Too Cute Tuesday often shys away from crafts that take more then a few hours to complete, let alone multiple days. We have short attention spans and like the instant gratification of having accomplished something (anything!) between 7 and 9 pm on a Tuesday night.
All that said, We made a special exception for limoncello. You may remember that we got the party started with zesting lemons and Shakira just two short weeks ago. Tonight, it was time to see how it all came out.
Spoiler Alert: It doesn’t suck, which both surprised and delighted us.
Materials:
Grain alcohol, water, and lemon zest hanging out in a cool dark place for two weeks
Sugar
Water
Pan and spoon
Coffee filters
Glass containers
Cocktail of the Night: Sampling limoncello, if only to make sure it was coming out well
1. Head to Craft Central early since you were promised a walk. Get there and have Christy want to eat macaroni and cheese instead. Decide to go for a run on your own, if only because you accidentally got a little poufy since you switched out coffee for chai without reading the nutritional label on the chai. D’oh!
2. Get back from run and begin the filtration process. That’s right, straining the alcohol mixture into clean containers using coffee filters will take you way longer than you even expect, which is why the word ‘process’ is used to describe it.
3. While the filtering happens, get a simple syrup going with equal parts sugar and water (we used 8 cups sugar and 8 cups water but you may prefer more or less sweetness in your final product). Boil water on the stove, add sugar, stir and let thicken while the pot simmers.
4. When syrup is cooling, pour drained alcohol into containers until they are approximately half full. Watch 90210 while this is happening. Why is the dialogue for these shows so cheesy?
5. Pour syrup into the remaining half of each container. Pass around a mug of the remaining limoncello for Too Cute Tuesday participants to taste. Hey, not bad….actually pretty good.
*A friend of mine told me last weekend that presoaking the lemon zest in a bit of alcohol for 30 minutes beforehand will draw out a lot of the toxins/bitter taste. Then you can follow the recipe as usual. A good tip to pass along, especially if you are brave enough to use non-organic lemons.
Aren’t we crafty…and craft brewers at that!