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DIY Soft Drinks

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Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#161

Post by kakacik »

lopis wrote: post #139
peaxkl wrote: post #24

I recently started getting into homemade ClubMate production. The goal was to create a drink that has caffeine, less sugar than regular mate and is still tasty. It took me 4-5 tries to get to a recipe that tastes good. Earlier tries involved cooking the mate, which led to a bitter taste. Cold brewing led to way better results. Here is my current recipe for 5 bottles (á 0,5l): - 60g mate tea leaves (coarse) [1] - 500m…

65 grams of sugar for 500ml is "less sugar"?How, if a 500ml bottle of club mate only has 25 grams? Did you mean 6.5 grams perhaps? Edit: My bad, I didn't realise that was for 5 bottles. Carry on.

Still not great if consumed regularly, sugar is one of the worst thing we pump our bodies. Its basically a slow acting poison that kills our organs. Complex carbs are better, but stuff in drinks is same as eating spoonfulls of it directly

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#162

Post by malloryerik »

I'd be interested in soft drinks that were unsweetened altogether and not just sugar free. Sometimes I have sparkling water + apple cider vinegar + lemon/lime juice and it's wonderful when well mixed.

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#163

Post by lagniappe »

jfengel wrote: post #159
mattmaroon wrote: post #22

One pro-tip as I now somehow have a commercial bottling license these days: get pre-hydrated gum Arabic. Much easier to work with. Almost everybody who messes this up will make the mistake at the hydrating the gum Arabic stage. Blend it with any dry ingredients like sugar before using. If you can’t source it, I’m not going to tell you that you SHOULD pretend to be a bottling company and ask a gum provider to send you…

I wonder how they pulled off Crystal Pepsi. A neat trick, even if nobody cared.

The 90's were a magical place. Best we can do now is Clear Pepsi.

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#164

Post by juvvel »

Ah, good old Dragonspice.de, they have provided me with supplies for many of my experiments as well. I have many of the essential oils already, I might try this! Thank you for posting your recipe.

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#165

Post by juvvel »

nchmy wrote: post #17

I bottled 20 litres of kombucha yesterday with ginger and lemongrass. It'll be very fizzy and ready to drink in 3-5 days. Costs next to nothing and quite healthy - water, black tea, sugar, (gifted and self-reproducing) scoby. The flavourings are what costs most, depending on what you use.

Kombucha is the best "natural" soft drink for me, too. It's not entirely sugar-free, though (even though you can get it to low-sugar with longer fermentation).

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#166

Post by Fnoord »

aitchnyu wrote: post #4

Disappointed there is no carbon dioxide injection. In the 90s till date in this corner of India, Mr Butler is a compact pure mechanical device which can make nose tickling strong sodas. If I were a soda fan, I would have DIYed and rejected the flat mop water that most commercial sodas have become.

Right? In the summer, there's two things I drink. Cold water overnight infused with whatever (lemon, cucumber, mint, etc) and carbonated water from the store. Both are cheap to make and pleasant when it is hot. Neither has added sugar. You can also infuse with fruits like strawberries. In the other parts of the year (esp. winter) I make a can of tea (nearly 1,5l) with two teabags. One cup of tea is about 0,2l so it will last the whole day, and it stays hot for 24h. Make in morning and you got whole day together (we are two drinking this). Sometimes goes to waste cause of being away, too hot weather. There's a lot of good fusion brands available (I like Yogi Tea's blends a lot), you can also make your own herbal mix. Just be careful with some herbs and medication.

The carbonated water and lemon in water make for an acidic liquid. This is nice when it is hot, but it is also bad for teeth. So I do try to limit these somewhat, never drink it right before brushing, brush 2x a week, and floss with those special toothpicks. I also drink the acidic stuff with the main meal in evening when the teeth already get a blast from the meal, regularly at least.

As a former wine drinker (who can also appreciate special beers and heavy liquor) I was not able to stick to one beer on friday evening, and I recognized the struggle to battle an addiction, being an alcoholic in disguise. I've been sober past years, approx 4, apart from an occasional mistake due to alcohol in a desert or an intentional tiramisu during Christmas.

I also still drink coffee, but with caffeine not so much. Mainly in morning/afternoon. As a kid I was a fan of cola, the coca cola one (for some reason never liked other ones like Aldi's or Pepsi much; there's a lot of choice these days). Club Mate is a bit hard to source and the pfand is annoying (justified, but...) to send back from NL. But I been able to quit that in puberty. So, while I like cheap/bulk, I am not sure what I could gain from DIY soda (the carbonated water is cheap and we get the groceries at the doorstep, also useful since we don't have a car).

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#167

Post by nchmy »

juvvel wrote: post #165
nchmy wrote: post #17

I bottled 20 litres of kombucha yesterday with ginger and lemongrass. It'll be very fizzy and ready to drink in 3-5 days. Costs next to nothing and quite healthy - water, black tea, sugar, (gifted and self-reproducing) scoby. The flavourings are what costs most, depending on what you use.

Kombucha is the best "natural" soft drink for me, too. It's not entirely sugar-free, though (even though you can get it to low-sugar with longer fermentation).

I'm not concerned with sugar-free. I drink maybe 500ml per day, and otherwise consume ZERO added sugar. And It's surely a small fraction of the sugar in soda, fruit juices etc... I also like it sour/highly fermented

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#168

Post by bombcar »

malloryerik wrote: post #162

I'd be interested in soft drinks that were unsweetened altogether and not just sugar free. Sometimes I have sparkling water + apple cider vinegar + lemon/lime juice and it's wonderful when well mixed.

Sparkling iced tea would likely hit a spot.

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#169

Post by hutattedonmyarm »

qmr wrote: post #160
mattmaroon wrote: post #22

One pro-tip as I now somehow have a commercial bottling license these days: get pre-hydrated gum Arabic. Much easier to work with. Almost everybody who messes this up will make the mistake at the hydrating the gum Arabic stage. Blend it with any dry ingredients like sugar before using. If you can’t source it, I’m not going to tell you that you SHOULD pretend to be a bottling company and ask a gum provider to send you…

What's the use in ice cream? My ice cream is just ... ice cream. Cream, milk, sugar.

As an emulsifier, allowing the fats and the water to mix better. I _think_ it also might help to trap air bubbles. It helps you turn on the creaminess-knob

Re: DIY Soft Drinks

#170

Post by amelius »

rootusrootus wrote: post #53
SamDc73 wrote: post #26

I switched to zero sugar about a year ago, but all the zero sugar sodas use aspartame (yeah yeah not proven to cause cancer, but still not a great sweetener) for now (out of laziness), I just grab plain sparkling water and add Stur drops Also didn’t expect to be pulling recipes off GitHub, but I’ll take that any day over those paywalled sites Definitely want to give this a try!

> aspartame (yeah yeah not proven to cause cancer, but still not a great sweetener) Compared to what? Aspartame is almost certainly the most studied artificial sweetener in existence, and the safety profile looks very good.

Yes, I wish aspartame was used more.

I hate those stupid sugar alcohols, and stevia as well. Yuck.

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