Lemon Aid

One of my favourite summer drinks has always been homemade lemonade: fresh lemon juice sweetened with sugar syrup and diluted to your own taste. It’s incredibly easy to make, and a million times more tasty and refreshing than the bottled stuff from the supermarket. Plus, once you’ve got the hang of the basic recipe, you can adapt it to make a whole range of fruity beverages.

Sugar syrup

The basis of good lemonade is the mixture of lemon juice and sugar syrup. The syrup I use here is a called a simple syrup, because frankly the ratio of one part sugar to one part water can’t really get much simpler. You just boil it up to dissolve the sugar, and behold! you’ve created the base for just about every fruit drink under the sun.

To flavour your drink, you can mix the syrup with fresh fruit juice, or you can flavour the syrup itself – or both. So, for example, mint syrup combined with lemon juice and diluted makes minted lemonade (recipe below). Don’t stop at mint, though – plenty of herbs make great syrup. There are a few ideas below, but as usual, experiment!

Lemonade

Ingredients

(serves 2)

½ cup lemon juice

½ cup caster sugar

½ cup water

Still or sparkling water to taste

Method

This one is laughably simple. Pop the sugar and water in a pan and bring to a boil, stirring until the sugar dissolves. As soon as the mixture boils, remove from the heat, transfer to a jug, mix in the lemon juice and allow to cool. Once it’s cold, dilute to taste with still or sparkling water.

Enjoy with plenty of ice, and maybe a sprinkling of summer berries to jazz it up a touch.

Minted Lemonade

Ingredients

(serves 4)

1 cup lemon juice (probably about 6 lemons)

1 cup caster sugar

1 cup water

Several sprigs of fresh mint

Method

Exactly as above, but add the mint in with the sugar and water before you boil it. The syrup will be infused with minty flavour. Just sieve out the mint before you add the lemon juice, and add in some fresh mint leaves to serve.

A few more summery drinks ideas

Coriander syrup: Add a few coriander stalks (not the leaves, as they’re too fragile) to the syrup before you boil it. Strain and combine with lime juice. Freshen up the flavours by adding some of the coriander leaves to the finished drink.

Ginger and lemongrass limeade: Add one stick of lemongrass (bruise first with the blade of a knife) and around a 5cm chunk of peeled, chopped ginger to the syrup. Strain and combine with lime juice.

Orangeade: Just like lemonade, but with oranges. Yum. You might want to include the juice of one or two lemons in there though, as it lifts the flavour. Also try it with rosemary syrup!

Rhubarb-ade: Chop up some rhubarb into smallish, roughly equal pieces and simmer with a 1 tsp sugar and 1 tsp water until it’s really tender but still just about holds together. Drain thoroughly through a fine sieve for a few hours, reserving the juice. Use the pulpy bit in the sieve as compote (it’s great with yoghurt, or creamy desserts like panna cotta and creme brulée). Combine the juice that runs off with a little sugar syrup to taste, then dilute with sparkling water.

Other fruits: The rhubarb technique also works brilliantly with most soft fruit, including strawberries, plums, red- and blackcurrants, gooseberries (the tartness makes a really refreshing drink) and apricots.

Ice lollies: Make your lemonade a little stronger than you usually like it (freezing dulls the flavour), then freeze it in those lolly moulds you get at the supermarket. There are some really stylish lollies to be made here! The ginger and lemongrass limeade above would make a funky frozen palate cleanser between courses...

Pretty ice cubes: Try putting pieces of fruit into the trays with your ice cubes: berries work particularly well, but also edible flowers, mint leaves, or tiny slices of lemon or lime. They’ll seriously jazz up your lemonades.

Finally

What with all the sporting events, this is the summer for parties and gatherings of all kinds. Some well-presented, homemade lemonades will definitely raise your event above the ordinary. Plus (and I mention this merely in passing) flavoured syrups and citrus juices also happen to make for some brilliant cocktails.

You might want to do a little research of your own here to discover your favourites, but once you can make flavoured syrup the world of cocktails gets a whole lot cooler! Pear and rosemary martinis anyone?

Have fun kids, and drink responsibly.