Ginger beer is made by fermenting ginger, sugar, and water — though most commercial versions skip the fermentation and add carbonation directly. The result should be spicy, slightly earthy, and noticeably gingery. The best ginger beers bite — you feel the heat of the ginger. Weaker versions taste more like ginger-flavored sparkling water. Fever-Tree and Reed's are standards. In cocktails, ginger beer is a mixer, not a garnish — it changes the character of whatever it's combined with.
Why It Matters
Ginger beer with backbone transforms simple drinks. A Moscow Mule made with a bold ginger beer is a completely different experience from one made with watery ginger ale. The spice cuts through sweet ingredients, adds warmth, and creates a kind of complexity that's hard to replicate any other way.
Where You'll Use It
Moscow Mule, Dark and Stormy, Penicillin, Kentucky Mule, and any highball format where ginger is a component.
Worth Knowing
Tonic Water
Tonic water is carbonated water with quinine (from cinchona bark) added, which gives it a distinctive bitter flavor. Quality varies dramatically between brands — commercial tonic is often very sweet with only a faint bitterness, while premium tonic (Fever-Tree, Q, 1724) has a cleaner sweetness and more pronounced quinine. In a simple Gin and Tonic, the tonic is half the drink.
Club Soda
Club soda is water carbonated with dissolved minerals — sodium bicarbonate, potassium sulfate — that give it a slightly salty, mineral taste. It's a neutral sparkling extender in cocktails: it adds carbonation without adding sweetness or flavor. Different from sparkling water in that the mineral content is deliberate and adds a mild character.
Sparkling Water / Seltzer
Sparkling water and seltzer are carbonated water without added minerals or flavor — neutral extension and carbonation only. In cocktails, they're used when you want bubbles without any additional character. The difference between seltzer and sparkling water is primarily branding — they're functionally the same in cocktail applications.