Strawberry Lemonade

On July 4th, we had strawberries and lemons in excess, oh and sun.  We had sun.  Supposed to see it this weekend but we'll see.  Anyway, I digress.

It was the mother lode and I racked my brain to come up with something to make with both of them.  Okay so it didn't take that long to come up with the lemonade idea.  I figured out with my own recipe and hoped for the best.  It was really good and greatly refreshing on a hot day.  I can't remember what that was like...  Here's what I did:

Strawberry Lemonade

1 cup of Sugar
1 cup of water
1 1/2 cups of fresh squeezed lemon juice
Strawberries for the glasses
1/2 gallon pitcher

Combine the sugar and 1 cup of water and bring to a boil.  Gently boil until the sugar dissolves.  Set aside to cool.  When the sugar syrup is cool, put it in the pitcher with the lemon juice.  Add water and ice to the pitcher to fill the pitcher so you have 1/2 gallon of lemonade.  When you are ready to serve it, put your strawberries in the glasses (I used 4 or 5 per glass) and gently mash down with a pestle or smush with a spoon.  Pour the lemonade over the strawberries.

Variations:  You can use raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, or any berry you can think of.  I think it would fun to try a combination.  

I hope you make this on a sunny day.  It was fabulous.  Please let me know if you try it!