Lemon Verbena Ideas?

[CharityCase]

By that topic line I mean that I've gone all the way through sorbet, verbena syrup and fresh lemonade and tea. I still have tons of it growing in my garden.

I've tried the syrup in a mojito in place of conventional simple syrup and it was good, but barely detectable.

Does anyone have ideas for cocktails with this lovely herb? My forum search came up with Mojitos and caipirinhas but what else have you done with it?

[Sunny Simmons Steincamp]

Edited for stupidity: I forgot this is in the Cocktails section. *grin* If you want a recipe for Lemon Pepper Smoked Salmon Cheesecake, let me know!

Edited July 20, 2006 by Sunny Simmons Steincamp (log)

[johnder]

I came up with a cocktail over here that uses verbena. It is a variation on a daiquiri. The 3 leaves I used did give it a pretty good verbana taste. You can probably increase its level by making a lime/verbena simple syrup to use in it.

John

[KatieLoeb]

How about a Mojito variation muddling fresh verbena leaves, Verbena simple syrup, a small wedge of lemon and a less juniper-ey and more citrus-ey gin, like my new locally produced favorite, Bluecoat Gin??

[Mayur]

Sounds lovely!

Incidentally, I thought exactly of 'ti punch with muddled verbena and then noticed your rum+verbena+lime recipe on that thread you linked to, johnder. Very nice.

Personally, what I'd do with it is take very generous quantities of it, plus a *judicious* amount of lime zest, and infuse a small batch of plain ol' garden variety white rum OR some gin with it (the latter is tricky; most of the ones I'd recommend, like the Bluecoat to which Katie linked or Broker's, my favorite source of Ken-doll-size bowler hats, are a bit pricey for this use in my world). The rum, plus a little sugar and some lime, as well as some bruised fresh verbena, would probably make a nice drink on its own; the gin could probably be mixed with a little cucumber juice for a nicely citric, herbaceous drink.