Hot Lemon Grog
Grog is water, rum, sugar and lemon, and the whole recipe comes down to when the rum goes in. Add it to a boiling base and the alcohol leaves within minutes, taking the caramel and vanilla notes you bought dark rum for with it. What remains is sweet spiced water.
- Prep
- 5 min
- Cook
- 10 min
- Rest
- 5 min
- Total
- 20 min
- Servings
- 2
- Level
- Easy
- Per serving
- 230 kcal
Ingredients
Makes: 500 ml, 2 mugs
Shopping list
The ingredients for the servings you chose — copy them or send them to a messenger. Tick what you already have at home: only the rest goes on the list.
Method
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Step 1: Peel the zest
Take wide strips of yellow peel off the lemon with a vegetable peeler, leaving the white pith behind — the pith is what turns things bitter. Squeeze the juice separately.
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Step 2: Simmer the spiced base
Combine water, sugar, zest, cinnamon, cloves and ginger, bring to the boil and simmer gently for 8 minutes. Boiling is right here: the sugar has to dissolve and the peel has to give up its oil.
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Step 3: Let it infuse
Off the heat, cover and leave for 5 minutes. The base deepens and the temperature drops to roughly 75 °C.
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Step 4: Wait for 70 °C
The base should steam but not hiss. Pour rum into anything hotter and you lose both the strength and the rum character you paid for.
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Step 5: Add rum and juice
Take the pan off the hob for good, pour in the rum and the juice of half the lemon, and stir. It must not go back on the heat.
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Step 6: Serve
Strain into warmed thick-walled mugs and add a lemon slice and a cinnamon stick to each. Taste it — grog usually wants more acid than you expect.
Tips & variations
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Tip
Barrel-aged dark rum brings caramel and vanilla; white rum brings only alcohol. For grog that difference decides the drink.
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Swap
Brandy in place of rum gives a classic winter toddy with a drier character. The proportions stay the same.
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Variation
Alcohol-free grog: swap the rum for 100 ml of strong black tea and a few drops of vanilla extract. Not the same drink, but an honest and good one.
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Storage
The rum-free spiced base keeps 5 days in the fridge, which turns grog into a three-minute job. The finished drink is not kept.
Nutrition
| 1 serving | Whole dish 2 servings | |
|---|---|---|
| Energy | 230 kcal | 460 kcal |
| Protein | 0 g | 0 g |
| Fat | 0 g | 0 g |
| Carbohydrates | 22 g | 44 g |
Approximate values calculated from standard ingredient data.
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