So, what do you do when life gives you lemons? Make lemonade of course!
And oh boy has life given me lemons! We came home from holidays to find a tree that was so laden with lemons that the branches were nearly lying on the ground!
Poor tree!!!!
Emergency lemon measures were called for! Friends and family were called. However, friends and family were either having their own too many lemon dilemmas or were already hooked up with other peoples too many lemon dilemmas. So, unable to give them away, I started thinking about how to deal with the lemon glut of 2019 on my own!
My old fashioned lemonade is a total classic. It’s the kind of lemonade you can imagine kids selling from a homemade stand, Lucy Van Pelt style back in the day. Or the kind that these kids gave away to marchers during the 1963 March on Washington led by Martin Luther King, Jr. Bless their non-capitalist hearts!
Old Fashioned lemonade is also incredibly easy to make! It has just three ingredients – Lemon juice, sugar and sparkling water. Garnishes of lemon wedges, mint leaves and ice cubes are optional.
But if you also wanted to add a little splash of booze, well, I won’t judge you. 😉
Stir the sugar into the lemon juice until it has completelty melted.
When ready to serve, fill a glass to about a third with the lemon and sugar mixture.
Add icecubes.
Top with sparkling water.
Garnish with lemon wedges and mint leaves.
Notes
The lemon and sugar mixture will keep for about a week in a bottle in the fridge.
I’m sure I will have many more lemony dishes in the coming months including a much more fancy lemonade and a super sounding pickle that was in a book I got for my birthday.
Let me know what you would make if you had a million lemons – I need all the inspiration I can get.
No, I’m not getting out my love beads and turning all peace, love and mung beans on you but I have been inspired by all things floral this week and I made you an amazing cocktail which is a veritable flowerbomb of flavour! (And not even the slightest hint of Parfait Amour).
Spring has sprung in Melbourne which means it’s constantly windy, all the better to spread pollen all over the place, so I’m sneezing constantly. We’re also having bizarre weather changes….Seriously WTF Melbourne? From 27 to 13 in one day? We’re living in crazy times!
On a happier note, the sun has been shining more frequently, we’ve had a couple of gorgeous warm days, I did twilight yoga in the park the other night and the garden is growing like crazy. Back at Easter we planted the front garden – I was going for a Mediteranean look so we have an olive tree, rosemary, thyme and lots of lovely lavender. We have a couple of dark pink ones:
Pink Lavender
As well as the more traditional purple ones:
Purple Lavender
Then my mum brought over these gorgeous roses from her garden:
So in between the sneezes, it really has been all about the flowers. And they have inspired a fabulous cocktail, called the Flower Power. It’s really a trashed up Lavender Lemonade, and you know what? I can get pretty damn trashy!!!! I was almost tempted to call this one the snowball, because once it got started it took on a life of it’s own.
So here is the entire evolution of the Flower Power Cocktail.
The Spark – Flower Power Coctail v1
The lavender in the garden got me thinking about a recipe I read ages ago on Thug Kitchen (which is an awesome blog) for Lavender Lemonade. Which you can find here:
You could just make this and live happily ever after. It’s nice, it’s refreshing and they are very, very funny people. But you know, with all due respect to Thug Kitchen…it’s not nearly trashy enough for this girl!
Lavender Lemonade Ingredients
Enter the Flower Power Cocktail v2.
Flower Power Cocktail v2 – A Kiss From A Rose
I had some gorgeous dried rosebuds bought to make my Persian recipes for book club (coming soon) and thought that they would be a nice addition.
They were.
The mixture will start to turn colour after about 15-20 minutes. For the best flavour, let the petals steep for at least an hour, I left mine overnight. An added bonus is that during the steeping your kitchen will smell like a garden
The Lavender and Rose Lemonade was really good. And a gorgeous pink! Very girly and perfect for sipping on a sunny afternoon.
Kissed By A Rose – Lavender and Rose Lemonade
But you know what? Sometimes this girl needs a little bit o’ booze mixed in with her flowers and citrus…so enter version 3…
Flower Power Cocktail v3 – The Crackling Rosie
So if you take your Lavender and Rose Lemonade and add a little hit of a florally gin like Hendricks you have a very pleasant cocktail. Still very girly and whilst you could sip it all afternoon it does have a little ginny kick to it.
Flower Power v3 – The Crackling Rosie
But you want more. I know you do.
So, without further ado…..
The Flower Power Cocktail
So far, we have been topping our lemonade or our cocktails up with a little sparkling water.
For the true Flower Power Cocktail, use the lemonade mix straight.
Add your half nip, or hell, a whole nip of Hendricks. Top with St Germain Elderflower Liqueur.
Oh baby, oh yeah!
A couple of these and you’ll feel like you’re in San Francisco with flowers in your hair!
The Flower Power Cocktail
Gilding The Lily – The Flower Power Cocktail Bling
If you really want to trash up your Flower Power Cocktail you can add some flower petal ice cubes and make some lavender sugar to rim your cocktail glass. If you make the ice cubes use big trays to make them. My ice cubes were kind of small and it was a hot day so I ended up with a couple of mouthfuls of petals. Which is not great tastewise and even worse if you’re trying to look all classy and have to keep spitting out lavender buds!
