House Sour Mix
Ingredients
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 cup water
- 1 cup lemon juice (roughly 5-6 lemons)
- 3/4 cup lime juice (roughly 6-8 limes)
Directions
- Make simple syrup by combining the sugar and water in a small saucepan on the stove. Cook, stirring frequently, until not quite at a boil and remove from heat once sugar is completely dissolved. Let cool to room temperature.
- If you already have simple syrup on hand, skip the first step and use 1⅓ cups of simple syrup
- Combine simple syrup, lemon juice and lime juice. Now it's ready to mix!
Nothing beats fresh squeeze house sour mix when it comes to cocktails. This will blow the liquor store sweet and sour mix out of the water! If you’d don’t have time to freshly squeeze the citrus you can substitute with bottle juices. Instead of grabbing the small concentrated bottles in the produce section of the grocery store, reach for 100% juice in the juice/soft drink aisle. Of course, nothing beats freshly squeezed.
Start by making simple syrup with sugar and water. It’s best if it’s cooled to room temperature before mixing with juice. If you already have simple syrup on hand, skip this step and use 1⅓ cups of syrup. Then proceed to juice your lemons and limes. If you have a juicer, even better! But make sure to peel the fruit before juicing otherwise you’ll get a lot of bitterness from incorporating the pith. Finally, combine your simple syrup, lemon juice and lime juice then you’re ready to go!
I like to have house sour mix on hand to use in most of my cocktails, especially margaritas! I think having sour mix on hand is a leftover habit from tending bar and needing to be able to make large quantities of cocktails in a short amount of time, but even at home it’s not only a time saver but much less messy to have mix in the fridge instead of juicing fresh for each drink.