Berry Good Lemonade

Berry Good Lemonade
26 January 2014

I always wanted to set up a lemonade stand when I was a kid. But Frankston in the early 80s wasn’t the place for entrepreneurial kids and their cute hand drawn signs. We had a few crazy neighbours, like the woman who took her budgie for a walk in its cage, in a pram. She also like to sit in her front garden in a wading pool on hot days. There was also the man at the end of the street who believed he was Elvis, I am sure he put black shoe polish in his hair and he always had a comb poking out of his back pocket. And the lady who sat at her front door just waiting to yell at us for riding our bikes in circles and making her dizzy. How good was the 80s childhood? Do kids do this anymore? Do they know their crazy neighbours and send the old ladies in the street batty with their outrageous circle work on their bikes?

Maya asked me yesterday if she could make a lemonade stand. I was stoked! Even though our street gets approximately 3 cars a day, I knew she was going to love it and it was a day spent outdoors playing.

It meant we got to do a few fun things together before she set off solo in to the scary world of retail.

We made lemonade.

And while we made lemonade, Maya told me the tricks she had up her sleeve to woo the traffic to her stand. Well there was only one, and that was a sign at the end of the street. But it was going to have big arrows, so it was going to work for sure. She also told me how she was excited about telling people about the lemonade (and elderflower cordial) she was selling. Telling them about where the fruit and flowers came from and how we had made the cordials together. She is very proud of knowing where her food is from, she takes a lot of pride in it.

Once the lemonade was cooling, we got a few things together to create a cute little roadside stand. Maya was in charge of sign writing.

Maya sat there for hours and made $2.70. She once had a flower stall and sat patiently waiting for a good 3 hours. Luckily she had company this time and we had thirsty house guests who were more than happy about the local store opening so close to home.

Berry Good Lemenade

What you need

• 1 cup of freshly squeezed lemon juice
• 1 lemon thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup caster sugar
• 2 cups water
• (sometimes we get fancy and put a splash of rosewater in, oh la la)
• bucket loads of ice, ice is the key to a rocking summer drink

What to do

1. Squeeze lemons until you have a cup of goodness.
2. Place the half cup of sugar in to a saucepan with the lemon juice.
3. Bring to the boil for about a minute.
4. Let cool.
5. Mix the water and the lemon syrup together (add water to taste if it is too strong).
6. Put in a pretty jug with lemons and tonnes of ice.
7. Voila! Drink.