Lilacs explode down my street each spring, providing a source of pillowy, fragrant blooms that not only look beautiful on my desk, they can be harvested by the handful and used to infuse all kinds of things in my kitchen, or fancy up anything from salads to puddings and cakes. You can’t get much more local, accessible and affordable. Here’s how to flavour just about anything with lilac.
Honey lilac ice creamJulie Van Rosendaal/The Globe and Mail
To make lilac syrup: it’s common to steep lilac flowers in water as if you were making tea, but a cold infusion has a slightly fresher flavour: collect a number of lilac flowers, cleanly pulled off the stems, and rub them in approximately half as much sugar, maintaining a flower/sugar ratio of 2:1. Let the mixture sit for an hour or so to macerate. Cover with about twice as much water and let stand, stirring occasionally, until the sugar dissolves, then strain.
To infuse cream or coconut milk with lilac (or other edible blooms): it can be done using the cold method above, noting it will take longer for the sugar to dissolve – you can use honey instead, or warm the flowers and cream (or coconut milk) until steaming, then let it steep as it cools. Strain and chill to use in ice cream or to whip and dollop over fruit crisps and pies.
To bake: You can blitz a handful of fresh flowers with sugar in a food processor before using in cookies, muffins, cakes or pies – the added moisture will give the sugar the consistency of wet sand.
To make a batch of lilac gin: Fill a bottle or jar with rinsed lilac blooms, add some sugar (about 1/4 cup for each 750 ml bottle, or to taste), and fill with gin. Shake, then tuck away for at least a few days, and up to a few months, tilting or gently shaking the bottle once in a while, when you think of it.
How We Eat: This tangy and tart rhubarb vinaigrette will liven up your spring salad
Honey Lilac Ice Cream
Any edible flower can be used to infuse cream to make ice cream – as they come into season, try peonies, which have a mild peachy flavour, rose, hibiscus or lavender – or a variety of florals for a flower garden in your ice cream bowl. (Feel free to use any ice cream recipe you like – just infuse the cream first.)
- handfuls of lilac flowers – as much as or more than the cream and milk
- 2 cups whipping cream or coconut milk
- 2 cups of milk (2 per cent or homogenized) or half-and-half, or any non-dairy milk
- 1/2 cup honey (or sugar)
Lightly rinse your lilac blooms and pull the flowers off into a saucepan. Add the cream and milk and heat until steaming. Remove from the heat and let cool in the saucepan, stirring in the honey or sugar at some point when it’s still warm – the heat will help it dissolve.
Let it cool completely, then pour through a sieve into a bowl, pressing on the flowers to extract as much moisture as you can. Refrigerate the sweet infused cream until it’s very cold, and then freeze in your ice-cream machine according to the manufacturer’s directions. (Alternatively, freeze in a shallow dish, removing from the freezer and stirring occasionally to break up ice crystals.) Makes about 1½ litres.
