Homemade hibiscus juice

Hibiscus juice is a really popular drink in Ghana. It is dubbed “sobolo” or “bissap” and can be found being sold through street vendors, or served at parties. When this tea is sweetened, it has a deep distinct flavor similar to red grape juice but is ten times better. Since you can play around with the ingredients of hibiscus juice, it can be fun to whip up.

How to extract hibiscus tea

Hibiscus tea comes from boiling hibiscus leaves in water and leaving it to soak for ages. This extracts the hibiscus flavor. On its own, hibiscus is as sour as raw cranberries. Some people add ginger and pineapple peels to their hibiscus tea. I like to add orange peels, cinnamon sticks, and fresh cloves.

Serving the hibiscus juice

After you have soaked the hibiscus petals for a good amount of time, strain and discard the petals. Mix the remaining juice with sugar, and adjust as needed. If you want to turn this hibiscus juice into a soda like I did, add some club soda. A cool recipe that I love is this coffee-flavored hibiscus soda. This recipe makes a large serving, so just serve it cold with lime/lemon wedges and fresh mint sprigs. It is refreshing in the summer time especially but I still love it in the colder seasons as well.

Hibiscus juice

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Servings: 4 Prep Time: 4 Hours Cooking Time: 15 Minutes 15 Minutes

Rating: 5.0/5

( 1 voted )

Ingredients

1 cup dried hibiscus petals

4 cups water to boil hibiscus

2 inch raw ginger root, peeled and grated

2 cinnamon sticks

1/4 cup simple syrup or granulated sugar (add more if you like it sweeter)

Tray of ice cubes

Handful of mint sprigs to serve

Lime wedges to serve

Instructions

1. Bring water to a boil in a saucepan on medium heat.
2. Add the dried hibiscus, cinnamon sticks, grated ginger and cover the saucepan with its lid.
3. Once the water turns a deep red color, turn off the heat.
4. Let the hibiscus steep in the saucepan for 4 hours or more.
5. Strain this and mix with the simple syrup/sugar. This is your hibiscus juice.
6. Muddle mint leaves at the bottom of 4 tall glasses (optional), add some ice and lime in each glass and pour the hibiscus juice into the glasses.
7. To turn this into a soda, top off each glass with club soda.