This started off as a liqueur. This is what we got. A cough syrup. Not that I mind, I’ve always been a believer in taking care of my own health and in natural preventative solutions.
During our vacation we met a couple that gave us a taste of their home-made liqueur and I fell in love with the aroma and the taste. It was made of Mugo Pine or Pinus Mugo (latin) and we are surrounded by it here in the Alps. So we collected some, covered it with sugar and set it out on our windowsill for the sunshine to melt it all. We did everything right other than taking into account that this should be done during the summer’s hottest days not the end of summer early fall. Duh! Of course it hardened like concrete and we couldn’t do a thing with it for months. Then we got the brilliant idea to add some ethyl alcohol (grain) to it and later some hot water and voilà! Mugo Pine cough syrup!
Both old stories collected from the area as well as a trip on the internet confirmed for me that Mugo Pine syrup is indeed good for upper respiratory tract infections, whooping cough, chronic bronchitis, mucus, and asthma. Taken externally it’s good for rheumatism and muscular stiffness. Not bad for an experiment that went all pear shaped.
Don’t ask me for the exact measurements of the ingredients we just totally went by intuition. The smell is wonderful and we sat there last night sucking the sugar and alcohol off the pine cones we extracted until we were woosy. We slept well though! The cones won’t be thrown out but used for firewood. Most everything gets recycled in this house. We’ll eventually filter and bottle the concoction.
Oh, and just because we’ve called it a cough syrup hasn’t stopped LV from using it as a liqueur!
Scentually yours,
Maxine
Her Two Scents 