I started a new Thanksgiving tradition last year just for fun. When I saw a recipe in the local paper to make limoncello, I thought it would be a perfect distraction project. Since I don’t drink alcohol but maybe once a year (and this is about that time for once), and I had none of the ingredients or tools, I was all in.
Try new things, they say. It will be fun, they say. And at least it’s not cave exploring or snow skiing.
Last early November, I popped into the local food market and Target to buy the things I would need for the first part of the preparation. I bought organic lemons, my container and jars, then went to the liquor store (all in the same strip mall) for vodka. The general opinion of my inner circle is that Tito’s is the drink of choice, so I got a big bottle and, on Thanksgiving Day, I set to work.
First, the lemons needed to be peeled to incorporate the yellow outsides with the vodka for the flavor infusion. My vegetable peeler didn’t quite meet the task, though it had peeled potatoes under my mother’s skills for decades, so I ended up using a grater. Once the peels (more like grains) of lemon and booze were in a container, I got to watch them for three weeks while they mingled and produced a yellow concoction not unlike Mountain Dew(R).
Once the infusion part was done, I needed to incorporate simple syrup to taste. My problem was that I had no taste by which to judge what I was making, never having actually consumed limoncello. When unsure, go with your gut, I always say. A few additions of sweet water and tasting later, I had a half dozen jars of liquid joy. They went over a treat.
This year, I had a new vegetable peeler for the task, but forgot about getting organic lemons to make the prep faster. I had bought non-organic seedless lemons, and needed to wash them in hot water to remove the wax coating. It wasn’t a bad chore, and I enjoyed watching the plumes of wax drifting in the sink water’s eddies while I worked. It added a few minutes to the prep, but we were on schedule, and the turkey would be going into the oven at the appointed hour.
When it came time to peel, my new device started out going through those lemon rinds like a knife through butter.
Until that butter was my fingertip in the way.
A moment of stinging pain, and suddenly my index finger was a leak in the dam, dripping happily like it was auditioning for a slasher movie. Direct pressure stung like heck and did nothing. I had to abandon the project for a bit and sit down with my arm above my head to slow the pulsing flow of my dark red DNA infused lifeforce from exiting my body like those movie patrons fleeing The Blob.
After seriously considering a visit to urgent care for what amounted to a pinprick wound–what a way to spend Thanksgiving–the deluge subsided, and I was able to securely bandage the spot with waterproof tape and bandages and get safely back to the project, minus one vital finger.
As I’m typing, the finger isn’t tender, nor has the skin color altered in any alarming way, but I do have one heck of a bandage job on there to help me when I had to work yesterday (no Black Friday off for me), and so far I’ve been able to do everything in spite of the inconvenience of that thick layer of first aid.
The limoncello is percolating at room temperature in the kitchen, soon to become my second annual homemade gift of intoxicating wonder.
And I can honestly say I put blood* into it, if not sweat and tears.
*(Due to my annoyingly calm nature, I was able to avoid spilling bodily fluids anywhere near the food, and I aimed my flowing finger immediately at the kitchen sink.)
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