When Life Gifts You Lemons! (My Limoncello, Lemonades and My Twisted Moscow Mule)

Hey FoodLovers! Don’t we all just love the multitalented fruit Lemon? It’s versatility knows no bounds….From making our dishes flavorful to curing colds then serving as an amazing body scrub ingredient….lemons do it all!

I was having a conversation with a friend over a month ago….The Ghanaian Princess and she suggested I make limoncello, I was excited because well anything to do with lemons and vodka then google search recipe happened and I saw that I would need atleast 30 days to make this happen, I rolled my eyes very well and went on about my business. But a few hours later, I realized this might be a fun adventure, it would up my amateur cooking game ‘Italian drink maker’ *hehe* and I could even use the leftover lemons for a lemonade! The Limoncello Adventure begins….

Know what you are making

Limoncello is basically vodka infused with lemon. It is mostly served as a digestif (drink taken after a filling meal to aid digestion) but can be used as base or garnish for cocktails and desserts.

What you need (I went small because it is my first time)

• 6 Lemons
• 2 cups Vodka (I used caramel infused vodka because why not? It’s My Limoncello *big grin*)
• 1 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 cup water

What to do

• Zest lemons (The zest is the scraping of just the colorful part of your lemon….you think the juice is flavorful enough? Try the zest! And since we are trying new things, I might as well learn how to zest a lemon with a knife instead of a zester)

Peel skin off lemon, Use a paring knife to trim off the pith (the white part between the fruit and the skin), Cut up into desired size

• Place zest in glass jar (mainly the big pieces), pour in 1 cup of vodka, cover jar and leave to infuse for 10 days
• After 10 days, cook water and sugar in saucepan for about 10mins and leave to cool
•  Add vodka mixture from before then stir in remaining 1 cup of vodka
• Store in airtight container for another 30 days
• Strain mixture into bottle and store in refrigerator for as long as 3 months (Took me about a month to exhaust mine) 

Did you know that it is actually pronounced ‘limonCHello’…..now add that Italian feel to it….limoncello!

Was it worth the wait? 

Very worth the wait….tastes like sweet lemony velvety liqueur. I did not get any hint of the caramel though.

After sipping a whole glass down one evening, I realized it left a warm sensation in my chest and for some reason, I was instantly reminded of a moscow mule (cocktail of lime, ginger beer and vodka) so time for some experimentation….

My Twisted Moscow Mule

I felt that mixing lime with limoncello might make the drink extra tart so decided to add a sweet note to it with honey flavored yoghurt….

Ingredients 

• 1 tablespoon lime juice
• 4 tablespoons limoncello 
• 4 tablespoons greek style yoghurt 
• 8 tablespoons ginger beer 

Method

• Mix all ingredients and serve with a slice of lime and ice cubes

Wondering what happened to the leftover lemons our limoncello prep?

Lemondaes!

Ingredients 

• 1 cup lemon juice (About 4 large lemons)
• 6 cups water
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 Handful mint leaves

Method

• Cook water with sugar until sugar dissolves (sugar syrup)
• Remove from heat and leave to cool 
• Pour lemon juice into pitcher, throw in mint leaves then sugar syrup and mix properly 
• Served chilled with mint leaves as garnish

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