Chestnut Free Garden Lemon Ginger Cooler
This bright, garden-fresh drink is the kind of thing you want in your hand on a warm afternoon — zingy with fresh lemon, cooling from cucumber and mint, and gently spiced with real ginger. The base gets its sweetness from a quick maple syrup simple syrup that you steep with sliced ginger until it turns fragrant and bold, which means no refined sugar and no mystery additives. Muddling the cucumber and mint in the pitcher releases just enough of their natural oils to make every sip feel like it came from a fancy spa menu. A splash of sparkling water at the end keeps things lively and effervescent without overpowering the delicate herbal notes. Every single ingredient here is naturally free from tree nuts of any kind, so there's no label-scanning or cross-contact anxiety to worry about. It's an easy, crowd-pleasing pour that works just as well for a backyard gathering as it does for a quiet solo treat.
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Learn more →Ingredients
4 servings
For the ginger simple syrup
- ½ cup water
- ½ cup maple syrup
- 2 tbsp fresh ginger, peeled and thinly sliced
For the cooler
- ¾ cup fresh lemon juice (from about 4–5 lemons)
- ½ medium english cucumber, thinly sliced
- ¼ cup fresh mint leaves, lightly packed
- 2 cups cold water
- 2 cups sparkling water, chilled
For serving
- 2 cups ice cubes
- 4 lemon slices (optional)
- 4 fresh mint sprigs (optional)
Instructions
- 1
Combine the 1/2 cup water, maple syrup, and sliced ginger in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring until the maple syrup dissolves. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook for 3 minutes, until the syrup is fragrant and the ginger has softened slightly.
- 2
Remove the saucepan from the heat and let the ginger syrup steep for 15 minutes, until the ginger flavor is pronounced. Strain through a fine-mesh strainer into a small bowl or measuring cup, pressing the ginger slices to extract as much liquid as possible; discard the solids.
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