Two kegs in and I'm sold using syrups for variety rocks!

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TomSD said:
I really like the results with Splenda... well the store brand but same difference.

I don't mind the taste of the plain carbonated water so I guess in that I'm lucky. I'm not a big fan of syrupy drinks so drink mine way on the lite side... more flavored seltzer than soda/pop. If I didn't like the bite of the carbed water I would be screwed.
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I actually really like plain carbonated water a lot. I think it's just that I'm trying to get the water to taste like regular pop. That may be my problem. If I don't expect it to taste exactly like store bought pop, perhaps I'll like it even more.

Definitely going to give sucralose a shot on the next round of syrups.
 
I just tried mine out tonight. Ordered cola, rootbeer, vanilla, orange, black cherry, and the pink lemonade. Used regular sugar and dd the 2.75 cups in the 19 oz of water and the 1 oz of concentrate in the qt. bottle. Tired out the rootbeer and cola in a 16 oz glass with some cubes. Pumped in 16. Still a lil dry for my taste. Might have to wind up putting a lil more sugar in.
 
I'm wondering if you put sugar (splenda - store brand) in the water in the keg, or just plain water? I'm planning on doing this when I force carb my beer for the SWMBO. I'll have a regulator that can carb at different pressures so i'm not worried about that. I'm just not sure if you sugar the water thats getting carbed.
 
Nope just poured a 5 gal jug of my bottled spring water into the keg and carbed it. When you make the syrup you add all the sweetener and flavoring you need.

HeavyBrew ... give more squirts a go. The actual suggested is 3 oz syrup to 7 oz water but to me that is WAY too sweet/syrupy. I do it at 1 oz syrup to 15 oz water if that tells you anything. The 16 squirt thing is only 1 oz to 15 oz water... you could double or even triple it and still be below what they suggest, lol. I do find myself adding more of the sarsaparilla and root beer to give it more bite but even then it is nowhere near their suggested ratio.
 
and the silicone orings im told are less likely for the soda (ie, root beer) to adhere to. i ordered 100 packs of them from mcmaster super cheap.
 
Yeah flavor exchange is one of the reasons I like just carbing water. That and I REALLY like having the variety.

McMaster rocks for that I have enough gaskets to cover me for pretty much ever plus I've gotten all kinds of random stuff from them (tap inserts, bayonets, quick connects, etc).
 
I will be doing this soon, I love seltzer water as is, and I also love a good Italian soda, so from now on I will be making my own seltzer water! I already have the syrups in the pump bottles. I typically make my sodas with Pellegrino and milk (I do 50/50 seltzer and milk, usually with peach syrup). Now I will forgo the store bought water and make my own! I don't know why I haven't thought of this before.
 
TomSD said:
Nope just poured a 5 gal jug of my bottled spring water into the keg and carbed it. When you make the syrup you add all the sweetener and flavoring you need.

HeavyBrew ... give more squirts a go. The actual suggested is 3 oz syrup to 7 oz water but to me that is WAY too sweet/syrupy. I do it at 1 oz syrup to 15 oz water if that tells you anything. The 16 squirt thing is only 1 oz to 15 oz water... you could double or even triple it and still be below what they suggest, lol. I do find myself adding more of the sarsaparilla and root beer to give it more bite but even then it is nowhere near their suggested ratio.
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Thanks, that helps. I won't be so stingy. I was being to think I did something wrong.
 
I just pumped 32 pumps of the cola into about 14-15 ozs of water. Much better, but the cola isn't that great, lol. I'll try my others later tonight. Thanks for making me brave Tom, lol. If you think about it, a can of coke is about 140 calories, an oz of syrup is 70 cal. I guess there has to be some kind of relation to getting that right flavor..
 
Yeah the cola was 'meh' at best but I use it to mix with vanilla which comes out good. Sarsaparilla and root beer are great though I think.

I really like that it is no calories, if you go with sugar substitute, or caffeine though. That and flavor to taste since most sodas I don't care for... too syrupy/sweet.
 
TomSD said:
Yeah the cola was 'meh' at best but I use it to mix with vanilla which comes out good. Sarsaparilla and root beer are great though I think.

I really like that it is no calories, if you go with sugar substitute, or caffeine though. That and flavor to taste since most sodas I don't care for... too syrupy/sweet.
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I hear ya, thanks for showing us. It all started with me wanting to make some rootbeer at home. One of these days I'll have to figure out how to make some from scratch..
 
This is next on my list. I have a keg of Sprecher root beer carbing for the kiddies for Halloween. Once that is gone, I'm planning on carbing water and using your syrups. I've been drinking too much caffeine in the evening and this seems like a great way to get great carbs drinks without the caffeine.
I just hope I can get the root beer taste out of my keg.
 
I just made the mistake of looking at the ingredients. Proplylene glycol? Well, at least my blood won't freeze in the winter :p

-Joe
 
Om nom sarsaparilla! The recipe calls for 1 1/4# of sugar. I used 3/4# and it's plenty sweet for me. I went with 20 pumps/pint for the first try and I like it so far.

Thanks for the thread!

-Joe
 
OK... this makes me want to do the keezer build even more!

Does anyone know if there exists a 'tonic syrup'? (I've already e-mailed the folks at Prairie Moon - I'll let you know what they say.)

Would love to execute this method for tonic water (or just mix a corney with tonic out of a bag-in-box, water, gin, and roses lime... G&T on tap..)

Definitely like the variety of this method and the fact that it's not putting anything but water in one of my kegs...
 
Been carbing water for a while now for the wife and have started to really like it. I have a number of those clear flip top bottles that fancy lemonade comes in (if there is an ikea around they have them cheap too).

We like taking a slice of cucumber (cut like a pickle spear) and putting it inside the bottle. Makes a very refreshing drink. Fresh ginger is nice too.

I am interested in trying the syrups...this summer I used kool-aid and a simple syrup for snow cones...makes a pretty good grape soda as well.

If you have a Mexican supermarket nearby they have some very interesting powered flavors...have not tried any yet but the tamarind sounds really interesting. Just make a simple syrup add your flavor powder and then reduce it down till it gets to a consistency you like.
 
I ordered half a dozen today. Can't wait till I get them in.


Primary- Kolsch
Kegged- Sorachi Ace Pilsner, Wet Hop Citra Pale Ale, 10 Gal Black IPA, 10 Gal Oatmeal Stout
Bottled- Berliner Weisse, Zeus IPA
Next batches- Greenbelt Pale Ale, 100% Brett Pale Ale, SMaSH
 
viiiwonder said:
Would love to execute this method for tonic water (or just mix a corney with tonic out of a bag-in-box, water, gin, and roses lime... G&T on tap..)
QUOTE]

I mixed whiskey and coke (poured from 2 liter bottles) into a corney and it worked really well the first night but after that I couldn't get it to pour without foam, not sure if it was the liquor or what but I never got it to work right after that first night.

Mike
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Correct me if I'm wrong (been a while since my teen age years working in fast food) but isn't that how restaurant's serve soda, mixing syrup and carb. water on demand? I seem to remember replacing syrup boxes. I think I'll give this a try.
 
Yeah, its what restaurants do, but this is done on the cheap compared to them, and you get to mess with the ratos if you want.
 
correct me if i am wrong here but wouldnt using this method also contain wayyyyy less sodium then the store bought soda does(typically 30to45mg per 8oz)??
 
I just ordered a good variety of flavors from PM for when I get my keezer finally finished (hopefully within the next few days!) I'm excited to give this a try.

I was thinking this syrup may also double as a good flavoring for shaved ice.
 
Yeah it does, right out of the bottle... a couple squirts.

I'm still using the heck out of it and just to get an idea how long the stuff lasts I have one more refill, which I am about ready for, then I have to start thinking about reordering. I've lost count of how many kegs of water I have gone through so far, lol.

The only thing I wasn't happy with is the tube in the bottles is cut too short. Not by a lot but enough that you have to jockey around for the last little bit then pour out maybe a serving at the end. I would've preferred a better fit but other than that the bottles have worked great. I think the big key is keeping them in the fridge to protect against mold or bugs, specially if you use sugar instead of substitute.
 
TomSD said:
I like those! Been thinking of going pour or something with a longer draw... pumping stops making sense when you have to pump like 30 times, lol.
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yea, they seem pretty awesome! I like the lid that is stored on the bottom and i can replace the spout so it stays sealed while not in use. I can't wait for the extracts to get here, they shipped out today.
 
I'm so glad you just replied to this thread - I had forgotten I wanted to do this once I got my keezer up and running, and I too am due to finish mine once KegConnection de-ices their warehouse this week!
 
I've always wondered why I saw bits and pieces about having to pump 30 times but I never saw the bottles in the very early postings.
I've been using old Torani bottles with pumps (I get most of them for coffee flavors and I also keep 5 pounds of caramel, butterscotch and hershey's around. ) but early on made myself sodas with a soda siphon. The co2 tank has made things easier there. The torani pumps pull 1/4 an ounce per pump.
http://shop.torani.com/Syrup-Dispensing-Pump/p/TOR-010030&c=Torani@Syrups

Most food service places should have something that will create the longer draw, usually in the snowcone syrup area actually.
 
Ironic you should bring that up, I saw on Prairie Moon's site that they had a 1 oz draw pump, but they only indicated that it fit the .5 & 1 gallon containers. I e-mailed asking if it would fit the smaller bottle and received this response just two days ago:

"The 1 oz pump will not fit our current quart bottle. However, we are getting a new quart bottle which it will fit. Check back the end of next week. We hope to have it on the web site by then."
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I'll be waiting until then to place my order...
 
Those are much better looking. Actually, I was going to recommend something like that regarding using one of the 5 pound hershey bottles and a pump that gave about an ounce. I didn't measure it out though, but I thought it was about that amount. (I don't know why I didn't think of it. I had measured the torani syrup and downed the syrup, but I was actually using the chocolate syrup for a chocolate kefir.) http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00125UJWG/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20 but they're up there in price. Glad I got all of mine for free.

I'll probably have to get some of those and some containers when I get some extract from them. I don't have any empty Torani bottles left. The three that I had kept now contain cola, root beer and ginger ale syrups.
 
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Thanks for the tip. Just got delivery on the syrups. I went ahead with a 25' beer line. Does this sound like a good length?
 
25' should probably work. I went with the inserts to reduce the flow though and they work great. I left my line lengths the same across all my taps then used two inserts in each seltzer keg.
 
TomSD said:
25' should probably work. I went with the inserts to reduce the flow though and they work great. I left my line lengths the same across all my taps then used two inserts in each seltzer keg.
Click to expand...

Thanks. I'll probably buy the inserts and hang onto them in case I need the line length for something else.
 

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