Raspberry Lemonade

Raspberry Lemonade.  Totally my favorite kind of lemonade.  Not the cheap-o minute maid stuff called "pink lemonade", but the actual, freshly squeezed, made with real fruit raspberry lemonade.  I get really excited when I see that certain restaurants sell it.  I have not found the same case to be true of grocery stores though, except for maybe SimplyLemonade's version of pink lemonade.  That stuff is pretty good.  It's just missing the little pieces of lemon pulp and raspberry seeds that didn't get caught by the sieve.

I decided to give a homemade version of this a try, since it didn't seem like it would be very difficult.  It was not.  It was actually very fun and very delicious.  I like my lemonade pretty tart, so I used a few more lemons than average.  

You need to make this.  Drink it on a bright sunny day while working on your garden.  That's what I did and it was delightful.  

Raspberry Lemonade

10 whole lemons (depending on how tart you like your lemonade, I think I used about 12)

2 pints of fresh raspberries

1 1/2 cup sugar (more or less to taste)

6 cups water

Slice all the lemons in half.  Put the lemon halves and raspberries in a very large pot or bowl (Pot with a flat bottom works best).  Mash down the lemon halves and raspberries with a large spoon or spatula, extracting as much juices from the fruits as you can.  This takes some work, but it's fun and totally worth it!  Do it for about 10 minutes or so, until the fruit looks like it cannot take anymore.  Stir in the water.  Pour through a sieve into a large bowl/pitcher.  Give the fruit a few last good pounds and pushes to get out some more juice.  Discard (or eat what you can) the solids.  Add the sugar to taste and serve over ice!