to create a unique elixir.
Uplifting elixir
Rose
petals
St
Johns wort flowers
Borage
flowers
Evening
primrose flowers
Ox-eye
daisy flowers
2
lavender flower heads
Self-heal
flower stalks and leaves
Lemon
balm leaves
Alpine
strawberry leaves
Runny
honey
Brandy
Strip
all leaves from stems and place inside a jam jar. Chop leaves into small pieces
with scissors. Add flowers to the jam jar. The amount of uncut leaves and
flowers should loosely fill the jar. Carefully pour in runny honey until the
jar is half full. Stop pouring several times and stir mixture with a chopstick
to remove any air bubbles. Fill jar to the top with brandy, mixing everything
together with a chopstick. Seal the jar, label and date. Leave in a cool, dark
place for 4-6 weeks. Strain and use as required. Dosage is 1 dropperful at a
time up to 4 times a day. (Not suitable for children under 12 but you could make a soothing cordial using the same plants maybe increasing the lemon balm, adding chamomile and omitting the roses and SJW)
So many herbs offer us a myriad of wonderful combinations to enhance our lives not only in summer but all year round.
1 comment:
Hi nice readiing your post
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