Sour Cherry Shrub

This recipe is for everyone who loves to pucker up, baby! If you can’t get enough of candy like Sour Patch Kids and Sweet Tarts (especially the sour cherry recipes I’ve devised to make the most of my annual cherry-picking spree.

If you’re a fan of slightly tangy beverages like kombucha and switchel, no doubt you’ve also enjoyed a shrub or two along the way.

These drinks all use the power of fermentation to add a little oomph to their flavor profile.

Whereas kombucha makes its own tasty bacteria, switchels (also sometimes known as fire cider) and shrubs use the prepackaged power of vinegar to bring the funk.

What is a shrub?

A shrub is an olde-timey way of preserving fruit. Back in the days before refrigeration, both vinegar and sugar were used as natural preserving agents.

Shrubs can be made by either:

• cooking fruit in vinegar and letting the natural sugars sweeten the mixture
• combining fruit, vinegar, and sugar and letting the fruit break down

This way, fresh fruit could be transformed and enjoyed past its growing season. Spices, herbs, and other seasonings can be added to the shrub mixture, but those are the basics.

You can also read more about the history of shrubs in my strawberry shrub recipe.

What to mix with a sour cherry shrub

You can certainly sip on this shrub solo, and also savor the pickled fruit bits—they’re a great accompaniment for cheese plates.

But I like to blend my shrubs with other elements to make more complex drinks. By keeping the base shrub recipe simple, it lets you play around with so many other flavors.

Try this sour cherry shrub with:

• plain seltzer for the purists
• or seltzer with muddled herbs like basil or mint, and a simple syrup of your choice
• lemonade (preferably homemade)
• or lemonade and iced tea for a cherry Palmer
• gin and lime cordial for a gimlet-style cocktail
• sparkling wine of any type
• Aperol and seltzer for a spritz

And that’s just for starters!

Lately I’ve been mixing mine with a little pine syrup, seltzer, and sometimes a splash of lime juice because I really love sour things.

What if this shrub is too sour for me?

No worries! Not everyone has the same appreciation-slash-tolerance for high levels of acidity.

If you want to soften the sour blow without adding more granulated sugar to the equation (whether in the form of plain sugar or a syrup), it’s easy.

Substitute half of the sour cherries for sweet cherries, or another sweet fruit such as green grapes or peaches instead.

Play around with what’s in season—because with a shrub, you can keep it even after the summer has passed.

You can also substitute white balsamic vinegar for the apple cider or Champagne vinegar for a sweeter, yet still tangy, taste.

This will give your shrub a more unusually vinegared flavor, but it’s always fun to experiment!

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Sour Cherry Shrub

Yield: about 1 1/2 cups

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Additional Time: 7 days 1 hour

Total Time: 7 days 1 hour 10 minutes

Make a sour cherry shrub - a sweet and tart drinking vinegar - when fresh cherries are in season. This tangy beverage can be sipped on its own, or mixed with seltzer, wine, or spirits.

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Ingredients

• 1/4 pound (4 ounces; 113 grams) sour cherries
• 1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar
• 1 cup apple cider vinegar or Champagne vinegar

Instructions

1. Coarsely chop the sour cherries and transfer, along with any juice, to a quart-sized mason jar.
2. Add the sugar and vinegar and stir well to combine.
3. Let the shrub sit for 1 hour at room temperature, stirring occasionally to help the sugar dissolve in the liquid.
4. Transfer to the refrigerator and chill for 1 week. You can gently swish the jar every few days to help the flavors combine.
5. After 1 week, your shrub is ready to use. Mix with seltzer, wine, iced tea, or use in your favorite cocktail.

Nutrition Information:

Yield: 8 Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 8Total Fat: 0gSaturated Fat: 0gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 0gCholesterol: 0mgSodium: 2mgCarbohydrates: 1gFiber: 0gSugar: 0gProtein: 0g

The nutritional information above is computer-generated and only an estimate.

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