Brazilian Lemonade
Ingredients
- 2 large limes, thin skinned (see note)
- 2 cups water
- 1 cup cold water
- ½ cup sugar
- 4 tablespoons sweetened condensed milk
- Ice
Instructions
- Cut the limes in half and squeeze out the juice. You should have approximately 1/2 cup juice. Keep the rinds and set the juice aside.
- In a blender, combine the juiced rinds with 2 cups of water. Blend for one minute until the mixture is coarsely mixed and frothy (if you make this start to finish and feel the mixture is too bitter, try only blending this part for 30 seconds or 10-12 pulses). Strain the mixture through a fine-mesh strainer set over a liquid measuring cup or bowl, pressing on the solids to extract all the juice. You should have about 3/4 cup liquid, more or less. Stir in the reserved lime juice. (You can go ahead and discard the pulp in the strainer.)
- To the blender, add the cold water, sugar, lime juice mixture, and sweetened condensed milk. Blend for 10-20 seconds. Add ice as desired: I added probably about 2-3 cups of ice - enough to make it cool and frosty but not thick like a smoothie. Blend until smooth. Add more sweetened condensed milk or sugar to taste, if needed. Serve immediately.
Notes
Halving the Recipe: this recipe can easily be halved!
Limes: large, juicy limes with thin skin are important here, otherwise the bitter taste of the lime rind will come through. So avoid those limes with bumpy, thick skin. To be safe, I'd buy 3 limes so in case they aren't as juicy as you think you can supplement the 1/2 cup juice with the 3rd lime (but don't blend up the rind of the 3rd lime if you have to get the juice out of it).
Sweetened Condensed Milk: you can add more sweetened condensed milk depending on how sweet and creamy you want the drink to be.
Serving: also, this drink doesn't fare well being made ahead but the beauty is it is so quick to make, you can make it right when you want to serve it!