One can never have too much thyme, but I often find myself with a lot of leftover thyme stems. These woody, inedible, but still fragrant little plant parts may seem unusable, but you can reclaim every bit of your thyme by using them to flavour cocktail syrup.
Photo: Claire Lower
The process is no more complicated than making a regular simple syrup. Just heat a cup of sugar and a cup of water in a pot until the sugar dissolves, then chuck your (rinsed) de-leafed stems in the pot and put the lid on. You can throw some citrus peels in there too if you have them lying around, but be careful as they can very easily overpower the thyme. Put the lid on the pot, let everything steep for an hour (or overnight), then strain the syrup through a fine mesh sieve into a pretty bottle. Use in any cocktail you want a little more thyme with; I like to spend a lot of thyme with gin.
This is part of Eating Trash With Claire, a Lifehacker series where Claire Lower convinces you to transform your kitchen scraps into something edible and delicious.
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