Homemade Lemonade

Well Y’all, It’s time for the Summer Sipping Drink Week to come to an end.

I showed you how to make our favorite Southern Sweet Tea, shared my favorite Homemade Limeade  and now I’m closing the week out with Homemade Lemonade!!

Lemonade is totally one of those drinks that I love on a hot day but dangit if it doesn’t make me even more thirsty! Does it do that to anyone else?

I love drinking lemonade but I feel like I need to follow each couple of sips of lemonade with a few sips of water. haha

But during the summer though, I’m getting lemonade at festivals, carnivals and pretzel shops! Yep, pretty much if lemonade is an option on the menu and it’s hot outside I’m going with it.

It’s just one of those “Summer Musts” for me!

I even remember having a little summer lemonade stand when I was little.  haha

Growing up, my neighbors always had yard sales, like all the time. I would set up my little lemonade stand (with the help up my dad) at the edge of our year and sell my lemonade and little debbie snacks to the little old ladies and kids that stopped by to look through the items laid out in the driveway.

My dad said it would help me learn about money and well I was all about getting more money haha.

I remember being somewhere around 6 years old one year and this lady came up to my lemonade stand and refused to pay me 25 cents for a cup of lemonade but was demanding that I give her son a cup of lemonade because he was whining for it.  Yes a grown woman was bullying a 6 year old for free lemonade.

I remember running inside to get my dad and he came out and turned into an “old grumpy man” and was pretty much like “y’all get off my lawn, ya cheapskates” haha.

Oh memories… bahahahaha

But yeah, Lemonade. Back to making lemonade.

Back then I just made my lemonade with water and lemonade concentrate that use to come in the can from the freezer section!

That kind is still fantastic haha but I’ve stepped up my game just a tad and I’ve been working on making Homemade Lemonade. 🙂 Like totally homemade.

So let me tell you a few things real quick before we get onto the recipe.

• Don’t leave the lemon slices in this lemonade when you store it IF you’re going to be storing it for more than a few hours. It makes it REALLY strong and I can’t handle it like that haha. 

• Adjust the sugar to your taste. I like 1 to 1.5 cups of sugar because I want more lemon tang. Big Bear wants 2 cups of sugar in his! 

• If you add the cup or so of sugar and want to add more, don’t just pour the sugar into the cold lemonade. It won’t dissolve.  Take some of the lemonade  and pour it into a cup and heat it in the microwave (or on the stove) and then stir your sugar unto the hot lemonade until dissolves and then stir that back into the large pitcher of lemonade.

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Homemade Lemonade
By: Angie Barrett – BigBearsWife.com

6/6/15                                                                     (Click to Print)

Makes 6-8 glasses of Homemade Lemonade 
                                            

Ingredients 

2 cups white sugar, we use Dixie Crystals white sugar for our Lemonade
4 cups hot water
5 cups cold water
1 cup lemon juice
Ice (about 1-2 trays of ice)
1-2 lemons to slice and place into the pitcher or glasses

Directions 

Stir the sugar into the hot water and stir until sugar is dissolved.

Add in the cold water and lemon juice. Stir.

Add ice.

Slice one or two lemons and add the slices to the pitcher.

Chill until read to serve.

• Don’t leave the lemon slices in this lemonade when you store it IF you’re going to be storing it for more than a few hours. It makes it REALLY strong and I can’t handle it like that haha. 

• Adjust the sugar to your taste. I like 1 to 1.5 cups of sugar because I want more lemon tang. Big Bear wants 2 cups of sugar in his! 

• If you add the cup or so of sugar and want to add more, don’t just pour the sugar into the cold lemonade. It won’t dissolve.  Take some of the lemonade  and pour it into a cup and heat it in the microwave (or on the stove) and then stir your sugar unto the hot lemonade until dissolves and then stir that back into the large pitcher of lemonade.