[Enter the LESBIANS]

ingredience:

lemons/limes (this needs to make up the bulk of the fruit being used, like at least 80%)

whatever other fruits or fruit scraps you want, plus any herbs/other flavorings you want to try. by fruit scraps I mean things like cherry pits, apple peels, pineapple cores, strawberry ends, things like that.

granulated white sugar, the coarser the better, 50% by weight of total citrus rinds + 100% by weight of any additional fruit. you'll measure this after you prep the fruit.

water as needed

equipment:

a few nonmetallic mixing bowls

a mesh strainer

a chinoise, ricer or some cheesecloth

a kitchen scale

a citrus juicer or reamer (manual or electric)

a potato masher

juice the citrus through a strainer - saving all rinds -  and refrigerate the juice for the time being. dice the rinds and other fruits if any, keeping the rinds separate. make note of weights, and measure your sugar.

 Place sugar in a large nonmetallic bowl. If using non-citrus fruits and/or any other flavorings, mix them in with the sugar and mash with potato masher. add diced citrus rinds, mix thoroughly, and mash again. cover and let stand at room temperature for at least 4 hours. this allows the sugar to draw out flavors that would otherwise get discarded with the rinds, and the rinds' acids should be enough to dissolve the sugar into a syrup.

Afterward, mash one last time, then collect the syrup by pressing the macerated mixture through a strainer/chinoise or ricer, or squeeze it through cheesecloth. if you want, this can be saved as a standalone syrup at this point, for use in cocktails or desserts. if not, slowly pour the reserved juice through the solids to to help get the remaining syrup out, and squeeze/press again. do the same thing one more time with warm water (roughly the same amount of water as juice). discard solids (or try making sangria with them!).

taste the mixture and add more water if necessary. a stronger mix is totally fine if you anticipate serving over ice on a hot day, or adding booze, or if there was a lot of non-sour fruit. keep in mind that it will taste a bit less sweet once it's chilled. pour into a pitcher and refrigerate.

citrus oils will float to the top, so stir/shake before serving. love you. enjoy.

some tried and true flavor combos:

straight lemon or lime, or any combination of the two, is of course an untouchable classic

lemon & strawberries (that's pussy babe!)

lemon & orange with a hint of vanilla (creamsiclemonade...?)

lemon & apples or apple peels with cinnamon/ginger/allspice (for late summer)

some cocktail type combos, booze optional:

lemon or lime & berries with basil + gin

lime & mint + white rum

lime & ginger + dark rum

lime & cucumber + gin

lime & orange (berries optional) + tequila

I hate posts like these that attempt to split hairs over individual oppression points to argue that one group of trans people has privilege over another (especially since, if we must, trans men notably have higher rates of sexual assault and less representation in government than trans women, facts that get conveniently ignored or even actively erased in these convos) because well. It’s unproductive, but even moreso it becomes a breeding ground for rank TERFish transphobic bile to be spread around uncritically:

The fact is that the true trans pay gap isn't between trans men and trans women, it's between white trans people and racialized trans people. This whole thing where we're bickering about which trans gender is doing better is fucking ridiculous when racialized trans people are on average, experiencing worse outcomes than white trans people on every metric.

Do trans men have systemic power over trans women? There really isn't a good evidence to back that up, nor is there any reason to believe the reverse. There is no steady metric for measuring the systemic power of one portion of a tiny minority against another, and it's stupid to bicker about it when we already know that different groups of trans people need support with different issues. Non-exhaustively, trans women tend to need support against stranger violence, and exclusion from education, and trans men tend to struggle with domestic violence, and discrimination in hospitals- and all trans people have higher rates of discrimination in all these fields than cis people. Most the issues trans people face are intimately connected to exploitation and violence at the hands of cis people- I mean not least because they are 98-99.6% of the population

I really should have expected this.

For the record, this painting is also for my dad’s barn.