Limoncello, lemon’s sweet digestive

Many Italians have sipped with friends after dinner, during hot spring or summer nights, a glass of limoncello.
When we think about it we feel of being in the Amalfi Coast and Sorrento, that beautiful part of the peninsula where every street corner smells about lemons. What a place, blessed from God.
There are several stories about the origin of this delicious liqueur. Somebody says that is born with fishermen and farmers who used to drink a shot early in the morning to warm up. Others say that the recipe has its origin inside a monastic convent to delight the monks during the time betweenprayers. Probably the most real one is that it’s born at the beginning of the 20th century in Capri, from lady Maria Antonia Farace. She had a garden with lemons and oranges and she invented her own limoncello. Her grandson, after World War II, opened a restaurant and guess what, the specialty was a lemon liqueur made using his grandma’s recipe. The lemon skin is the most important ingredient, rich of essential oils, fragrant, with a strong aroma. One version, more sophisticated and sweeter, it’s the limoncello cream, basically limoncello to which is added milk cream. If you want to make it home just be patient,follow my recipe and wait until gets ready.

Limoncello recipe:
8 organic lemons
½ lt. of alcohol
600 gr. of sugar
750 ml of water
Wash the lemons with water and brush them to remove any reside of dirt or wax. Remove the skin from the lemons with a sharp peeler, carefully avoiding the bitter white pith. If any white pith remains on the back of a strip of peel, scrape it off. If you get any of the white part, Limoncello will be too bitter. Put all the alcohol in a big glass jar with a sealed lid. Add lemon zest.Leave the jar to steep in a cool, dark place for one month. After that heat the water in a big saucepan with sugar until sugar dissolves and let it cool down. Once cold add the syrup to the lemon zest and alcohol and let it rest in a dark and dry place one more month. Remove all the zest, filter and put the liqueur in clean bottles, seal tightly and keep it in the freezer.

Limoncello cream recipe:
6 organic lemons
½ lt. ofalcohol
1 lt. of skim milk (if you like it less strong, add more milk, like 1,250 lt.)
1 Kg. of sugar
vanilla (powder or extract)
Wash the lemons with water and brush them to remove any reside of dirt or wax. Remove the skin from the lemons with a sharp peeler, carefully avoiding the bitter white pith. If any white pith remains on the back of a strip of peel, scrape it off. If you get any of the white part, Limoncello cream will be too bitter. Put all the alcohol in a big glass jar with a sealed lid. Add lemon zest.Leave the jar in a cool and dark place for 2 weeks.Heat the milk in a big saucepan, add vanilla, stir, and let it cool for a couple of hours.Add the sugar to the milk and vanilla and heat it again on the stove to completely melt the sugar (just a few minutes).Let the mix cool and put it in the fridge overnight to make sure it’s really cold. Strain out the lemon peels and keep the alcohol. Add the flavored alcohol to the cold milk mix and stir. Put the liqueur in clean bottles, seal tightly and keep it in the freezer.

For any further information contact me at
stefaniamontalbano@carlozucchetti.it