How to make Elderflower cordial

The above photograph is Elderflower and NOT an attention seeking imposter

Taking a break from buying or applying make-up, me and my dear friend decided to make elderflower cordial. Its easy ! so easy you should go do it NOW! Yes NOW! Go forth my friends and reap the pleasure that is making your own cordial!

What we did

We went 2 minutes down the road to my local elderflower bush. The night before we had toddled back to mine at 1am and went a bit mental every time we saw white flowers. I am going to put some pictures of the imposter plants which get you all excited and then when you get up close leave you disappointed and sad. I also don't want anyone to poison themselves.

The offenders i came across is the dreaded cow Parsely and Hawthorn tree

White flowers smells nice = elderflower. WRONG from a distance this has tricked me many a time. With Hawthorn (bottom picture)The flowers are way too big and the leaves all wrong! do not be tempted by this imposter! Cow Parsly grows on the ground. Do you think nature would make it this easy to make yummy cordial? NO its a white flower close to the ground back away!

Now i think collecting about 20-30 heads is about right.

Firstly wash them and try to get all the insects out. If you cant thats ok. We filtered ours later (use muslim or a J cloth!) to get rid of the pesky beasts. We melted sugar in a saucepan full of water. Now i put the water in first. Bad idea as this made my cordial, very watery.My advice is to add maybe a cup of water to the sugar until it has all melted and dissolved. You can always add more water!

You then need to add 3 lemons. I recommend putting the zest of one of the lemons in the sugar/water mixture and then just chop all of them up and (a little squeeze to get the juice out into the mixture might be quite cool) then add a chopped orange. Add the elderflower and leave in a cool place for 24 hours.

After this you have your cordial! i recommend keeping it in the fridge so it keeps better. I also think elderflower cordial+spirits= goodtime+no hangover (according to a very reliable source) = more goodtimes!

Enjoy!

A review of ...Clementines

Cool name. Crap fruit.
Ahhhgggghh, just, agggghh, they make me angry. Fruit really shouldn't make you angry. The problem with Clementines is not that they are a particularly bad tasting fruit (they could be Lychies nothing that is used to make potpourri can ever taste good), but it's just that they are basically just a worse version of the glorious Satsuma!
Satsumas are sooo good. they are the bast thing for giving up Chocolate, they have just the right amount of sweetness to make a sweet toots of ten happy and they are just as convenient as snack food. Clementines though, pips everywhere hard to peel and the sweetness is taken over by enough citric acid to corrode Titanium. They even make body butter out of Satsumas- clearly they are the most wholesome fruit.

All this may be bearable had it not been for the fact that during the good satsuma months preceding the dark days of Clementine season you had gotten completely addicted to Satsumas, having bags a day, Jamie Oliver would be proud, and then post Christmas, when you need to loose a bit weight and keep out the winter colds- suddenly all the Satsumas are cruelly stolen away and the inferior excuses for citrus fruits take their place! Well I won't stand for it any more! It is a matter a great importance to national health that a nice convenient fruit stays on the shelves all year around? Allthees scientists working on giant pink carrots and not one can make all year round Satsumas? And what kind of place is that grows one kind of fruit and then changes to a slightly different kind of that fruit- surly they grow in the exact same climates? Who is it that suddenly decides to switch fruit? And most of all considering their bad quality why is it that people are named after Clementines but there are very few Satsumas christened? I demand answers!!