Easy family recipes - Elderflower Cordial with Maple Syrup

This week's family friendly recipe dates all the way back to Roman times!

 

Driving back from holiday recently, I couldn’t help noticing all the elderflower blooming by the roadside. It seems to be a bumper year!

This got me digging out my trustworthy recipe for homemade Elderflower Cordial with Maple Syrup. It’s a really simple activity to do with the kids and is a great way to teach them about sourcing food from nature. This is a lovely, light and refreshing drink with just a hint of caramel.


Traditional elderflower cordial recipes call for a massive amount of sugar. I’ve seen recipes which require 600g of sugar to product just 500ml of cordial. I might as well go ask the kids to gargle with cola!


So with this recipe I experimented with using maple syrup instead of processed sugar. Although maple syrup is still high in calories, nutritionists say it doesn't create that same blood-sugar spike that messes with our insulin levels that processed sugar does.

It also is said to benefit from having anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. When I read that this is also true of elderflower, it felt right that they should go together. It took three attempts to get the balance of flavours right but the result is just about perfect.


Do experiment with the ingredients to find the taste that’s right for you. You can dilute this with tap water; my kids loved this in fizzy water. As a lucky accident, I found this is also really very comforting for a sore throat when drunk warm straight from the pan.


Ingredients
20 elderflower heads
zest and juice of 1 - 2 unwaxed lemons (½ lemon per 500ml liquid)
maple syrup (6 Tbsp per 500ml liquid)


Method

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More recipes like this from Dawn Quest at Meals Our Kids Love here