Mint liqueur

When the summer season comes, many gardeners and caring housewives stock fruits and berries for the winter. Basically, these are blanks in the form of jam, see, jam, compotes, syrups, alcoholic liquors and tinctures. Spicy herbs are usually dried. But from fragrant fresh mint you can easily make mint liquor, which is distinguished by its original emerald color and indescribable aroma.

There are many recipes for making mint liqueur, but the essence of this drink remains unchanged, and the composition is unusually simple. As you know, mint liqueur consists of two components - herbal tincture and sugar syrup. To make mint tincture, twigs with fresh mint leaves are used, which are crushed and poured with an alcohol base. As the latter, you can take high-quality vodka or, even better, pure ethyl alcohol.

After the mint completely gives its aromatic essential oils to strong alcohol and paints it in an unusually attractive green color, it will be about a week. You can proceed to the next step - making sugar syrup for the future mint liqueur. It's still easier here: granulated sugar is added to the water and the liquid warmed to complete dissolution of the sweet crystals.

The chilled syrup is mixed with a strong aromatic tincture and shaken thoroughly. After straining twice, the mint liqueur is bottled and left in a dark, cool place for a month to age.

You can serve the finished mint liqueur not only as an excellent self-drink in terms of taste. It can be used as a flavour component in the preparation of many dishes. Basically, culinary experts add mint liqueur to desserts, pastries, cakes, ice cream, sorbets, puddings, casseroles and many other delicious sweet treats.

In addition, the most fragrant mint liqueur is an excellent basis for making all kinds of cocktails and other mixed alcoholic beverages. Take, for example, the rather popular Mint Breeze cocktail, which includes champagne in addition to mint liqueur in a ratio of 1 to

2. After careful mixing in a shaker, the drink is served in tall glasses with cubes of food ice.

For lovers of a more savoury taste, a Mint Chocolate cocktail is a great option. To make it, chocolate and mint liqueur is beaten in a shaker, to which a portion of fresh milk is added.

In general, when using mint liqueur as part of cocktails, you can safely experiment by choosing ingredients that suit your taste. The unsurpassed aroma, subtle taste and eye-catching colour of the mint liqueur is sure to highlight all the virtues of the rest of the ingredients.