Mango Shrub
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Making shrubs, or drinking vinegars is my all-time favorite way to upcycle the bits of fruit that usually go unused. This recipe is a DIY zero waste method to make a mango shrub to use in cocktails, or mocktails.
You’ll need the following equipment:
Ingredients:
This recipe really spices up a margarita or vodka soda. So easy and such a great way to maintain those sustainability goals! Next time you are cutting fruit, save your scraps and make a shrub!
Shrubs, sometimes referred to as drinking vinegars have been made for ages as a way to enjoy off season fruits during the winter months.
Of course, nowadays, you can eat off season fruit whenever you want thanks to refrigeration and modern transportation- though the fruit never does taste as good as when its peak season.
Shrubs were originally drinking as a nonalcoholic beverage- either mixed with water or sparkling water. nowadays they are mostly used in cocktails in place of citrus.
To make a shrub, basically you macerate some fruit with sugar, let it sit for a few days till a syrup forms, then mix it with vinegar.
For vinegar, I like to use balsamic, apple cider or any kind of wine vinegar.
For this mango shrub, I’m going to show you a great hack, I will only be using scraps to make this shrub. The Pit and the mango skins actually have a lot of flavor. This is a great way to make use of it.
First, I’ll peel the mango’s exterior - you want to make sure you have scrubbed your fruit before peeling, as you don’t want any pesticides in your shrub.
Then I’ll remove the flesh. Keep in mind you can use the mango flesh as well, but I want to use mine for a mango salsa.
The pit is always tricky to remove the fruit from, if anyone has a hack for this I’d love to know!
After I’ve removed all the flesh, I’ll place the mango skin and pit in a bowl and cover the top with sugar. I’ve never really measured it, but basically you want to just cover the top- for reference I’m using 50ish grams of sugar for one mango. This step is unnecessary, but I like to massage the sugar in a bit before storing.
Now just cover it and store it in the fridge for a few days- I’ll check on it every few days to make sure it hasn’t fermented. The amount of time can vary depending on the fruit- I let this mango sit covered in the fridge for 5 days.
Once all the sugar has dissolved you will be left with a delicious fruity syrup.
For the mango shrub, I will be adding equal parts apple cider vinegar to mango syrup.
Depending on the tartness of the fruit, you will want to add less vinegar, but since my mango was really ripe, it needed a bit more acidity to balance it out. I would not recommend adding more than equal parts vinegar, remember its always easier to add than take away.
