Ingredients

Simple recipe to make Grenadine Syrup

Grenadine

Sometimes it’s good to cheat…

Flavoured syrups are a useful component to cocktails as they allow us to add flavour at the same time as adding the sugar that is necessary in many drinks to achieve sweet:sour balance.

Unfortunately mass production and efforts to achieve economies of scale may be good for many of the big-brand syrup producer’s bottom lines but they have had a pretty negative effect on the quality of many of the products that reach the market. Spinning around to the ingredients list on a syrup bottle you’re more likely to find a long list of artificial flavours, colours, preservatives and other E numbers than anything resembling a simple combination of sugar, water and authentic flavouring. Grenadine is no exception.

Originally made from pomegranates, modern store bought Grenadine is usually a bright red, artificial ‘red berry’ flavoured syrup sweetened with high fructose corn syrup and is commonly used to provide a berry flavour without the alcohol of berry shrubs or liqueurs.

If we are going to make Grenadine to use at home then we want the original, proper pomegranate flavour; we could use real pomegranates but instead we are going to cheat and use pomegranate juice – its quick, easy, and still gives us the real fruity flavour we’re after.

The “Cheaters” Grenadine Syrup Recipe

What you need

  • Pomegranate juice (we see note below)
  • Fine sugar

Method

Very quick and easy; to make the Grenadine all you need to do is mix equal amounts of the Pomegranate juice and fine sugar in a bowl until the mixture is completely dissolved. Once the mixture has dissolved you can transfer the syrup into a bottle and store it in the refrigerator until you’re ready to use it. It really is that easy!

Sugar
Sugar

.

Followed by juice...
Followed by juice…
then Stir! Stir! Stir!
then Stir! Stir! Stir!
The finished product - Grenadine
The finished product – Grenadine

Note:

The key to making sure you make good grenadine this way is to ensure that you are using pure pomegranate juice – you want to make sure that the juice is 100% pomegranate juice so make sure you get a decent product like POM Wonderful. It’s worth paying a little more for a much better flavour.

3 Comments

  1. Have a recipe for “roses” lime juice? My local stores quit carrying Rose’s lime juice

  2. Fine, if you can get 100% pomegranate juice. I couldn’t and everything I found was adulterated with grape juice or other berry fruits. Does it matter? I think it does a bit. Anyway I now grow my own pomegranates. Breaking out and juicing the fleshy seeds, called arils, is not difficult or particularly time-consuming.

  3. I would recommend simmering the syrup for 20-40 minutes until reduced by half (i.e. 2 cups become 1 cup). Then stirring in an equal amount of sugar (1c reduced juice with 1c sugar). The flavor is more intense and you can use less; this maintains the integrity of your cocktail. Indeed, this approach can be used for almost any juice such as cherry or apple cider (great in winter cocktails). Consider using maple syrup (already reduced prior to bottling) in a whiskey sour next fall!

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