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1
Place the almonds in a bowl and cover with cold water and allowed them to soak for 30 minutes.
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2
Drain and discard this water, then crush the almonds using a rolling pin, or you could use a food processor to chop them to a fine grind.
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3
If you need to, you can add some of the water to the food processor.
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4
Transfer the crushed almonds to a large bowl and mix them with the water, let stand for one to two hours.
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5
Place a damp cloth or cheese cloth in a mesh filter, over another bowl, and strain the almond and water mixture - squeeze the cloth to extract all the liquid.
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6
Put the chopped almonds back into the almond water, let it stand for another hour and then strain again.
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7
Repeat a third time if you wish.
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8
This is will get all the oils out of the almonds.
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9
Note: To speed up the process you can gently heat the almond water to 50u00b0C (125u00b0F). If you do this, you can cut the soak times to about 15 minutes.
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10
Pour the strained liquid into a pan, discard the almond pulp, add the sugar and cook over gentle heat, stirring constantly.
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11
Remove from the heat when the sugar is completely dissolved.
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12
Allow to cool for 15 minutes and then add the brandy or vodka and the orange flower water.
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13
Store the orgeat in a clean glass bottle.
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14
Once the orgeat has cooled down it is ready to use.
