Strawberry Syrup by Elaine
Just when you are fed up of making jam and freezing the glut of your scrumptious home grown strawberries – try this! It’s full of flavour and versatile too. Keep it is the fridge for up to 3 months – though I have kept it for longer!
Ingredients:
- 1 lb ripe strawberries
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 7 fl oz (200mls) water
- 1 vanilla pod split with seeds scraped out and reserved (optional)
- 1 teaspoon of citric acid
- 7 – 9oz castor sugar
Instructions:
- Hull and slice the berries and place in saucepan with 7 floz (200mls) water and the lemon juice. Heat them gently over a low heat until the juices ‘run’. Crush the fruit with a potato masher or the back of a wooden spoon.
- When the fruit is really soft and gloopy, strain through a muslin lined sieve. Squeeze or press it to extract the maximum juice.
- Return juice to the rinsed out pan. Now add the vanilla pod and seeds to the pan with the sugar. Whisk to distribute the seeds and then heat gently over low heat until the sugar has dissolved without stirring. Bring to the boil for 5 minutes.
- Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the citric acid.
- Pour immediately into warm sterilized bottles using a funnel. Seal, label and leave to cool then store in fridge.
I pour over ice-cream as syrup or add to fizzy water or champagne as a cordial to add a flavour of summer!
