Lemonade

Holy Crap! It has been hot out. Usually I love the heat but this year it is killing me. Probably because I can't do anything but stay home and attack the vines in the back yard. Last year was great when Dylan lived on the beach and I had to visit almost everyday, somedays when he was still at work. This year we are in a cute little house and I am finally able to have a garden. So after gardening one day I was feeling a little old fashioned so I needed an old fashion summer drink. Lemonade! The 1924 edition of The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book by Fannie Merritt Farmer delivered.

This super easy recipe didn't call for as much lemon juice as I thought it would. But, I can do this!

I always have lemon juice on hand for cocktails but I thought I should probably go with fresh lemon juice for this drink. Don't you just love my parrot glass? It's huge!

There is something very satisfying about juicing the crap out of a lemon. I strained out all the seeds and pulp. Almost left some of the pulp in. For texture.

So this basically made a simple syrup with lemon. Sorry there are no pictures of boiling water. It was boring.

First I had to do the basic lemonade, ice, water, and the lemonade syrup. It was a lot sweeter than I thought it would be. I don't know why I was surprised. I saw the amount of sugar that is in it.

Let's have a little fun with this! I have watermelon and peaches! The drink on the left has a couple of scoops of watermelon muddled at the bottom. The one on the right has about half a peach.

The basic lemonade was too sweet for me. But it was great mixed with other fruits! The peach was my favorite but I could see keeping this on hand and making fruit lemonades all summer. Strawberry, raspberry, and blueberry would be tasty. Next time I will make it with more lemon juice to give it more of a bite.

My Rating: Too sweet as is but great as a mixer.

Lemonade Cookies

I am so tired of the cold. It doesn't look like spring in coming anytime soon so I figured I might as well pull the Holiday cookbooks back out. This Holiday Homemaker was published by Wisconsin Power & Light. It doesn't have a date but I am guessing 1960's.

This looked like a light spring-ish recipe.

I only needed the lemonade. They only had one kind of frozen lemonade and it was a lower sugar 'healthy' kind.

A big, sticky mess! I'm not sure how this will turn out...

I was not certain how big these would spread. (Pre-cut parchment paper is great!)

Don't these look great?! Fluffy little clouds.

I completely forgot to take a picture of the finished cookies with the lemonade icing. Opps! They were pretty. Trust me.
These were easy to put together but boring. I don't know if it was because I had to use 'healthy' lemonade but the flavor was way too light, almost not there. I loved the texture but everything else was forgettable.

My Rating: Boring. Nothing to save.

Friends and Family Rating: "Not bad"