Wednesday, July 9, 2014

The Cooling Taste of Mint


Among gardeners mint has a bad reputation for taking over the yard, but not at my house. I’ve planted mint three times and three times it has struggled to live and finally given up the ghost. Luckily for me, Laurie has an abundance of mint that she frequently shares with me.

A couple of days ago she brought me a generous bunch. Goody! I could make another batch of mint syrup to add to iced tea.


I cut the mint up with scissors, including the tender stems, but discarded woody stems and damaged leaves. It made two cups.


Then I put two cups of water and two cups of sugar in a saucepan and brought that to a boil for one minute, stirring until all the sugar was dissolved. Next, I poured the hot syrup over the mint leaves to steep in a one-quart measuring cup and set a plate on top.


When the mint syrup had cooled completely, I poured it through a strainer into a bowl with a spout.


It made almost a quart of lovely pale green syrup.


Everyone who tastes iced tea with mint syrup loves it. I think it would make a mighty fine mojito, too, with lime juice, rum, sparkling water, and a decorative sprig of mint.

If you want to make mint syrup just remember the formula: equal parts water, sugar, and mint.

Copyright 2014 by Shirley Domer

1 comment:

Jayhawk Fan said...

This syrup is a magical elixir!