Not yet a present – there is still time until Christmas!
If you liked the recipe for the pizza dough, you might have the time for a longer project – it’s worth the effort. To go with the Italian food, of course, you also need some “Sun of Sicily” to finish off – what could be better than a real limoncello?
Here’s a recipe for it – of course there’s much more possible with this base…have fun!
Ingredients
- 10 large, unsprayed Sorrento lemons (alternatively 20 conventional organic lemons)
- 2 litres Belvedere Vodka (alternatively a vodka of your choice or drinkable pharmacy alcohol)
- 8 litres of a good still mineral water (we simply used Perrier Sparkling and “shook out” the carbon dioxide beforehand)
- 1,8 Kg finely granulated white sugar
Expenditure
Preparation: 60 minutes
Maturing: 10 – 14 days
Follow-Up: 45 minutes
Equipment
- 1 measuring cup (up to 1L)
- 1 kitchen scale (up to 2Kg)
- 1 large glass bottle with 3 – 4 litre capacity with large opening
- A sharp paring knife or a ceramic peeler
- 1 bowl
- 1 stainless steel sieve
- 1 large stainless-steel bowl (3 litres capacity)
- 1 large stainless-steel pot (5-6 litres capacity)
- 1 stainless steel funnel
- 1 pot with 3 litres capacity
- 7 x 0.75 litre glass bottle for the final filling of the Limoncello
Preparation
- Pour the 2 litres of Belvedere Vodka (at room temperature) into the large glass bottle and close it
- Wash the lemons with cold water and dry them
- Now peel the lemons so that only the yellow, coloured part of the lemon peel (exocarp or flavedo) is removed. If you get some of the white fabric (mesocarp or also called albedo) underneath it, the limoncello becomes bitter and the work was in vain. So slowly and carefully!
- Cut the carefully cleaned peels into strips (only the yellow!) and add them to the Belvedere vodka in the large glass bottle and close it – now it becomes clear why the bottle needed a large opening!
- Place the bottle in a dark and cool place for 10 – 14 days (not in the refrigerator!)
- After the vodka has washed out the aromas and colourings from the lemon peels in around 2 weeks, the big bottle content must be put through the stainless-steel sieve into the big stainless-steel bowl. The remaining peelings can be used for other dishes, dried and grated, or used for compost. As a result, the Belvedere Vodka should now have a strong yellow colour.
- Now place the large pot on the stove and heat the 1.8 litres of good still mineral water in it. As soon as the temperature is high enough, gradually start to dissolve the 1.8 kg of fine sugar until no more sugar crystals are visible in the solution. Then let the finished solution cool down to room temperature.
- Now add the flavoured Belvedere Vodka slowly to the sugar solution while stirring, once everything is evenly mixed, the stainless-steel funnel is taken to fill the 0.75 litre bottles.
- As soon as this is done, the bottles can be put in the fridge. Of course, you can put one bottle in the freezer under “observation” to test the success immediately – because of the alcohol content it will not freeze at once. But be careful, if the limoncello has less than 40% alcohol – and this is the case when you were using the Belvedere Vodka (which itself had only 40% before mixing) it will freeze.
It depends on how cold your freezer is set – with an alcohol content of 34% the spirit will freeze at -18°C – everything with less percentage will freeze earlier of course. Only really high percentage is not affected, even a good vodka freezes pure at below 27°C. So, watch out for the first bottle and take it out of the cooler in time – or you got yourself 90% alcohol from the pharmacy to prepare it – then you have to calculate how much alcohol is left after mixing. But with the soft Belvedere version it’s more fun from our point of view – we want to enjoy and also taste all the delicious and natural flavours of the Sorrento lemons, don’t we?
The ideal drinking temperature for your limoncello is between 0° C and 4°C, so you don’t necessarily have to cool your limoncello down that much. It is important that you put enough “wet ” small glasses in the freezer in time. These will not break, but will get a nice layer of ice. This is where the limoncello is particularly good when served.
Of course, you can vary our recipe and try it with other basic alcohol, other citrus fruits – or even completely different fruits – basically it works surprisingly well, even good results with chocolate have been reported to us. So be creative or even conservative – our Limoncello was very tasty.
We hope you have fun “making liqueur” and surprise your friends at the next party with something homemade!