Coming soon to Beer Table - dried lemon, juniper & hops soda!

Last week we dropped off a keg of apple & ginger carbonated juice with the good folks at Beer Table (in Park Slope) who now have a dedicated soda draft line. It seemed to go over well which made us very happy. This week Antonio has been hard at work finalizing the recipe for a more experimental bitter soda -  a dried lemon, juniper & hops soda - which we think will go great with the range of beer that Beer Table has.

The dried lemons we picked up from our favorite spice store in Manhattan, Dual Speciality Store in the East Village. These are lemons or limes that have been dried in the sun until they are hard, dry and nearly black. Apparently they are used in some middle eastern cuisines.  We had been eyeing them for months, wondering what they tasted like (delicious tart, lemony, earthy funk!) and finally decided to pick some up and try some recipes.  Juniper berries (not really a berry, but the female seed cone produced by some species of juniper trees) are used in northern European cuisines, and are one of the predominant flavors in gin. Hops of course are used in beer, we used chinook hops, a very bitter and very aromatic variety used in American style IPA's.  So, while these components are from very different places, they have overlapping but still complementary flavor profiles that make for a nice mix- the tartness and earthiness of the lemons seems to pair really well with the piney aromatics of the juniper berries and the bitter, citrousy notes of the chinook hops.  There is also a touch of raw honey to balance things out, though the soda is not at all sweet. 

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Look for this flavor at Beer Table sometime early January, and stop by now to try some apple ginger and some great beer.

Happy Holidays! A little cranberry magic to spice up your meals

Happy Holidays!  I'm writing from Hong Kong where I'm awaiting the arrival of the other half who has been slogging away in the lab and the kitchen making a couple of kegs in time for the Christmas / New Year's week at Beer Table. Go Tony!

It's only another couple of days till Christmas and if you're getting sick of the egg nog, here's a recipe that should spice things up. This recipe was first seen in Nona Brooklyn's Food & Drinks Picks for the Holidays, collected by Rebecca Lando of Working Class Foodies - check out the guide for other delicious ideas from other Brooklyn food peeps, such as Danielle from Brooklyn Home Brew and Liz from Liddabit Sweets. 

Spiced Cranberry Soda

(makes one liter)

half pound cranberries
1 cinnamon stick
10 cloves
2 balls allspice (feel free to experiment with other spices such as nutmeg)
1/4 cup sugar

1. Bring 700ml water to boil in pot. Add in cinnamon.
2. Clean cranberries. Add to water.
3. Simmer for 20 minutes, stirring regularly.
4. Add in clove and allspice. Cut heat. Leave everything in pot for 5 minutes.
5. Strain and filter.
6. Pour into a carbonating device such as a ISI soda siphon. Add in cold water. Carbonate (if you don't own a soda siphon, you can simply add seltzer water to the juice to get a fizzy beverage, or this cranberry juice is also a great mixer for use with vodka).

A successful party! Brooklyn Soda Works at Beer Table!

It was great to see a number of you at our party with SCRATCHbread last week - and congratulations to SCRATCHbread for making their goal on Kickstarter. We served up lemon, thyme & green peppercorn soda (paired with gin) and spiced apple cider with bourbon, while Matt & his team made up a delicious batch of fondue - perfect for a freezing cold evening. Thanks again to Red Jacket Orchard and The Manhattan Cocktail Classic for kindly donating the apples and booze!

We still have a couple of things up our sleeve for the last part of 2010. We're happy to announce that Beer Table in Park Slope will soon be carrying our soda. We'll be starting off with a keg of apple & ginger soda this coming weekend to celebrating the new draft system that Justin from Beer Table has installed, and hopefully after that we'll be dropping off fun new flavors with them on a regular basis.  

We're incredibly excited about working with Justin and Tricia - their bar has been the location of a number of our 'work meetings' and they also host a monthly home-brewer's meet-up where we've tried out test batches of root beer on unwitting home-brewers. They have one of the most eclectic and interesting beer selections in New York, and their space is always wonderfully welcoming and intimate. Plus its one of the few places I get to eat a malt gelato after drinking a beer that smells like engine oil.

Also happening this weekend (December 18th from 3-5pm) is a demo that I'll be doing in Pantry Magic in Hong Kong (where I'll be for the rest of December). I'll be demonstrating how to make your own spiced cranberry soda, as well as a lemongrass & lime soda, and a salty lemon & ginger soda.

Brooklyn Soda Works & SCRATCHbread invite you to a holiday party & fundraiser!

You're invited!
To celebrate the end of our successful first season and our upcoming partnership with SCRATCHbread, we're co-hosting a fizzy fondue extravaganza & fundraiser.


We'll be making:

- gin cocktails with our lemon, thyme & green peppercorn soda

- bourbon spiced apple cider with cider from Red Jacket Orchards

SCRATCHbread will be slinging fondue featuring their delicious breads and Granny Smith apples from Red Jacket Orchards.

When: December 7th, 5-9pm

Where: 1069 Bedford Ave (at Lexington)

$10 at the door gets you fondue or a drink (all proceeds go towards SCRATCHbread's Kickstarter campaign)