lavender lemonade.

Spring has officially come to New York City, and everyone seems to have called in sick to enjoy this gorgeous weather. Personally, although I can only imagine how beautiful the Highline looks right now, I prefer somewhere a little less stressful to enjoy the sun's first outing of the season (even in the best of spirits, New Yorkers can get pretty nasty when it comes to vying for one of those coveted built-in chaise lounge spots up there.) Instead, I went way uptown to the upper-west portion of Central Park to take in the sun and peacefully The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemmingway (//Ralph Lauren's inspiration for his SS13 collection).

A few feet away from my own towel was a group of twenty/thirtysomethings having a very tumblr-esq picnic. Naturally my first instinct was annoyance- how dare they disturb my antisocial reading time!!- but this quickly morphed into mesmerization when I saw their curious looking drinks. After awhile it got the best of me and I had to ask them what it was exactly that they were drinking?

Lavender lemonade. I vaguely remember reading about it for the first time in a Vanity Fair interview with Taylor Swift. Honestly, I had no idea what was actually in this, but if it tasted nearly as pretty as it sounded, I knew I had to try it. Besides, when the weather gets to be in the low 80s like this, all I really want to do is relax on a roof/park/sidewalk and enjoy happy hour with a few friends.

Taking to the internet to satisfy my craving (dangerously easy access at all hours… especially when it comes to those 2am hankerings for fries) I found that, surprisingly, there aren't many options in the Manhattan area for this concoction. In fact, I could only find one: Cafe Fornant in Hell's Kitchen. While I'm sure it's a perfectly charming spot, I was in no mood to go to Hell's Kitchen (is one ever?) Instead, I decided to utilize the internet and the Whole Foods down the street in attempt to make my own version. I don't have my own kitchen yet (on a side note: I'm moving into my first solo NYC apartment in a month!!) but thankfully I found a simple-enough recipe on Joy the Baker (below, slightly modified) that called for little more than a pitcher, a friends stove, and a grocery store.

6 cups of water
1 cup of sugar (if you want to be healthy try 1/2 cup sugar, 1/4 cup raw agave nectar) 
1/4 cup honey
4 tbsp. dried culinary lavandar
 2 cups fresh lemon juice
thinly sliced lemons and lavender for garnish
red and purple food coloring

1 -over medium heat, mix 2 cups of water with the sugar (and nectar). Bring to a boil and stir. 

2 - remove from heat. stir in lavender and honey. 

3 - cover and let seep for 10 minutes. Strain out lavender (push buds into the bottom of the strainer to      get it all out) 

4 - mix the rest in a large bowl and combine everything in a large pitcher. To give it the gorgeous lavender color (let's be honest, most of the reason we want to drink this is because it's pretty) I mix in a few drops of blue and red food coloring - chill in refrigerator. 

5- **serve in mason jars on a rooftop in Nashville, SoHo or the W.Village over ice and garnish with lavender and sliced lemons.**