Combine 1/2 cup water and ¾ cup sugar in a small pot or saucepan. Heat on the stove over medium heat until sugar dissolves into water to create a simple syrup.
3/4 cup sugar
Lemonade
Cut lemons in half and squeeze lemons to get fresh-squeezed lemon juice.
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
Place 2 cups chopped strawberries, ½ cup fresh-squeezed lemon juice, and ½ cup of the simple syrup in either a blender or food processor. Process until smooth.
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice, 2 cups chopped strawberries
Pour the mixture through a mesh strainer to get the juice out.
Combine 3 oz of the strawberry juice mixture and 4 oz of water in a glass that’s 8 oz or larger.
2 cups water
Add ice and fresh strawberries and lemon wedges for garnish.
Notes
Double the recipe to make a 2-quart pitcher full of strawberry lemonade. Then add 32 ounces of water and 24 ounces of the strawberry mixture to make your lemonade.Get an actual shaker bartender kit to measure out the right amount of the ingredients. I wrote this recipe in ounces rather than something like a cup because liquid is measured more accurately in ounces.Make this less sweet by making a simple syrup that’s a 1:1 ratio (1/2 cup sugar to 1/2 cup water) or make it sweeter by making it a 2:1 ratio (1 cup sugar to 1/2 cup water). Simply changing the sweetness of the simple syrup can change the overall sweetness of the lemonade! Alternately you could also just use less simple syrup in the recipe but that tends to change the measurements as well.Turn this into sparkling strawberry lemonade by replacing the water (for the lemonade, not the simple syrup) with unflavored strawberry lemonade. Serve and enjoy immediately since the sparkling water will go flat. If you do go sparkling, it will not store without losing the sparkle.