Making Limoncello

I made myself a promise that I'd make an effort to start trying new things - to broaden my horizons, and generally enrich my life - so when recently invited by my friend Julie to make limoncello with her, I jumped at the chance. Limoncello is an Italian liqueur made primarily of lemons, sugar, and Everclear,that many Italians make around the holidays. My friend Julie is Italian, and lived in Italy until she was 6. I wanted to take photos of HER making the limoncello, but she was camera shy.

So, today was Day One of our limoncello making.

We began by rinsing about 90 organic meyer lemons, drying them off, and setting them in a big bowl.



Next we got our zesters out, and we each zested about 30 lemons. We used 15 lemons per batch of limoncello, so it will yield about 6 batches.




After each batch of 15 lemons, we scraped the zest into a big jar, then added two bottles of Everclear to each jar. We shook up the mixture and covered it. The zest will marinate in the Everclear for 2 weeks. Then we will add the milk and sugar to make the Limoncello Crema. Stay tuned for part 2 in 2 weeks!




Thanks to Julie for teaching me to make limoncello, and to Julie's friend Amantha for so generously letting us use the lemons from her tree, and make the limoncello at her house!