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From banana soda to hard blue raspberry slushies, Clover Food Lab and Downeast Cider bring unique flavors to your summer palate

From banana soda to hard blue raspberry slushies, Clover Food Lab and Downeast Cider bring unique flavors to your summer palate

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From banana soda to hard blue raspberry slushies, Clover Food Lab and Downeast Cider bring unique flavors to your summer palate

A local company is thinking outside the bottle when it comes to the sodas at its restaurants. Clover Food Lab creates its own sodas with unique flavors including vanilla, rhubarb, and banana. Restaurant staff make the soda syrups in-house each day and then mix them with carbonated water.

The staff at Clover Food Lab provided Chronicle with a recipe for viewers who want to make their own soda syrups at home. You’ll find that recipe at the end of this story.

Downeast Cider is known for the product that’s right in its name: cider. After more than a decade in business, the East Boston-based brewing company is expanding its range to products they call “beyond cider.” Those beverages include one of Downeast’s summer offerings, Slushie. There’s no apple in this drink. Instead, it is made from an alcoholic base made of fermented sugar and yeast.

Clover Food Lab's Ginger Soda Syrup

Courtesy: Clover Food Lab

Makes 3 cups of syrup

● 1/4 cup chopped ginger, peeled with the side of a spoon and chopped into 1/2 inch pieces

● 1 1/2 cups sugar

● 3 cups water

● ¼ teaspoon salt

● 1 1/2 teaspoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

● Sparkling water to taste

1. Put all ingredients (except for the sparkling water) in a blender. Gradually work up to high speed for about a minute.

2. Strain the mixture through a fine mesh strainer. This strained mixture is your soda syrup.

3. Fill a glass with ice. Pour soda water into the glass, leaving about a half inch of space at the top. Top with soda syrup. Taste. Add more syrup if you'd like it to be a bit sweeter. We recommend 2-3 oz (4-6 tablespoons) of syrup for every 10 ounces of sparkling water.

Rhubarb Soda Syrup

Source: Clover Food Lab

Makes 3 cups of syrup

1. Put all ingredients (except for the sparkling water) in a blender. Gradually work up to high speed for about a minute.

2. Strain the mixture through a fine mesh strainer. This strained mixture is your soda syrup.

3. Fill a glass with ice. Pour soda water into the glass, leaving about a half inch of space at the top. Top with soda syrup. Taste. Add more syrup if you'd like it to be a bit sweeter. We recommend 2-3 oz (4-6 tablespoons) of syrup for every 10 ounces of sparkling water.