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I had a bottle of delicious rose and melissa cordial, but gosh was it expensive! I was wondering if anyone add a recipe for the base syrup of the cordial that I could add melissa from my garden and either rose EO or water to - any ideas?

what is melissa? (apart from a girl's name?)


pardon my ignorancce

I don't know what mellisa is either...

I have made cordial before but it involved steeping the flower heads (dandelions) in water for a day, then saturating that water with sugar... it was too sweet but it was the right idea, I think I'll do it again this year.

Don't know if that helps you in the slightest?

Mellissia is Lemon Balm.

Essentially make a sugar syrup and bung in as much herbal flavoring as you want/can stand simmer GENTLY for a short while, strain and hot bottle. The juice of a few lemons or some citric and/or tartaric acid helps balance the flavour of the syrup when mixed

Thanks....so if I want say 1 litre of syrup how much liquid to sugar should I use?

ah - lemon balm is one of my "weeds" :-)

very aromatic - so what is this stuff useful for?

Clara wrote:Thanks....so if I want say 1 litre of syrup how much liquid to sugar should I use?

when I make lemon cordial i just add enough water to dissolve all the sugar... I use a pound of sugar and enough hot water from the kettle, along with the lemon juice in this case to just dissolve it.
or maybe you could alter this elderflower cordialrecipe to work

if it does work - let us have the recipe.. please!

dave45 wrote:ah - lemon balm is one of my "weeds" :-)

very aromatic - so what is this stuff useful for?

Many traditional uses, though one that is proven outright is the efficacy of the hot water extraction (i.e. lemon balm tea) against herpes simplex (cold sores).

Clara wrote:

dave45 wrote:ah - lemon balm is one of my "weeds" :-)

very aromatic - so what is this stuff useful for?

Many traditional uses, though one that is proven outright is the efficacy of the hot water extraction (i.e. lemon balm tea) against herpes simplex (cold sores).

not that i disbelieve, im keen on herbal remedy, but i would love to see the research that backs it up my mum gets cold sores but hates the taste of lemon balm, if i had something to convince her with it might save her some suffering

frozenthunderbolt wrote:

Clara wrote:

dave45 wrote:ah - lemon balm is one of my "weeds" :-)

very aromatic - so what is this stuff useful for?

Many traditional uses, though one that is proven outright is the efficacy of the hot water extraction (i.e. lemon balm tea) against herpes simplex (cold sores).

not that i disbelieve, im keen on herbal remedy, but i would love to see the research that backs it up my mum gets cold sores but hates the taste of lemon balm, if i had something to convince her with it might save her some suffering

Sadly (!) this knowledge came by way of a good old fashioned book so I can't send you a link, but it was source referenced to another book: Leung A, Foster S. Encyclopedia of common natural ingredients used in food, drugs and cosmetics. 2nd edition, John Wiley & Sons Inc USA 1996.

I googled melissa herpes simplex and came up with more than one study - take a look.

many thanks