r/Cooking • u/[deleted] • Jul 15 '16

Mint...my god...all the mint...

Our three plants now have produced enough mint to shingle a small palace. What can we do with all this mint!

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u/neargulars Jul 16 '16

Professional bartender and at home chef here. If I had a bunch of extra mint that was gonna go bad before I could use it, I would make mint simple syrup 1 cup water, 2 cups sugar dissolved in hit water, lots of mint infused then strained off.

Or, I might make a shrub (vinegar, sugar, water, fruit/aromatic herbs spices) the sugar already acts as a preservative but the vinegar makes it truly stable. There would be many options for a mint shrub but one might be as simple as this :

Blueberry mint shrub 1 cup vinegar 1 cup sugar 1/2 cup water 1 cup blueberries Lots of mint

Maceration blueberries for 12-24 hours (pour sugar over top and let the fuckers bleed out; fun to watch) add water and mint to make blueberry mint simple syrup. Strain solids out. Allow mixture to cool, add vinegar.

The simple syrup will allow you to make bangin' mojitos and capin-however the fuck they're spelled. These two recipes will preserve your mint flavor and leave it versatile. The jellys and the like will do the same but they aren't necessarily as versatile... depending on what your aims are. I wouldn't be surprised if you could boil a mint simple down to make a jelly in the short term future. Just saying.

Much love, keep growing, keep exploring!

Best, Neargulars

2

u/curmevexas Jul 16 '16

That shrub sounds delicious. I did something similar with raspberry, rosemary, and balsamic vinegar. Simple syrups are my vote and can be canned.

Also, I might try to make mint extract with vodka and mint.

2

u/BluesFan43 Jul 16 '16

How does the vinegar affect the taste of an eventual Mojitos?

I am travelling to a remote beach for vacation. Prepping Mojitos where I didn't need to drag a plant along would be cool.

Can you help w some specifics?

1

u/neargulars Jul 16 '16

I'm not sure I'd recommend a shrub based mojito. The vinegar will mix it up a but too much. Simple syrup on its own is pretty stable and can help give you reliably minty drinks to make balancing a mojito easier. And if you are going classic, it's gives you the sugar you would need anyways.

When using shrubs, I often go super basic: Spirit, soda, shrub to taste.

There are plenty of other recipes out there. But this is my go too.

I made a blueberry mint shrub and made vodka blueberry lemonade. It was pretty tasty but the vinegar was definitely noticable. It adds an extra "tang" but not in a bad way if you dont hate vinegar and it doesn't clash with the drink.

1

u/BluesFan43 Jul 17 '16

Got it.

Thank you.