Mango Lemonade

A good refreshing and chilled summer drink is what I love best about summers. I love trying out the new summer drinks that the local coffee shops and juice shops comes up with during summer and I try them all. Manish loves chilled drinks, specially with lots of crushed ice in them. I prefer with less ice, but whichever way it's served, my lil'Appu can gulp them all down ;-) We are a bunch of juice lovers in the house.

Lemonade tops the chart of all our favorite summer drinks. Who doesn't love Lemonade?
I love sweet lemonade, Manish doesn't mind the salty version either. Lemonade brings back so many memories of my college days when on hot and humid days after class, my friends and I would go down to the college canteen and drinks glass after glass of sweetened cold lemonade. It was bliss and we could literally feel the cool drink pass down our throat! 
The first time when Manish and I met also we had a lemonade, so you see it brings back romantic memories as well...have I shared too much? Lol!! ;-) 

Another summer item I'm crazy about are mangoes. I've lots count of how many mangoes we've eaten this summer and I love to see my lil'Appu literally relish it. I have been wanting to try a Mango Lemonade from long and finally decided to make it for lil'Appu's 3 rd birthday party. I made a small batch just enough for myself and Manish and we loved it.

It's so vividly beautiful with that bright sunshine yellow color that the mango pulp imparts to the lemonade and it's sweet yet still very mildly lemony and tart. This lemonade will literally make your tastebuds flow and is so refreshing. It's a perfect summer drink and a pretty one too ;-) 

I don't really measure when I  make lemonade, I just keep adding lemon juice, water and sugar syrup until the taste is just right for me. But I've tried to approximate it to the best I can for this recipe. Feel free to adjust it as per taste.
I like to make a simple sugar syrup while making any fruit drinks. It makes sure there are no undissolved sugar crystals in your drink and any leftovers can be refrigerated and used later on for another drink. 
I often flavor the sugar syrup with either vanilla, mint or orange/lemon rinds for a mild yet pleasant flavor which is imparted to the main drink.

Mango Lemonade

You'll need

2 cups  fresh Lemon juice 

2 cups Mango pulp

6 cups Water

2 cups simple Sugar syrup

Plenty of Ice

Raspberries and Mint leaves for garnish

For sugar syrup

2 cups sugar

2 cups water

1 tsp pure vanilla extract

Directions

Make simple sugar syrup

In a saucepan, add sugar and water and heat it until sugar completely dissolves. Add vanilla extract and turn off the heat. Allow the sugar syrup to cool.

Mango Lemonade

In a large pitcher, pour the fresh squeezed lemon juice, mango pulp and water.

Add 1 cup sugar syrup and mix well. Stir well and refrigerate for few hours. 
(Taste and add more sugar syrup if needed else more lemon juice/water)

Before serving add ice, garnish with raspberries and mint leaves and serve chilled!

Notes

1.  I've used store-bought sweetened Mango pulp (Swad brand), so I didn't have to use too much sugar syrup as the drink was sweet enough to my taste.

2.  If using fresh mangoes, then peel the mango, scoop out the flesh, grind it into a pulp along with the lemon juice. Strain and add the remaining ingredients. In this case you may need more sugar syrup to balance the sweetness depending upon how sweet the mango is.
3. Try adding sparkling water or club soda for a fizzy drink ;-)
4. You can also add mango cubes in the lemonade along with raspberries. 

I have also made mango lemonade with mint flavored sugar syrup and that tastes awesome too. Add handful of fresh mint leaves while making the sugar syrup and remove the leaves . Use this syrup while making the lemonade.  The aroma and subtle flavor of mint definitely adds a boost of flavor to the lemonade.

For Appu's 3rd b'day party I made a punch  topping the lemonade with some raspberries and ice in a punch bowl. And to go along with the Dino theme, I named it Active Volcano Punch! It was a crowd pleaser and got over so fast, I had to make it again twice during the course of the party. It looked pretty and tasted refreshing and both kids and adults enjoyed it!

I'm sure you'll love this Mango Lemonade as mush as how we do. Try it out and let me also know how you liked it :-)

-Manju