Making Lemon Cordial

Someone once said that if life gives you lemons you should make lemonade, but we prefer to make lemon cordial!

Most of the cold beverages produced by the more self reliant person tends to hinge around alcohol – wine, beer, cider, elderflower champagne – you name it, booze is the way to go. Don’t get me wrong I find the process of brewing and winemaking to be very interesting, but we don’t drink the proceeds so unfortunately there is not much point in getting too wrapped up in it. So here is a home grown beverage that is cheap, tasty and won’t get you drunk!

You will need –

3 lemons
2 cups of sugar
1 dessert spoon of citric acid
600ml of boiling water

Method –

Using a vegetable peeler, remove the rind from the three lemons, avoiding as much of the white pith as possible, which can introduce bitterness to the cordial.
Halve and juice the lemons.
Place the rind, juice, sugar and citric acid into a heatproof bowl and add the boiling water and stir to dissolve the powders.
Leave the mix to cool so that the lemon essence is extracted from the rind.
Once cool, strain into a bottle, I find that a batch will fill a glass “Bickfords” Lemon juice cordial 750ml bottle nicely.

The cordial is ready to use as soon as it is cooled by putting a centrimetre or two into the bottom of a glass and topping up with cold water. I have tried the same recipe with oranges instead of lemons but it doesn’t seem to work as well.