Home Kitchen Vanilla Lemonade

Thirsty? Good thing because I made you lemonade.

It’s been real real hot these past few days and nothing quenches my thirst like an ice cold glass of lemonade.

I was emailed this method from a SS reader named Kristin. She sent me her recipe for vanilla lemonade last week and I was pumped. It was my first time ever hearing of vanilla lemonade and I was beyond excited to make her recipe.

In her email she said she thought using real vanilla beans could be memorable and would love to see my spin on it… and that’s only what I did.

Out with the vanilla extract and in with the bean.

For this Vanilla Lemonade Gather:

for the simple syrup:

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup water

3 slices of lemon peel

1 vanilla bean

1 generous pinch of kosher salt

cheesecloth, to strain syrup

for the simple syrup:

juice of 6-8 lemons, strained

8-10 cups of water

1 cup of vanilla/lemon syrup

Lemon slices to garnish

This dish actually is pretty darn unfussy. Sure you dirty a few dishes… but it will leave your house smelling amazingly like fresh lemon and a fireside vanilla so you won’t even mind the sink-full of dishes. These certainly are two flavors I’ve never thought of pairing together for a beverage… but in my gut I knew it would work and my gut never lies.

Next on my list is to steep a little lavender in there.

Start by splitting your vanilla bean entirely in half and scraping out the seeds with the back of your knife.

Into a small sauce pan add 1 cup of sugar and the 3 strips of lemon rind. There is no pith attached to the peel, I simply simply used a vegetable peeler to peel off the strips.

Add in a pinch of salt

Next, add in the scraped vanilla beans and the whole pod into the pot with the sugar and lemon peel.

Lastly to make the simple syrup you’ll need to pour in 1 cup of water.

Bring the everything up to a boil.

Once the sugar has dissolved reduce the heat and let it gently simmer for 5-10 minutes to bring out as much of that lemony-vanilla-ness as possible. Stir occasionally and remove the simply syrup from the heat.

I then lined a large measuring cup with some cheesecloth secured by a rubber-band and poured the simple syrup through to catch the lemon peel, vanilla pod and the majority of the seeds.

Some will pass through but it’s okay.

Let the syrup cool, I sped up the whole process by sticking the measuring cup in a large bowl and packed ice around it.

In the meantime I juiced about 8 lemons or about 1 cup to 1-1/2 cups of juice and strained the juice in a mesh strainer to catch the pulp and seeds.

Because I didn’t have a bowl or pitcher large enough to do it all in one big batch. So I split the 8-10 cups of water, the lemon juice and the syrup evenly among two large pitchers and gave them a good stir.

Into a serving pitcher add a few slices of lemon. It might be a good idea to pick out any seeds you find in the slices.

It truly smells memorable!

Finally, pour the vanilla lemonade over ice and serve with a twist of lemon.

The vanilla rounds out the tartness of the lemon which is an standout classy twist to regular old lemonade. Now all I need is the entire Shades of Grey series. And maybe some bon bons and then my summer is ready to begin. Like ASAP.

Thank you Kristen for sending me you’re recipe! I enjoyed it until the last drop!

Enjoy! And if you give this method a try, let me know! Snap a photo and tag me on twitter or instagram!