Come with me as I explore carbonation. We’ll blow things up. We’ll dissolve gas into liquid. We’ll get nice and silly from the bubbles doing weird things to our tummies and brains and blood…My friend Lee after I told him about us finally doing carbonated cocktails said “That’s so 2019, dude.” Thanks asshole…Whatever, I’ve always been a late bloomer…Anyway, it ain’t as easy as it looks, Mr. Lee. There’s a number of rules you have to follow and sometimes it doesn’t really seem worth all the effort but it is fun and the cost is negligible…About $150 all said and done for the set up…Let’s go.

If you want to experiment with cocktail carbonation, look no further than your friendly neighborhood aging bartender to help you. I actually learned most of this from another aging bartender, a dude I’ll call…Melodist K…A singer of cocktails and exceptional service from my neighborhood. A bit of a doppelgänger or myself or maybe I am of him…A man spiraling down into middle age while also having two young children and working five nights a week in a restaurant bar. Yes, sometimes you look in the mirror and another face looks back at you. A face not your own but eerily similar.

About a year ago, I saw this other dad at the park wearing a Fernet Branca sweatshirt. A bearded, bespectacled, tall drink of water with a sarcastic aura. The next couple of times I saw him I noticed a certain gait, an air if you will, of being pummeled mercilessly by his own choices. Yes, we know our own kind and only those middle class, middle aged schlubs who can’t afford nannies to watch after the beautiful monsters they’ve created with their unbridled passion and lust can possibly know what I am speaking of.

On a particular morning, Melodist K was wearing a margarita t shirt and so I asked him ”Are you a bartender?” To which he replied, “Yes.” The rest was history. I now had a person with which to speak with about specs, reps, techniques, and favorite sorts of booze while going through the tedium of pushing a swing or digging a hole in sand.

Fast forward a year or so and he got me to go whole hog on the CO2.

Anyway, the articles you read in online mags tell you some of the story but not all. They give options but not details. They don’t give you a list of the formula or the best equipment which is what I’m about to do for you.

Best equipment is going to be a big ol’ C02 tank which costs about $32 and weighs about 80 pounds. A length of hose for it about five feet long ($5) from the hardware store, two hose clamps ($3 for both), a C02 regulator ($60), a three pack of carbonation caps ($10), a two pack of ball locks ($10) and some empty plastic soda bottles (I bought six for $12).

Save yourself the trouble of doing the isi whipper thing. It’ll cost almost as much and be less satisfactory.

Here, I’ll make the list look better (be careful when googling this stuff as some NSFW images may pop up in the S&M realm when you Google “ball lock” and “hose clamp”):

CO2 tank

CO2 Regulator

Length of Hose/Tubing

Two Hose Clamps

Ball Lock

Carbonation Caps

Plastic Soda Bottles (1.5 liter preferred)

The whole thing looks like this all said and done.

There’s myriad information on the interwebs on how to put this all together. You can make sodas, and force carbonate your ciders, etc. There’s also a million video tutorials on how to do this. What they will not divulge, however, is the exact specs you will need to create a cocktail. But fear not, two weeks into my own carbonation journey and I have an ok idea of this to share with you.

Here’s the basic formula:

3 parts liquid (juice, water, tea)

1 part simple syrup

1 part strong booze (80 proof or so)

2 parts weak booze (sherry, vermouth, etc.)

1% ish citric acid if you’re not using lime or lemon juice for your liquid.

So, seven parts in all.

The biggest of the rubs here, is particles. Everything must be clear. With carbonation there are many rules. It’s a bit like writing a novel versus writing a screenplay. Adhere or else suffer. But no one wants a sparkling drink with a bunch of shit floating in it…

And here is a list of the, for the most part, unbreakable rules:

Thou shalt not carbonate dairy

Thou shall clarify your juices

Thou shalt not overproof your concoctions

Thou shalt chill everything before carbonating

Thou shalt not oversweeten your concoctions

In other words: No dairy. Clarify everything. Keep it low ABV (around 15%). Keep it not so sweet. Keep everything as cold as possible.

What you are trying to do here is forcefully dissolve gas into liquid. Go too far one way and you will not accomplish this. Think of all the things you love to drink that are super fizzy. They stick with the above rules don’t they?

Your AI generated image for this post, #416, 12/22/24