Lately, I’ve been all about (not-so) simple syrups. I find them to be an diverse tool for both mixology and cooking. Plus, they are easy to make, and infinite in flavor possibilities.

It all started when I bought a couple of plastic squeeze bottles, for about 99 cents a piece. They sat in the cabinet for a couple of months, until I came across this article. That jived perfectly well with the fact that I had bought a bottle of POM Wonderful.

I split the bottle, used both methods, and combined the results. The finished product: pomegranatey awesomeness!

Then, a friend in California was kind enough to send me a bag of kaffir lime leaves. My mind was overwhelmed with the possibilities. Should I infuse vodka with it, or make a syrup? Should I use it alone, or combine it with ginger? Lemongrass? Chilis? Star anise?

Since I was too broke for (more) vodka, I settled on making a syrup, and since it was readily available, I decided to combine it with ginger. This is the recipe I used:

Kaffir-Ginger Simple Syrup
Makes about 1 1/4 cups

1 cup water
1 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup fresh ginger root, unpeeled, smashed and cut into quarter-size slices
8 kaffir lime leaves, sliced

In a small saucepan, bring the water, sugar, ginger and lime leaves to a gentle simmer. Cook for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat; set aside to cool. Cover and refrigerate overnight to allow the flavors to infuse the syrup. Strain the syrup, discarding the solids.

Both are excellent mixed with some diet tonic, and served on the rocks!