Cordial, shrub,
or something else

The fork in the road, in the stillroom, is hot or cold.

Most things are hot.

A cordial.

Water, sugar, & whatever the fruit or flower or leaf is. Brought up to a gentle simmer for long enough to draw the flavour out.

The sugar does the holding (preserving the colour, the scent, the body of the thing).

Once it's strained & bottled, a cordial lives in the fridge after opening and keeps a few weeks.

Lovely with sparkling water, with gin, with prosecco. Sometimes stirred into yoghurt or spooned over ice cream.

A shrub.

Goes the other way. No heat.

Apple cider vinegar, sugar, & the leaf or fruit. Left to sit, cold, for a few days while the vinegar pulls the flavour out the slow way.

It comes out sharper than a cordial. Brighter, with a tartness behind the sweetness. More useful in the kitchen than a cordial is.

A teaspoon stirred into plain yoghurt. A spoonful in a salad dressing. A glass with sparkling water on a hot day. Or, best of all, drizzled over roasted things straight out of the oven.

Shrubs keep longer than cordials, because the vinegar does the work the cold can't. A bottle will last months without refrigeration. Years sometimes.

They're an older preserving tradition (going back centuries), quietly making their way back into kitchens now.

When to reach for which.

A cordial when you want the soft side of a flavour. Roses, lavender, honey, quince. The things that ask to be sweetened.

Cordials are for cocktails, for celebrations, for desserts. The bottle that lives on the dinner table.

A shrub when you want sharpness. Strawberry leaf, mint, herbs, things that need an edge to hold them up.

Shrubs are for cooking with as much as drinking. The bottle that lives in the kitchen.

There are other things, too. Tinctures, syrups, oxymels, vinegars infused for the salad bowl rather than the glass.

They come and go in the stillroom as the season suggests.

For now, though, mostly cordials. One shrub.

And whatever the leaves whisper to me next.

Browse what's currently in the stillroom