We hate cough drops almost as much as we hate coughing. The ones we buy in the store either taste like candy or some kind of poison, and the throat-soothing affect of either is always a little dubious. But here are some cough drops we think we can get on board with: the homemade kind!
This tutorial comes by way of the Instructables website, and simply combines super-concentrated tea with a dose of sugar. You boil them together until reaching the hard-crack stage and then pour the syrup into a simple mold made of powder sugar to harden. (By the by, that powder sugar mold has intriguing candy-making possibilities, no?)
One batch makes dozens of little lozenges - more than enough to keep us stocked through the cold and flu season. Wrapped in wax paper, we can carry them around in a pocket or backpack for when we need them. We think a little packet would also make an excellent addition to a care package for a sick friend or family member.
The tutorial makes this look easy enough to do even while sick, but we think we'll make a preventative batch just to be on the safe side!
Get the Tutorial: Homemade Cough Drops from Scoochmaroo via Instructables
Related: Recipe: Bourbon Cough Syrup for Grownups
(Image: Scoochmaroo via Instructables)
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Fantastic! Thank you!
Wow! I would have never thought of this. I love this idea!
I have done something similar with a strong horehound tea. It worked out very well.
I feel the same about most, if not all, shop cough sweets (the swiss herbal brand Ricola is the best of a bad bunch IMO) so thank you for this! I also just fancy trying out this method.
martha stewart also has an awesome recipe for homemade cough drops with ginger and horehound.
I'd like to try this with Traditional Medicinals Throat Coat tea. I've found it to be a very effective remedy (although I can't discount the placebo effect in that.)
Traditional Medicinals makes a pastilles version of Throat Coat, but they're ridiculously expensive -- about $7 for 24, $0.30 each. (A 30-count bag of Walgreens cough drops is going for $0.50 on the website -- less than $0.02 each.)
The Throat Coat tea bags are $3.50 for 16, and this recipe appears to make about 34 cough drops out of 4 tea bags. That's $0.88 worth of tea bags, or about $0.03 a cough drop, plus the cost of the sugar. Still more expensive than the Walgreens, but also a lot more pleasant.
But...but...the cherry Luden's are tasty. lol.
Anyway, I never bother with cough drops, because yes, the 'medicated' types are nasty. If I have a sore throat I nuke some jello back into its liquid stage and drink that warm.
@Kakugori does that have any kind of medicinal effect other than it being a warm liquid or do you just like warm liquid jello? lol I've not ever heard of anyone doing this.
Well, I just like warm liquid jello (much more than I like it cold!). But the gelatin sort of coats your throat going down, and it feels nice. More effective than a cough drop, IMO.
@Kakugori: My mom used to do this for me when I was a kid! I had forgotten about that. I don't know anything about relative effectiveness, but I was sick a lot, and apparently a huge pain about eating and drinking when I was sick, and this was one of the things that would work for me.
Oh, interesting! I've always loved Traditional Medicinal's Throat Coat. I'll definitely have to try this.
My recipe for homemade cough drops just uses standard herbs like horehound and elder flowers, but using Throat Coat sounds so much more intriguing. :-)
http://www.nourishingjoy.com/homemade-cough-drops/
Oh, interesting! I've always loved Traditional Medicinal's Throat Coat. I'll definitely have to try this.
My recipe for homemade cough drops just uses standard herbs like horehound and elder flowers, but using Throat Coat sounds so much more intriguing. :-)
http://www.nourishingjoy.com/homemade-cough-drops/