One of my facebook friends put up a photo tutorial on how to make Ginger-Ale.  We have a kegerator, and extra empty soda kegs sitting around, so I thought, “Gee…maybe Trevor and Jim can make a batch of Ginger-Ale!”

Step one, though, would be to sample my friend’s Ginger Ale to see if we even liked it.  No sense in making 5-gallons of it if nobody in our house is going to drink it!  So a couple weeks ago, the kids and I drove over and sampled his home-made beverage.  VERY ginger tasting, quite “spicy” really!  The kids and I agreed we would make a milder version with less ginger. 

So the next day I went to the grocery store and picked up a sack of lemons,

a good size chunk of ginger,

and a bag of organic sugar. 

A few days later Jim and Trevor set up the kitchen for their soda making adventure.

Trevor squeezed all the juice from the lemons, and measured out all the sugar.  I grated the ginger root.  Jim got the pots all set up and the stove ready.  We mixed it all together, brought it to almost a boil, and let it simmer for 30 minutes.  Strained it, poured it into the keg, topped it off with cool water, sealed the keg and connected the CO2. 

We let it carbonate for 2 days.  Poured a glass, it was too sweet.  Too syrupy.  Not carbonated.  He set the carbonation again and we tried it the next evening.  Still the same.  One more day.  Same.  Hmmmmm.  So that night Jim shook the keg for about 10 minutes and reattached the CO2.  The next afternoon (Friday) we poured a sample cup- and ta-da!!  It’s fully carbonated.  Not so sugary syrupy sweet anymore either.  It’s DELICIOUS!

Trevor has decided his next soda-making adventure will be to make a lemon-lime drink, kind of like 7-up I guess.  Jim would like to make some sort of berry sparkling water beverage.  This could be a lot of fun!