Happy Cocktail Friday and happy 4th of July weekend! If you’re celebrating with friends and family this weekend, you need to make this Big Batch Lavender Lemonade Cocktail! It’s so refreshing and the lavender simple syrup really lends some flavor complexity to what would otherwise be a tasty but pretty standard lemonade cocktail. I also prefer to use gin in my lemonade cocktail because I think the fresh botanical notes of the gin helps set off the other flavors in this cocktail, but you could certainly use vodka if you prefer.
Culinary lavender can usually be found at craft stores (since it’s often used in soap making) or online. I get mine at World Market. You want to make sure you’re using fresh stuff for the most flavor! It does expire, and trust me, you don’t want to rely on it after it’s expired. Once you steep the lavender buds in the hot simple syrup, be sure to strain it through a fine mesh strainer. I also double strained mine using a cheesecloth (a paper towel will work too) to make sure I got all the little bits of lavender and leaves out.
Ingredients and Substitutions
Here’s what you’ll need to recreate this Lavender Lemonade at home:
- Lemon juice – Fresh squeezed is best for flavor here, but if your grocery store sells fresh pressed lemon juice in the produce section, that’ll work too if you’re crunched for time. Definitely don’t get the shelf stable “lemon juice” though!
- Gin – I opted for gin in this recipe because I love the flavors it brings to the party, but you could totally use vodka if you prefer.
- Water – Just like regular lemonade, you’ll need to dilute the lemon juice and sugar to make this drink delicious.
- Culinary lavender – You can find this at most craft stores or online. I usually have good luck finding it at World Market too.
- Sugar – Regular old granulated sugar is what I used here. I don’t know how low calorie sugar substitutes would work since I haven’t’ tried it, but as long as they’re 1:1 subs for granulated sugar, they should be fine. Honey would probably be a tasty substitute, but you’d need a whole cup of honey.
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Recipe
Big Batch Cocktails: Lavender Lemonade
Ingredients
Lavender Lemonade Cocktail
- 24 fl oz water
- 14 fl oz fresh squeezed lemon juice
- 12 fl oz gin
- 12 fl oz lavender infused simple syrup, (recipe follows)
Lavender Infused Simple Syrup (yields ~12 oz)
- 8 fl oz water
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 2 tbsp dried lavender flowers
Instructions
Lavender Infused Simple Syrup
- Add sugar and 8 fl oz of water to a small saucepan and bring just to a boil over medium heat. Stir until sugar is dissolved completely. Remove from heat.
- Once syrup has stopped boiling, add dried lavender, cover, and steep the lavender for 5 minutes. Strain using a fine mesh strainer. (I like to add a layer of cheesecloth in my strainer to catch any really small pieces too.) Set aside to cool.
Lavender Lemonade Cocktail
- Combine all cocktail ingredients in a large pitcher. Serve over plenty of ice and garnish with fresh lavender and lemon peel.
Nutrition Information
For my macro trackers out there, I wasn’t able to create a My Fitness Pal barcode for this recipe since I would have had to decide for you whether to put the alcohol calories in as carbs or fats – that’s up to you! The 29 carbs listed here are from the simple syrup and lemon juice. For my non-macro trackers, here’s more info on what I’m talking about.
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