SO NOTWITHSTANDING OUR BOHÉMIEN FRIENDS and their two-wheeled delivery system, speed is of the essence. This helps to explain why elderflower in the bar trade has traditionally been available only as a non-alcoholic syrup – what some Europeans refer to as a cordial – extracted from freeze-dried or frozen flowers.
        This sort of concoction tends to be cloyingly sweet and frustratingly inconsistent – traits a bar-tender must occasionally endure amongst his clientele, but never, we hope, amongst his ingredients.
        As we were saying, speed is crucial to preserving the freshness and flavor of these fragile blossoms. To that end, they arrive at our distillery post-haste and are immediately macerated to capture the freshest flavor.
        Here again is another reason nothing like St-Germain has ever been created before. Traditional maceration processes yield little flavor from these tiny blossoms. Unfortunately, the other customary option, pressing the flowers, causes a regrettable bitterness.