Fighting the heat with Limoncello

Ingredients
10 organic lemons
1 bottle vodka
3 ½ cups water
2 ½ cups sugar

I don’t know where you live, but in my part of the world, it is so hot right now, I seriously wish I was an iceberg, just for the fact that it would take slightly longer than to melt than in my human form. The birds are no longer singing in the morning but waddling around semi-unconscious, breathing becomes an activity in itself and re-hydrating seems more like a competition of how much water a person can drink in a day.

How much water can a person drink before craving something more substantial? Something that is ice cold and sweet, fiery and quenching thirst at the same time? Luckily, inspired by last week’s day of blogs dedicated to Marcella Hazan and all the Italian deliciousness, the Santoku master got his own little project going: making limoncello (following a recipe from the Foodnetwork).

The first day, he peeled the lemons (you want to use organic lemons) and covered them with the vodka in a huge bowl, filling the whole apartment with the most delicious scent. For three days, while the alcohol dissolved the lemon peel’s fragrant oils, we waited, growing increasingly restless, prowling around the lemon bowl and taking a sniff at it whenever we could. I see you laughing at us, but try for yourself to resist the siren call of lemons slowly relinquishing their flavors, adding and mixing it with the purity of vodka to give birth to something new and beautiful.

On the fourth day, the sugar syrup was brewed by cooking the sugar and water together, adding the mixture to the lemons, but still, the limoncello was not ready yet. Finally on the fifth day, he strained the liquid and filled it in bottles to be put immediately in the freezer.

And after a mere couple of hours of more waiting in the soaring heat, we gave in to our daydreams, quenched our thirst and and drank ice cold yellow golden limoncello.

Life is good!