Lemon Digestif
TIME/SERVINGS
Total: 10 mins, plus steeping time
Active: 10 mins
Makes: 3 1/3 cups
By CHOW Food Team
Like an alcoholic Lemonhead, our take on limoncello is both tart and sweet, and is a nice finish to a big meal.
What to buy: We chose Everclear 151 grain alcohol to use in our digestifs; it picks up the flavoring elements much faster than vodka.
This recipe was featured as part of our Make Your Own Digestifs project.
INGREDIENTS
- 4 medium lemons
- 2 cups grain alcohol, such as Everclear 151
- 1 1/2 cups Simple Syrup
INSTRUCTIONS
- Using a vegetable peeler, remove lemon peel in wide strips, making sure to avoid the white pith.
- Place peels in a 1-quart glass jar with a tightfitting lid, add alcohol, cover, and let steep undisturbed at room temperature for 6 days.
- After 6 days, remove peels and add simple syrup. Stir to combine. Store in the freezer.
COMMENTS | ADD YOUR OWN
Any difference between this and limoncello?
I think you mean "remove lemon peel in wide strips," not thick.
Do you steep this at room temp, in the refrigerator, or in the freezer?
gourmandadventurer, MplsM ary, and klaus, thanks for the questions and comments. We have adjusted the headnote and recipe language for clarity. Thanks!
wow, that was fast. Thanks.
never tried the stuff. sounds tasty. I am just curious, why remove the peels, why not just leave them in
Another (lemon) twist on simple syrup is to make like you're candying lemon peels and:
-blanch them 3 times by putting peels in boiling water for a few minutes, pouring out the water, and repeating a couple of more times.
-adding equal parts sugar and water (usually 1 cup and 1 cup) to the lemon and leaving it in until the lemon peels start to look clear
By that point it will be pretty syrupy.
Let the peels dry overnight then roll them in sugar, dip in chocolate, or just refrigerate them.
You can use the syrup for the booze and will be even more lemony than regular old simple syrup.
MetroHound, my peels ended up dissolving when I left them in some everclear for a few weeks. I don't know if it's safe to drink but I'm assuming the alcohol wouldn't let anything bad grow ;) If you never hear back from me, well that will be your answer.
We recently made lemoncello and we used half everclear/half vodka and we stored it for 40 days.
We then tripple filtered the the liqud using paper coffee filters. It removed all of the silt.
We then mixed in the simple syrup solution.
It came out very good.
If I were to make this today, what would the results be like if I chose to drink on Thanksgiving? (2 days steeping)
I have a limoncello recipe on my flog -- www.scottjosephorlando.com -- under Chef Recipe category. I, too, use Everclear (ABC sells a house brand of grain alcohol that's find to use), but I use the whole bottle.
Two days steeping won't be nearly enough time, Blind Mind. My recipe calls for two weeks minimum. Worth the wait. Find some small bottles to give it as Christmas gifts.
Scott
Thanks, I guess I'll have to wait for the next holiday...
How many bottles should this recipe fill? Or put another way, what size bottle should I look for if I want to make this for gifts? "Small" is a bit subjective... I'm unsure what that really means, but am interested in trying this recipe. :)
I doubled the recipe (2 bottles of Polish grain alcohol and a dozen Meyer lemons) which made 8 pint jars of the stuff to give away as gifts. The grain alcohol and lemon peels steeped for about a month. When I added the simple syrup, the liquid in the jars was bright yellow.
Living in Washington State, unless you have a very special permit, you cannot purchase so-called "industrial alcohol" like Everclear 151. So, any suggestion to substitutes, please?
StripperingGormet: go to Oregon. It's legal there (that's what we did).