Summer – Marz&Micha

I’m clearly not an expert in this matter as i am not too fond of beaches in general. In Costa Rica they are too hot for me so never took the time to get to like them truly. I’m also not sure of how to clasify them but here we go.

Said this, Germany has more beaches than i originally thought. We all know Germany has borders with basically half of Europe (ok i’m exaggerating, but it’s a lot of countries), but it also have the North Sea and the Baltic Sea around in the north. This might not be enough for germans tho, as you can find a lot of “beaches” also around lakes and rivers (like the Rhin in Düsseldorf or the Elbe and Alster in Hamburg)

I remember the first time i took Micha to a Costa Rican beach, he asked me “Is this a natural white-sand beach or is it man made?. I was confused. Man made? Who would make a whole beach?. Well… Germans do.
So this beaches around rivers and lakes are mostly man made. Someone at some point decided to have a beach there and put a lot of sand. It works!.

So far we have visited the Elbstrand Oevelgönne in Hamburg and the Baltic Sea in Mecklenburg-Vornpommern

Elbstrand Oevelgönne, Hamburg.
You have to be careful when a big ship is passing close.

The best for me is Elbstrand Oevelgönne, cause it’s close to the city so you can run away from the heat anytime and go back to a normal environment. It is literally in the Elbe so probably not a good one to get into the water, but the rest is really pretty and you can just throw your blanket and chill while you see all the ships passing by in the Elbe.

The Baltic Sea is also really pretty and the water is (i think) cleaner than the Elbe so is “safe”to go in. I say “safe” cause i saw several germans inside, but i also saw a lot of jellyfish so i’m not sure. Apparently this jellyfishes are non-poisonous but i don’t know them so i didn’t risk it. This one is also way more relax than the beaches in Hamburg, as there is normal to see people drinkking or listening to music, but in the Baltic Sea is more about getting in the water and making LOTS of sand castles.

So this summer in Germany is not as hot as last year’s (thankfully) but still hot enough to want some cold drinks other than water. And we were definitely not into going under the sun to the supermarket to buy drinks (and even less to get into the hot car to do so) so we took normal things we already had at home to make some nice – experimental beverages.

1. Watermelon – Orange – Basil

This one might sound odd but stay with me, it’s our favorite. The original version here was only Orange + Basil, which i know from my country and i kinda missed, unfortunately it was not enough to fill a glass and i added some watrmelon juice. NO.REGRETS ♥

We used no sugar but you can also add. Here the sugar for us was brought by the oranges. Also, the final color following this recipe is of a beatiful summer sunset.

Recipe:
2 Oranges
5 Big basil leafs
As much watermelon juice as you want.
1 cup of water

2. Watermelon – Cucumber

Another not-so-common mix but believe me it’s worth it.
For this one we used only Cucumber and Watermelon cause we wanted something refreshing and not so sweet.
This one might also taste great with honey, but the following recipe was ust perfect for a picnic by the beach on a really sunny day.

Recipe for a 500ml bottle:

1/6 of a watermelon
5 cucumber slices
1 cup of water

3. Watermelon – Lemon

Now a more safe mix: Watermelon lemonade with honey.
Every time we use lemon on a watery mix we try to use a bit of honey to avoid it being over acidic. This one is the easiest mix as you only need watermelon, lemon and some water, but let’s go to the recipe:

For this and the past 2 recipes literally mix everything in a blender and enjoy!

Recipe for a 500ml bottle:

1/6 of a watermelon
2 lemons (or limes)
1 cup of water
1 full tablespoon of raw honey

4. Classic Iced Tea

Another safe one! Here we made a tiny mistake and left the tea too long in hot water, so we reccomend that you leave it for just a couple of minutes (instead of like 10 as we did).
For this we used just hot water, one black tea bag and lemon so we think is one of the easiest to do as you might have all ingredients already.
Also it might taste better if you add honey or sugar.

Recipe:
1 black tea bag
1.5 cups of water (a cup is about 235ml)
1 lemon
Optional: 1 big tablespoon of sugar or honey

5. Green Tea + Honey

For green tea + honey the best is to add extra honey. Here we reccomend not going with sugar so all the mix remais as natural as possible (and so you get the best flavor out of the green tea). Truth is we are not into sweet green tea much, but the honey flavor here makes you feel like everything will be alright ♥

Recipe for 500ml:

1 green tea bag (with the possibility of chosing flavoured green tea if you need)
2 full tablespoons of honey
1.5 cups of water (1 cup is about 235ml)
you can also spice it up with a little ginger

6. Rose Hip – Lemon – Honey

This is probably the most difficult in ingredients to get so you can change the main the into any other red-fruit tea. Rose hip has different names in different languages. In German it is Hagebutte, in Spanish Escaramujo, Rosa Mosqueta or Rosa Canina. It is made with the buds, not with the flowers and gives a nice sweet taste to the mix.

Recipe:

1 tea bag of Rose Hip or any red fruit you can find
1 lemon
1.5 cups of water
1 big tablespoon of raw honey

For the tea mixes every time we speak of water it is the water you need to make the tea, not extra water 🙂