Raspberry-mint lime rickey

Versatile fruit syrup makes for tasty drinks!

Cocktails and mocktails made with real fruit juice always taste so delicious. I like to make many batches of different kinds of fruit syrup during the summer – they freeze beautifully and can help bring a little sunshine and warmth into the colder months of the year. The combination of raspberry and mint makes a really fantastic syrup; note that it’s best made a day or two before you want to start mixing drinks so it will be chilled. Using a contrasting but complementary fruit to garnish – in this case, blackberries – gives this updated version of a classic cocktail an extra visual appeal.

Ingredients

For the raspberry-mint simple syrup:

• 12 ounces (340 grams) fresh or frozen raspberries
• 1 cup (250 mL) tightly packed fresh mint leaves
• 1/2 cup (125 mL) sugar
• 1/2 cup (125 mL) water

For the cocktail:

• 1.5 ounces (45 mL) raspberry-mint syrup
• 1.5 ounces (45 mL) Premium gin (I like Ungava)
• 1 ounce (30 mL) freshly squeezed lime juice
• lime wedge
• 4 ice cubes
• soda water
• blackberries (or raspberries) to garnish

Method

• Combine raspberries, mint leaves and sugar in a medium saucepan. Stir well and let sit, covered, for 6 – 12 hours to macerate and draw juice out of the fruit.
• Add water and bring to a boil then reduce heat to low.
• Simmer, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes.
• Let sit, covered, for 10 minutes then strain through a fine sieve, pressing down on solids to extract as much juice as possible.
• Refrigerate in a tightly-covered jar until ready to use. Keeps in fridge for up to 2 weeks.
• To create a cocktail, put syrup, gin, lime juice and lime wedge in a highball (tall) glass.
• Add cubes and top with soda water. Garnish with berries.
• To make a mocktail, simply omit the gin!

Makes 1 cocktail.