(whimsical music) - Greeting my beautiful
lovelies, it's Emmy. How are you? It's great to see you, and welcome back. Today I'm going to be making one of my most favorite beverages ever. And it is for lemonade, more specifically, State Fair lemonade. You know, the lemonade that's
made from actual lemons, and you have that beautiful
scent of lemon oil? Yes, that kind. Because Memorial Day is just
right around the corner. And for me, that's sort of the hallmark, the kind of marker of
the beginning of summer. And lemonade is the drink
of summer, in my opinion, or one of the drinks of summer. So the recipe I'm going
to be testing out today comes from Food Wishes, a
channel that's been on YouTube for the longest time. So many great recipes. I'll put a link down below. Chef John has a great voice and
a terrific mustache as well. And this recipe looks lovely. There are specific techniques involved in terms of extracting
that beautiful lemon scent that I think is essential to lemonade. You really need the
lemon oil, in my opinion, to make a really fragrant
and delicious lemonade. It's not just about the tang of the juice. It's the smell of the lemon oil. So let's go ahead and
make us some lemonade. The first thing we're going to
need, of course, are lemons. So I've got six lemons
rolling around here. We're also going to need some sugar. Oh, I hope I have enough sugar, curses. I should. Okay, so what I think is
interesting about this recipe is that we're going to really
capture those lemon oils. And all of that lemon oil is located in the rind or the zest. Actually not... There is fruit fly in here already? So we have to capture some
of that beautiful lemon oil. And it is located in the
beautiful zest of the lemon, which is just the yellow
part of the lemon. We don't want to get the pith, which is the bitter part
underneath the zest. So using a vegetable peeler
we're just gonna peel it, but we just want to remove
this thin top layer here. We want to avoid getting
any of pith, if possible. Just the thinnest layer and
already it smells so good. And if you squeeze it in the light, you can see all of that
beautiful oil coming out. That's what we want to capture. So we're going to zest all six lemons. And just use some gentle pressure here because we don't want any of that. Now of course, save the lemons
after we've peeled them. We also want the tangy juice
as well, but not quite yet. So it helps if you have a
really sharp vegetable peeler because look, on the bottom
here, there's no white pith. It's just zest. Have you ever lit citrus oil on fire, or put it in front of a match? It makes these beautiful sparks. So you just take some citrus peel, orange peel, tangerine peel, lemon peel, and right in front of the flame
of a candle, squeeze this. And you'll get these
beautiful little crackles because the oil ignites. It's pretty great. A little experiment I did with my kiddos. It smells so good. My hands are gonna smell
amazing after this. Now, to all of this beautiful zest, we're going to add a cup
and a quarter of sugar. One cup of sugar. So we have the total of a
cup and a quarter of sugar. Now we're going to toss this. And the sugar is going to draw out any moisture from the zest and capture some of those oils as well. This smells heavenly. Alrighty, so now we're gonna let this rest anywhere from two hours to overnight so all those flavors can be
extracted into the sugar. And then we can continue
with the next step of making our lemonade. Okay,
I'll see you in a little bit, after this has done its resting. (Emmy chortling) Alright my lovelies, it's been a few hours since I combined my
sugar and zest together. And, as you can see here, a lot of the water has
come out of the zest, and it has liquified a bit. It's a little bit sandy, but very different than the
mixture we started with. So now behind me, I've got
some water coming up to a boil. And we're going to create
the lemony syrup infusion for our lemonade. So, almost to a boil.... So I'm gonna give this a stir
and press on the lemon peels. I forgot to mention before
you even peel your lemons, make sure you wash them
really, really well. So, now it smells so good in here. I wish you could smell it. So lemony and zingy and bright. (kettle beeping) Oh, there's my water. So now we're going to pour four cups boiling water right on
top of the lemon peels. (Emmy sighs) That smells so good. Get every bit of that. Okay, so give this a little bit of a stir to help the sugar dissolve. Look at this beautiful yellow
color it's already taken on. Isn't that gorgeous? Look at that color. So while that's cooling off a bit, we can squeeze the lemon juice. Cutting my lemons in half. I'm gonna try out this new juicer of mine. My other juicer I still
have, which I love, my vintage juicer. My kids especially love using that juicer because you just get
to pull on that handle and see all the juice come out. What I like about this, it has a little increments
on the side here, so I know exactly how
much lemon juice I've got. But for this recipe, it's
actually not that important because we just need the
juice of those six lemons. So, juice away! And we will compost the rest. So out of curiosity, one large lemon has about about an 1/8
of a cup of lemon juice. So it's gonna vary, but some lemons seem to be juicier than others. So how much juice you actually
get might vary a little bit. But so far out of two lemons,
I've gotten a 1/4 cup. So by the end of this, we should have 3/4 of a
cup of pure lemon juice. Oh my gosh, did ever tell you the story of when I got phytophotodermatitis? Both my kids and I got it because we made limeade using limes. We were on vacation, of course. And we were squeezing limes. And the next day we were
walking around a theme park in the sun all day. And the following day, we had kind of itchy
burny skin on our hands. And then we noticed on the next day, it had a bit of a pattern to it. It was kind of like a chemical burn. Spattery, it was in between
like our fingers here. But my husband didn't have
any signs of it at all. So I was researching and I found out we had phytophotodermatitis, which is caused from the oils of citrus, particularly limes, and UV light. And it causes a chemical
burn on your skin. It's a true thing. Sometimes they call it, I
think, bartender's burn. Because bartenders are often
muddling limes and stuff and get the lime oils on their skin. And then the reaction with the UV lights, it burns your skin. The more you know. So make sure you wash your
hands really thoroughly after squeezing citrus
before going out in the sun. Okay, last half here. And actually we have
more than 3/4 of a cup. We have about almost a cup. And now we shall return to this bowl here, this beautiful concoction. Now this is pretty warm. And to speed things up, I'm going to strain our
beautiful peels out. So I'm going to place
the colander over here and then pour this over the top. So we can get every little bit out. Okay. Beautiful, so to this warm concoction we're going to add one cup of ice. That will help cool things off. Stir it, and at this point,
it's almost at room temperature. I'm going to add our juice, all that beautiful
tanginess, into our bowl. Now we want to thoroughly
chill this before we serve it because warm lemonade, cannot do it. So I'm gonna place this
in the refrigerator and chill it for a couple of hours. Can also just serve it with a bunch of ice if you're in a hurry, but I'm
going ahead and cool mine off. So into the refrigerator. Here we go. Oh, I've got lots of
mushrooms spawning here. Welcome to my world. So while the lemonade is cooling off, I thought I'd make this a full experience by having my lemonade with a corn dog. Because that's what I think of when I think of state fair food. But when I went to the supermarket to look for frozen corn
dogs, they didn't have any. I have a great corn dog recipe, if you're looking to
make them from scratch. I'll put the link down below to that. But I was just looking
for the frozen variety. Couldn't find them, so I thought, "Hmm, I guess I'm having hot dogs." And then I remembered I had this gadget. I've been holding on to this for years. This is the Coney Island
Steamer that is made by Sunbeam. By the looks of the
packaging, it's from the 19... It's from 1978. This is 44 years old? 45, 78, 45. No, this is 43 years old. This is 43 years old. I found this at a junk
shop a few years ago. I think I paid 10 bucks for it. And let's cook with it. I hope it works. So let's go ahead and
unbox it so you can see. It's pretty straightforward. So, I washed it when I got
it and I kept it in this box. It's still has its the original papers. The Coney Island Steamer Frank 'n Bun Instruction & Recipes, look at that. And it is very straightforward to use. And here is the steamer. Okay, so I'm going to plug it in. So I already washed
this off, plugged it in. And now I'm going to
add one ounce of water right into the trough. Add the tray back, and then place a hotdog right there. And the odd little lid. And this is the bun steamer. You open up the bun, and you rest it right on top, like that. So your bun gets nice and steamy. And look, there's already condensation forming on the inside. So it's working. Pretty simple unit here. You can only cook one hot dog at a time. I can hear something happening
like the water is heating. And this is probably
pretty great for a kid to make their own snack. There you have it, the Coney
Island Steamer, Frank 'n Bun. (Emmy laughing) Not quite as exciting as the HotDogger. Did you see that hot dog gadget? I'll put a link down below to that one where you could electrocute
your hot dogs to cook them. Very, very thrilling. I think you could do six hot
dogs at one time or eight. Yeah, very, very efficient. And yeah, we'll set that for five minutes. And let's go check on our lemonade. (gentle upbeat music) All right my lovelies. The Coney Island Steamer
has completed steaming. It has been five minutes. My lemonade is chilled. So let's have a taste of the
state fair at home, shall we? So let me grab a plate. Okay, here's the bun. Oh, very pleasantly toasty and steamy, just as you would get out of a cart on the streets of any big city. And now I'm going to open this part to reveal a steamed dog. And then we'll place the
hot dog right in the bun. Beautiful.
(Emmy laughing) I like ketchup and I like mustard. I also like onions, but I think I'll just do the basics today. Oh, beautiful. Look at that, picture perfect. Lemonade, on ice. (Emmy humming) Very, very excited about this. All right my lovelies, let's taste our lemonade first. Here we go, to the state fair. Cheers. It's better than the state fair. It's so stinkin' good, so good. Tangy, sweet, zingy, but
filled with lemon fragrance. It's just so, so good. Cool and refreshing,
icy, icy cold, actually. So good. This is gonna be gone tonight. My kids love lemonade. They're gonna love this. So good. It makes me wish I lived
in a warmer climate where I could actually
have my own lemon tree that could live year round. I could keep a lemon tree inside, but I don't have a lot of sunlight. Anyways, I digress. If you have a lemon tree, I'm envious, because you could make this all the time. Alrighty, let's try our steamed hot dog. This is really impressive. Because the bun has been steamed, it is really soft, super soft, still soft. Alrighty, itadakimasu! These are the tastes of summer. Icy cold homemade lemonade. A hot dog, squishy bun, ketchup, mustard. Just great. The Coney Island Steamer does a great job. My hot dog is thoroughly warmed up. I'm really impressed with
the texture of the bun. The bun gets really soft and toasty. It's the best way to heat up a bun. I think it's even better than toasting it because it keeps the heat. And it's got such a
pillowy soft texture to it. It's great for a hot dog. So I highly recommend this lemonade. It is a little bit of work to make but so very worth it. And hot dogs, you know, hot
dogs represent summer to me. They represent childhood. They represent children and
just life in so many ways, especially since I've had my own children. And yeah, here's to summer. All right my lovelies. Thanks so much for watching. I hope you enjoy that one. I hope you learned something. Please share this video with your friends. Follow me on social media. Check out my website, where I'll include a printable
version of this recipe. And yeah, like this video, subscribe. And I shall see you in the next one. Toodaloo! Take care! Byeee!!! (upbeat music) (Emmy chortling)
