Celery soda
Per the directions, I did everything right, and the picture is quite nice, don’t you think? All that aside, this is an infusion that I’m not quite sure about. After you steep fresh celery, lemon peel, a little sugar, and celery seed in water, the syrup is strained and chilled, and combined with bubbly seltzer. The taste? If there’s a problem here it’s that I could barely detect any flavor at all. It tastes slightly sweet and I could smell the celery in the syrup, but I’m not quite sure it was worth the trouble. Taste is a subjective thing, so I might be the oddball.
Tonight, my plan is to combine it with a little vodka and club soda and see how it works in a cocktail!
One other note - I poured my celery syrup into a beautiful Galvanina Organic Soda bottle, a wonderful soda all on its own, and a bottle design worthy of a photograph.
Celery soda, recipe from Cooking Light magazine. If you try this recipe, let me know what you think.
Ingredients:
9 tablespoons sugar
1 1/2 cups water
3/4 teaspoon celery seed
4 celery stalks, finely chopped
1 lemon
Seltzer water
Directions:
Cut the rind off the lemon in thin strips. Combine sugar, water, celery seed, chopped celery, and the rind in a saucepan over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil, stirring until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and let concoction steep 1 hour. Strain syrup through cheesecloth and discard solids. Cool completely. Stir 4 teaspoons syrup into 1 cup (or more, depending on desired flavor) seltzer water. Store syrup chilled up to 2 weeks.