The quality of the culinary experiments happening in my friends' kitchens is more than a bit intimidating.

There was the rhubarb and ginger simple syrup that made me love gin. (gin + me = an unnatural pairing)

And the peony syrup that made my head swoon.

So when friends pointed out the abundance of sage blossoms in a neglected corner of my garden, I was super excited for the opportunity to keep up with the cool kids!

I used this really well written post on making flower jelly as my jumping off point.

45 minutes of flower picking and sorting later, I poured boiling water over all of those little purple flowers and immediately killed all of the pretty. It was okay though, Joe warned me that would happen in his post.

The next morning (more than 12 hours later), I strained the liquid into a sauce pan. While my sage blossom tea was coming to a boil, all impurities and scum were skimmed off.

Lemon juice and sugar were added. Once the sugar dissolved, I strained the syrup (twice) into sterilized jars and refrigerated. (I didn't seal the jars because I was eager to share with friends.)

Quantities, you ask?

1 Jeni's container of sorted, cleaned flowers from 2 overgrown sage plants (about 2 cups)

The remaining water from 1 heavily used teapot (about 4 cups of water)

The juice of 1 lemon

1 scoop of sugar in the only clean container I could find in a hurry (about 1 cup)

This was obviously not a measured experiment. I was prepared to add more water or sugar as necessary to get a light simple syrup with floral notes but it turned out just right on the first pass. And while the syrup was tasty enough for me to quit tinkering quickly, it was dramatically more enjoyable once it was cold.

Oh! I couldn't find the sharpies that I am always hiding from little hands so I "labelled" this jar by putting one small sprig of sage inside. Once I found a sharpie, I removed the sage and wrote something completely illegible on the lid. We all have our way, I suppose.

UPDATE: The sage blossom syrup is being used!

UPDATE: This is a big hit with the kiddos and adults in lemonade.