During our recent trip to Toronto, we stopped at Splendido for dinner. We didn't know very much about the restaurant, only that it had good ratings on Yelp and the picture of the meat plate looked too good to pass up. Pleasantly surprised, we ended up loving the entire meal, one of our best in a very long time.
From start to finish, all the flavors were spot on, starting with this homemade ginger beer that Ray requested from our awesome bartender, Sean Waddell. This alcohol-free concoction was delicious - sweet and tangy with lots of spice and heat from the fresh ginger juice and grated nutmeg. We begged Sean for the recipe, which he informed us belonged to his grandmother. Her version however called for the more traditional method of brewing ginger beer - with yeast. For practicality reasons, Sean and the team at Splendido modified the recipe and we are super excited to be able to share the recipe with you!
Our
biggest challenge was trying to juice the fresh ginger. Ray suggested I
puree the fresh ginger (skin and all) in my food processor and then put
the pulp in a cheesecloth to strain the liquid. This method proved to be
quite successful and I was able to get 2 ounces of fresh juice from one
single large ginger.
Homemade Ginger Beer
adapted from Sean Waddell of Splendido Restaurant
Ingredients
16 ounces raw simple syrup (1 part raw cane sugar to 1 cup water)
4 ounces raw ginger juice
1 cap (or teaspoon) vanilla extract
Directions
Mix the first three ingredients together to create your ginger beer base. The liquid will be super concentrated in both sweetness and spice. Then you can create your own ginger beer-based drink following some of the following combinations:
- Ginger beer + freshly squeezed lemon or lime juice + tonic water (make sure there is no sodium in it!) + mint
- Ginger beer + champagne or Prosecco
- Splendido's version: Ginger beer + orange juice + lime juice + fresh grated nutmeg
- Infusing the raw cane simple syrup with lavender, basil or thyme before mixing with the ginger beer
- Some form of your favorite ginger-beer alcoholic drink ie Moscow Mule
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