What is Simple Syrup?

Simple syrup is basically a liquid that is made by dissolving sugar in hot water, yet many people would go to speciality stores to purchase simple syrup or flavoured simple syrup thinking it’s something they can’t do on their own. The beauty of simple syrup is that although it’s easy to make, it can be used in a wide variety of applications; it is common in café, bakeries, and bars. 

Coffee shops add flavoured syrup to coffee, teas and lattes. In baking, depending on the thickness, simple syrup is often used to soak sponge cakes and pound cakes to moisten them. My friend’s mother poked holes in a freshly baked cake and drizzled some simple syrup in to make her cake rich, moist and full of surprises! Bakers also use simple syrup to glaze baked goods or to preserve fruits. Alcohol or flavoured extracts can be added to simple syrup to give it an extra flavour kick, and also to act as a preservative. It is also used as a base for making rock candy, a candy made with crystallized sugar.  Barkeeps used the classic simple syrup to sweeten and thicken drinks, and flavoured simple syrup to add interesting tastes to their cocktails. 

Types of Simple Syrups

The classic simple syrup is a mixture of one part sugar and one part water, or two parts sugar to one part water if you prefer it to be thicker and richer. Water is brought to the boiling point, and the sugar is stirred in until it’s completely dissolved. At which point it should be removed from the heat source, and allowed to cool before it is placed in a clean glass container.

This recipe is for lavender simple syrup, but you can make any flavoured simple syrup you can imagine. Just replace the lavender with any herbs, whole spices or any citrus rind you love. In the summer, make fresh simple syrups with the herbs in your garden such as basil, peppermint, rosemary or thyme. If you love snow cones in the summer as much as I do, add a packet of unsweetened kool aid to simple syrup for snow cone syrup. And for the cold winter months, use whole cloves, cinnamon sticks or vanilla bean to make simple syrups for your hot beverages. Let your imagination run wild! They’re great anytime of the year when you want an extra flavour kick in your lemonades, cocktails, hot beverage or dessert.

You can even play around with the thickness, or richness of your simple syrup. For a richer, more flavourful amber coloured simple syrup, use brown sugar, demerara, muscovado or coconut palm sugar instead of white sugar. It gives it that almost caramel character to the syrup and works especially well with cocktails that use brown spirits such as bourbon, tequila or rye whisky. I like using honey in simple syrup (except buckwheat honey since it’s a bit too overpowering) because I like how it gives the simple syrup an extra depth of taste. I prefer to use honey in my cocktails over white sugar since it’s healthier (and tastier), however, honey is too thick and doesn’t dissolve well. But by turning it into simple syrup, I can thin it out, and use it in all my favourite cocktail recipes. 

Classic simple syrups have a  very long shelf life since sugar is a natural preservative. So as long as impurities are not introduced to the syrup, it can be kept at room temperature for months. Before transferring simple syrup to a glass container, I like to be extra clean and place some hot water in the container, close it, and shake it a couple of times before pouring out the water and placing the simple syrup.  This gets rid of any impurities. 

Simple Syrup Ratio