ONE. OH. TWO. That’s the temperature here today. Now, I’ll grant you, the bone dry humidity level makes the heat a little easier to take, but still. It’s HOT.
When he was a young teenager, Robb moved from northern Wyoming where temperatures of -20 are not unheard of in the winter, to western Arizona, to a city that was frequently the hot spot in the entire country, with temperatures of 120 or more. His thoughts about this massive climate switch? “People still stay indoors for 3 months of the year. It’s just a different three months.”
Indoors, indeed. I’m pretty sure parts of Arizona were uninhabitable by humans in the days before air conditioning.
We desperately needed some frozen refreshment at our house this week, and since I don’t have an ice cream maker with which to turn my fresh cherries into frozen confection, I had to use plan B: freeze some lemonade.
Have you ever made old fashioned lemonade? It’s ever so tasty. You start by making a simple syrup, cooking equal parts sugar and water to get the sugar nice and dissolved. If you want to add cherries, you add them to the syrup. I was, as usual, lazy, and decided not to pit or even halve my cherries, but just throw them in with the syrup whole, use a potato masher, and let the sieve do the rest of the work. I’m an evangelist for this kind of laziness.
One thing you must remember is that old fashioned lemonade by definition uses actual lemons. There can be no discussion on this point. It’s real lemons or nothing, friends. I juiced about 5 or 6 lemons, which netted me about a cup of fresh lemon juice. I let everything chill out in the fridge before combining the lemon juice, cherry syrup, and some water.
Shall I give you a dose of honesty? I didn’t love how my cherry lemonade turned out. Too much lemon juice, maybe. But, then again, I’m not a very good judge, because I love my foods super sweet and I have next to zero tolerance for tartness. I hoped it would taste better frozen. Sometimes a textural change makes all the difference.
In this case, I was right. Eating icy flakes of cherry lemonade is somehow different than drinking the cherry lemonade. Don’t ask me why, it doesn’t make sense to me either.
I froze my lemonade in a large-ish Rubbermaid container
It’s worth it, though. Trust me.
{I like it so much, I’m entering it in the OXO cherry recipe contest. Thanks for hosting a great contest, OXO!}
- 1 cup whole fresh cherries (stems removed)
- 5-6 lemons
- ¾ cup sugar
- ¾ cup + 3-4 cups water
- In a saucepan, combine sugar and ¾ cup water, bring to a boil, stirring until sugar dissolves.
- Add whole cherries and cook 2-3 minutes. Use potato masher to mash fruit, and cook 1-2 minutes more.
- Pour syrup through a sieve, then chill until completely cooled.
- In a separate container, juice lemons. You should end up with about 1 cup of fresh lemon juice.
- Combine chilled cherry syrup and lemon juice. Add water to taste. You should end up with about 1½ quarts of lemonade.
- Pour lemonade into a container and place in freezer. Stir about once an hour for three hours. Then allow it to set completely in freezer.
- Once completely frozen, use a fork to scrape lemonade into slush. Spoon slush into cups and enjoy immediately.
If you enjoy this recipe, you might also enjoy:
Cherry Lemonade Arnie Palmer from Eating Clean Recipes
Frozen Lemonade from The Kitchn
Orange Ice Cream Freeze from Jen’s Favorite Cookies
This recipe linked up at:
Chicken Scratch; Alli-N-Son; Tidy Mom; Something Swanky;
This sounds so cool. I might have to try making fresh squeezed lemonade at the very least 🙂 I think my family would love the frozen cherry lemonade. I love your site and can’t wait to try some cookie recipes!
I’m currently working on cherry limeade over here – your lemonade looks divine! And I agree – there is no substitute for real lemonade. Would you like to join my crusade to ban those little plastic lemons full of whatever they are full of that is most certainly not lemon juice?
That sounds and looks SO refreshing! I used to live in Tucson, AZ where they had Eegees frozen lemonade. This reminds me of that, only better! Nothing better on a hot day.
Sounds Delish!! I’m loving that. would be good with strawberries too! I’m going to have to try it!
Stopping by from SITS!
SITS visit! This sounds wonderful! Can’t wait to try it!
Mmmm that looks so refreshing! With cherries so affordable right now, I just might have to make some, myself….
Hi, Jen! Like you, I have no ice cream maker as well! Are we the only two food bloggers who don’t have one?
This frozen cherry lemonade looks superb! It’s funny how frozen and non-frozen can taste differently! That happened to me once when I made a blood orange granita. It was too sweet when it was still warm, but frozen, it was perfect! I’m glad I took the risk and went ahead with that one!
I’m glad I’m not alone! I hear Carla at Chocolate Moosey doesn’t have an ice cream maker either. She tells me she uses David Lebovitz’ method for no-machine ice cream all the time. I might have to try it!
I like tart, so I’d like that version. It’s been hot here, too, so this looks mighty refreshing. And such great color! thanks.
This would be soooo refreshing on a day like today! Looks incredible! 🙂
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i love this recipe! it gets your taste buds!