This year vivoglutenfree is welcoming the New Year with pomegranate! One of the oldest Greek customs for the New Year is breaking a pomegranate for good luck, to bring health, happiness and joy to the household, and as many good things as the pomegranate seeds.

Pomegranate literally means flow and strength; it is the fruit of life and good fortune, while its origin goes back to ancient Greece, where they believed that pomegranate seeds symbolized abundance, fertility, eternity, but also good luck.

Pomegranate is a nutrient-rich fruit with multiple health benefits. They have a strong antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effect on the body and can even fight against cancer cells, giving it valuable anti-cancer properties. Studies have confirmed that pomegranate has a preventive as well as therapeutic effect against various forms of cancer (prostate, breast, colon), high blood pressure, diabetes, erectile dysfunction and male infertility, ultraviolet radiation, osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis, Alzheimer, bacterial infections and antibiotic tolerance (antimicrobial and antifungal action).

We can eat this wonderful fruit raw as a fruit or drink its juice, add it to green salads or can make it a delicious jam. My suggestion is to squeeze it and fill ice packs with its juice, so that you keep it in the freezer for several months and have pomegranate juice always ready.

Almost always I have pomegranate liqueur at home as my mother has been making it for years so I frequently use it in my desserts. Here, as a start I am giving you a recipe for a very easy and quick liqueur that I initially saw on TwinMirrors, but when I asked my mother how to make the pomegranate liqueur the way she made it and had already at home, she also told me the quick way I am writing below, as well as the classic one where we fill bottles and leave them in the sun! So now I have my mother’s liqueur in a purple glass bottle that was a gift from my grandmother, paired with 6 same purple glasses, which they used to offer the liqueur to the guests who were paying a visit on a festive occasion. As for the alcohol, I preferred to use the “tsipouro” (without anise, of course) that my cousin makes!

Choose large pomegranates that are bright red in color with shiny and hard skin without tears and cracks on them.

Yields1 ServingDifficultyBeginner

Tip: Check off the ingredients you have used in the recipe or note the ingredients you have and add the rest to you shopping list to buy them. - Attention: All ingredients must be checked that are Gluten-Free and without traces of gluten.

3 large pomegranates (each cleaned pomegranate gives about 300 g of fruit)

1 cup sugar

1 cup tsipouro

2 sticks cinnamon

5 sticks cloves

Abbreviations: g=grams • kg= kilograms • cup=250 ml • tsp= teaspoon=5 ml • tbsp= tablespoon=3 tsp=15 ml • ml= millilitre= (1ml=0.034 fl oz / 1fl oz=29.6 ml) • l=litre/liter=1000ml

Clean the pomegranates. It is the most time-consuming and boring process of this whole recipe. A quick and easy way is to cut its peel in a circle around the stem, then cut it into wide strips about halfway down, like you cut an orange. Then we open it enough, but not completely, and turn it over. We hit it with a spoon and the seeds fall out by themselves. For greater convenience make it directly in the pot. Also wear an apron or clothes that you won't mind getting splashed and stained by the pomegranates.

Put the sugar, tsipouro, cinnamon and cloves in the pot where we put the pomegranates and put them on a medium to high heat.

Boil for 3 minutes only, until the sugar melts and not more because we want to have this lively color.

Turn off the heat, cover it with its lid and leave it there for 24 hours.

The next day, press the seeds a little with a spoon or with the potato masher tool.

Strain it and divide it into bottles. We can pass it through a sieve with a turban (piece of cloth) to squeeze it more to get more juice from the pomegranate. Alternatively, strain with a coffee filter. I passed it through 2 very fine sieves/strainers that I have.

Ingredients