Another non-drinker here. I tend to go for fancy cordials - I have made my own in the past but they've always gone off before I could drink them up. But our local supermarket has an OK selection: elderflower, ginger, apple and pear, sometimes rhubarb or blackberry. You can make them up plain or with sparkling or tonic water and serve in a big jug with ice and some mint or lemon slices or whatever goes. I guess you could serve them hot in winter too. Best thing is they're very concentrated so much better value for money than pre-mixed presses or the like!
In the US, a cordial is a liqueur, haha. As you are in the UK it is...concentrated fruit juice? I get tripped up by the shifts between US and UK English. Would you be able to freeze your homemade cordials to keep them good longer, or would that ruin the flavor? They sound delicious.
Whattt?? You crazy people! Yes, cordial is kind of like posh squash. Like Ribena for grown ups. You basically concentrate fruit juice and sugar and a bit of preservative (like lemon juice or citric acid from the chemist) and then dilute it between 6:1 and 10:1 depending on what you've ended up with.
I did freeze an elderflower cordial once, and it came out of the freezer kind of funny, but I think it had probably turned before it went in. We don't have a garden these days and not much kitchen space so I've not given it much thought, but it's something I ought to restart when we move.
Haha, you are killing me! (But +1 for rhyming!) The US only uses the term "squash" to refer to gourds, and I had to look up "Ribena."
Another translation for US people: In the UK, a "chemist" is short for "dispensing chemist," a pharmacist, not someone whose job it is to play with chemicals and try to invent a better plastic or a new artificial flavor.
But thank you for the instructions. That sounds like it would make for some interesting beverages.
We use "squash" to refer to those pumpkiny-vegetabley things too. And do you honestly not have Ribena over there?? I thought that was a surefire winner! So do you just not have cordial in the US, or do you call it something else?
Definitely no Ribena over here. I'm pretty sure we just don't have cordial at all? I mean, we have very sugary fruit juice blends, I'm guessing it's something like that. And we have cordial cherries, but those are like... cherries inside goo inside chocolate. It's a candy.
Here are two typical recipes:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/jun/01/make-your-own-blackcurrant-cordial
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/sep/12/how-to-make-blackberry-star-anise-cordial-recipe
I'd really recommend making your own if there isn't any equivalent in American shops! It will seem even fancier if it's a "special English recipe". :)
So, I don't think I've ever had blackcurrants in my life, but they sound good. :)
Most juices in America are sold at the concentration intended for drinking. You can purchase frozen orange juice and lemonade concentrate in cardboard cans, but I think those are the only juices sold that way (and you have to make up the entire can at once). There is a company called Schwann's that delivers primarily frozen, primarily fancier foods that used to sell non-frozen little cardboard cartons (such as for children's milk at school) of juice concentrate in flavors such as apple cherry berry, but I don't think that is one of their products any longer, and it was intended as a beverage for children. I think the market died down when the press for 100% juice got strong, instead of the 5% or so that such concentrates give.
If we have any equivalent to UK squash, which I doubt, we would just call it juice concentrate. Here, nonstandard fruit juices (anything but orange, grapefruit, and maybe tomato in Bloody Mary drinks) are really considered a child's drink, unless it is one of those super-fancy onces like Bolthouse Farms juice or Naked juice. We also would tend to just reconstitute with normal water instead of sparkling/carbonated water.
I could be missing something, though. The US is a rather large country, and I've only lived in one corner of it.
And I too will have to try those fancy, English drinks. :)