I’ve got two weaknesses when it comes to non-alcoholic drinks.  The first is just plain ‘ol soda water (flavored or unflavored).  The other is a nice sharp ginger ale.  The past few months found me working for days to try and make a good yeast-carbonated ginger ale.  While I’ve brewed for many years, doing soda is different in a number of ways.  The pressures are higher, the chances of contamination by wild yeast is a lot higher, and you usually have to work with batches of a gallon or more.  Then there’s the yeast that sits in the bottom of the bottle waiting to be poured into your glass.  I’ve given up with that, at least for now.

I recently picked up a Soda Stream mostly to make carbonated water, but the design allows you to add flavorings after the water is carbonated.  You only work with a 1L bottle at a time, so it’s easy to make a small batch and you can also get results in a few hours rather than days.

When I make food I want it to be simple.  Or at least start simple and complicate from there as I learn more about the recipe I’m working on.

First impressions of this recipe:

Started with 1oz but there wasn’t enough flavor.  I made the mistake of just dumping the second ounce in and got the counter, floor, and myself rather wet.  The concentrate looks really dark due to the Turbinado sugar but will create a nice caramel color after it’s added to the water.

Possible changes:

• More ginger
• Grate or puree ginger
• Fruit juices for sugar rather than Turbinado (apple concentrate?)