Home-made Kala khatta lemonade

Summer is officially here and I come bearing the most amazing and refreshing lemonade!

Home-made Kala khatta lemonade which is as delicious as easy it is to make. It's a delicious mix of black grape juice, sugar, lemon mint and hint of spices. Its sweet, tangy, pretty, super easy and ice-cold- it's the perfect drink for onset of summer.

Gone is the time of soups, all I want in summer is refreshing drinks to keep myself hydrated. This kala khatta lemonade has become my new favourite drink and I am pretty sure that kids are going to love it too. It would make the perfect welcome drink too when you have people over.

We all have grown up eating baraf golas in summer and kala khatta has always been the most popular flavour to drizzle upon the golas. This lemonade is inspired from my childhood memories and I was ecstatic when it turned out good, even better if I must stay.

It starts with reducing black grape juice and sugar together along with some citric acid which maintains the beautiful and vibrant pink colour of the grape juice. Once the grape juice reduces down sightly, it's cooled and strained and then just mixed with water to make lemonade. It's as simple as that! Since black grapes are sweet on their own, I have added lesser sugar so this home-made syrup is much better than the store-bought ones which are loaded with sugar. You can even replace sugar with honey if you like.

I can't tell you how amazing this lemonade tastes! Black grape juice gets concentrated due to reduction and tastes extremely fruity with right balance of sweet and sour. Bruise some mint and lemon along with spices before serving in a glass and you will get the most delicious lemonade you have ever made. You really gotta try it to believe what I am saying!

Home-made kala khatta lemonade- fruity, pretty, delicious and ice-cold drink!

Diet: Vegetarian
Type: Drink
Serving: 3-4 glasses

Ingredients

1+1/2 cup fresh black grape juice- strained
1/4th cup sugar
1/2 Tsp citric acid
1 Tsp roasted cumin powder
Black salt- to taste
Salt to taste
Few mint leaves
Few lemon wedges

Method

Start by adding black grape juice. sugar and citric acid in a pot and cooking it on medium heat.

Once the juice starts cooking, you will notice some impurities arising. Discard with the help of spoon.

When juice reduces to 1 cup approximately, turn off gas and leave it aside to cool down in its own.

Strain the syrup and keep aside.( You can even make a bigger batch of the syrup and store it in plastic container in freezer for months)

To make the lemonade, run lemon wedge around the rim of glass and coat in pink salt+ cumin powder mixture.

Next, add few mint leaves along with lemon wedge, cumin powder, salt and pink salt and muddle together.

Now pour kala khatta syrup in the glass and top with ice-cold water/soda and serve. Add 1 part of kala khatta syrup to 4 parts of water).