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I live in a small suburban village. I have a small plot of land where bushes of currants, raspberries and gooseberries grow. This is what I limited myself to, well, I don’t like spudding 5 acres of potatoes and picking cucumbers in buckets.
But last year my mint sprouted miraculously. And what, you ask, to do with it? I’m not a very “advanced” cook. But from my grandmother I got a notebook in which she wrote down recipes for homemade alcohol. So I decided to try mint not in cooking, but in tincture.
This is how my subscriber Alice S began her story. I will be happy to share her recipe with you!
Why I took up the preparation of tincture
I have already heard from many acquaintances that they make various alcohols with the addition of mint. I saw bottles of mint tinctures in stores.
Yes, and in books of recipes met mention of this. So I decided: what the hell is not joking? Maybe you should try your hand at this field?
I’m not very good at alcoholic beverages, especially hard ones. Therefore, I carefully studied the information about mint tinctures not only in my grandmother’s notebook, but also on the Internet.
What is it made from? What is the cooking process? What can be combined with? Tasty or not?
After reading and thinking carefully, I decided that conclusions should be drawn from my own experience. Moreover, mint grows under the window. And began to prepare for the process.
Ingredients you need
To prepare mint liqueur, I needed quite a few ingredients:
- 1 liter of vodka;
- 120 grams of mint;
- 3 lemon;
- 400 gram of sugar;
- 100 grams of water.
That, in fact, is all. But before proceeding to the practical part, it is necessary to make preparations.
First of all, I needed to prepare the mint. I took a bunch and washed it well. Then she spread the twigs on the table and separated the leaves. The stems didn’t work for me. I dried the leaves with a paper towel, slightly crushed with a wooden rolling pin to better separate the juice.
After that, I peeled the zest from the lemons. This must be done carefully so that the soft white part of the peel does not get into it.
The cooking process
To begin with, I took a glass jar with a volume of 2 liters. I put chopped mint and lemon zest in it.
The next ingredient in my drink is lemon juice. I used a small mechanical juicer. Literally two or three movements, and the juice is ready. It’s very handy, I’ll tell you. Simply, quickly and easily you can squeeze juice from any citrus fruits. But you can squeeze the juice with your hands.
The resulting lemon juice, I added to a jar of mint and zest.
The last ingredient in the tincture is vodka. I added alcohol, tightly closed the jar with a lid and put it in a kitchen cabinet for 10 days. The place should be dark and warm.
I shook the contents of the jar every day during the entire infusion period.
After 10 days, I pulled the jar out of the closet. I made a gauze filter (I just folded the fabric in 4 layers) and strained the contents of the container.
I made sugar syrup first. To do this, I heated water and sugar until the latter was completely dissolved. I cooled the resulting syrup to room temperature. You can not do this, but simply add sugar to alcohol, but it does not dissolve well. But the syrup is mixed with liquor quickly and easily.
The glass jar was already freed after straining the alcohol component of the cocktail, and I poured the cooled syrup into it. Then I added strained tincture. I closed the jar again with a lid and sent it to settle in the closet for another 5 days.
Everything, the drink is ready. I passed it through cheesecloth for the second time and poured it into glass bottles for storage.
What was the result
Well, it’s time to try and see what happened. My husband and I sat comfortably on the terrace and poured ourselves a glass of drink. You know, we immediately liked the aroma. I would call it “lemon freshness”. Taking a sip, I felt a moderate sweetness with a slight sourness in the composition.
The drink, rich in mint, was refreshing. Lemon also felt great in the composition. But the taste of vodka was invisible. My husband and I liked the homemade tincture and now I make it every summer. Cooking it is simple and fast, but the result exceeds all expectations.
Excessive alcohol consumption is harmful to your health. Take care of yourself!
The experiment was a success. And you know, I wanted to continue my “creative activities” and make some more drink. Advise what other alcohol to make at home? One that is not very difficult and the ingredients are not too expensive.