Yes, you heard me right. This is magic lemonade! With less than 10 ingredients, this colour-changing lemonade can be made using a 100% natural colourant – the wonderful butterfly pea flower! This lemonade is both an amazing drink to impress friends and family, as well as a fun recipe for kids. Not only that, but I’m also going to include two methods for serving this magical drink. Because variety is the spice of life, after all! So, depending on whether you want to make a simple lemonade or a fun slushy, the method will differ slightly but are both still super simple. Plus, if you are planning on serving this magic lemonade at some sort of social gathering then I have plenty of other party food inspiration including this Two-layer Raspberry, Peach & Lemonade tart, or this Vegan Strawberry two-layer tart or for something savoury, how about this rainbow hummus veggie platter? If you’re looking for other fun recipes for kids, then how about this Sweet Potato Crust Rainbow Pizza or some veggie-filled savoury cupcakes with avocado ‘frosting’.
How to make simple colour-changing Lemonade
The first way is a tried-and-tested simple blue lemonade. If you serve this up to your kids (or friends and family) they’re sure to already be impressed with the deep blue colour. However, with a squeeze of lemon juice into the glass, you’ll see the magic lemonade at work, changing from blue to pink (if you’re lucky) to purple in front of your very eyes.This simple colour-changing lemonade is made in just four steps: Make the simple sugar syrup, steep the butterfly pea flower, mix and finally add the lemon juice.
To make the simple sugar syrup
If you’ve never made your own lemonade before or sugar syrup concoction then this might be the point where you think I was lying to you about this recipe being simple. But, honestly, it couldn’t be any easier. Simply dissolve 1 cup of sugar into 1 cup of water over low heat, till all the sugar has completely dissolved. Note* If you’re wanting to avoid using sugar then it is possible to use a natural sweetener of your choice. However, I haven’t done a lot of experimentation with this so I can’t guarantee what the results are like.
To Make the Butterfly pea powder tea
Once again, there are a couple of methods that you can use here, either using full butterfly pea flowers or using butterfly pea powder tea bags. I prefer to use the dried flowers though. To steep, simply place a handful of butterfly pea flowers into a small jug and add a cup of boiling water then leave to steep for around five minutes. The longer you steep the flowers, the deeper the blue colour that you will get. Then just remove the butterfly pea flowers and discard. Next, we mix the blue pea flower tea and sugar syrup together in a large jug, add two more cups of water and mix thoroughly. At this point, you have a large jug of sweet blue butterfly pea flower tea and the final step is to perform the magic. The way I love to do this is to let people pour their blue tea into a cup and then I give them lemon halves to squeeze straight into their glass (and this quickly becomes a super fun recipe for kids), so they can see the colour slowly change as the lemon juice drips into the glass. It can then be stirred, to complete the magic. (Example of the effect below!). Alternatively, you can juice lemons directly into a smaller jug and let your guests/ friends/family simply pour some into their glasses. This way makes the colour change happen very quickly but is less messy.
How to make magic colour-changing lemonade slushies
The second method is probably my favourite though, for a truly magical effect. This way take a little bit more prep time and needs to be made a day in advance but I promise you, it’s worth it! First, we steep the blue butterfly pea flower liquid following the method above and pour this into ice-cube trays. The actual size/shape of the tray doesn’t matter as the ice is going to be crushed in the end. This can then be left to freeze for a few hours, or overnight. Next, we make the sugar syrup, but this is where the method differs slightly. When creating slushies I prefer to make my lemonade syrup as a whole, rather than a simple sugar syrup. To make the lemonade syrup simply add your lemon juice directly into the sugar syrup. I know that different people prefer their lemonade at different levels of ‘tart-ness’, but I’d say between 1-2 lemons for this amount of liquid. This can then be left in the fridge overnight.
How to serve the Magic Lemonade
When you’re ready to serve up your magic lemonade slushies, it’s time to crush your blue ice. To do this you can either use a food processor or, I have this nifty Ice crusher specifically for slushies because I’m slushie obsessed! (and I love to make slushies for events so need one!) The one downfall I’ve noticed with my ice crusher is that the ice is all very uniformly ‘fine’ in texture, which means that when the lemonade is added, it melts quickly and the ‘magic’ colour-change is over very quickly. To avoid this, simply make sure some fo your ice is crushed slightly less, so there are larger pieces. Because these will take longer to melt, they will remain blue in your glass for longer. Thus you end up with this gorgeous blend of blue/pink/purple elements in the drink. Then simply pour your ice into your glasses (For different colour variations you can add some normal crushed ice above or below the blue ice), Pour some of the lemonade syrup into the bottom of each glass and top up with either ice-cold water or sparkling water and mix. Voila!
So, How does the Magic Lemonade work?
What I love most about this recipe is that it uses a natural colourant and ‘natures magic’ science to get the colour-changing effect. For this lemonade, we use a very specific magical ingredient called ‘butterfly pea flower’. This blue flower can be steeped in boiling water to release its beautiful, deep blue colour. And the next bit is where the magic begins. This liquid then reacts to the PH balance of your next ingredients. Meaning that when you squeeze in some lemon or pour in some lemonade, the blue will react and turn different shades of pink/purple. And, you might be surprised to know that this isn’t the only ingredient that has this colour-changing effect. Red cabbage water has this very same effect (and can be used for lots of fun experiments with kids). In fact, you can use butterfly pea flower tea for multiple fun recipes for kids, cocktails for adults, so get experimenting! I’d love to see what you get up to with your experiments so feel free to tag me in your creations @AlphaFoodie.
