Love and Olive Oil

Fresh Ginger-Lime Tonic

Fresh Ginger & Lime Tonic Soda

Ok ok enough ginger already, you might be saying.

No such thing, I reply.

I’ve talked at length about ginger beers, and even made my own at one point, complete with yeast fermented bubbles. That was true ginger beer. But this is practically a homemade ginger beer, made from fresh ginger juice, lime juice, and tonic water for fizz. Fresh ginger being the key to a bold and spicy mocktail that, if you’re a true ginger lover like me, you’ll simply adore.

Sure, you could add some gin and make a gin-gin & tonic, and I wouldn’t blame you for doing so, as this bold and bubbly beverage would make a perfect base for some booze.

Fresh Ginger & Lime Tonic Soda

This drink was inspired by a similar concoction at Nashville’s Pinewood Social.

I adore restaurants that have creative mocktails on their menu. Because a lengthy and interesting sounding cocktail menu totally bums me out when my only non-alcoholic options are soda or water, and maybe a ginger beer if I’m lucky. C’mon, restaurants, embrace the need for designated drivers and give us at least a few interesting options.

Fresh Ginger & Lime Tonic Soda

A word of warning: this drink is not for the faint of heart. You must like spicy ginger to the extreme. If you’re timid or you’ve never had a really strong ginger beer before, I’d suggest you start with that first (and be sure to check out my favorite ginger beers for some recommendations). Then, once you’re sure you can handle it, then you can move on to this.

Let’s just call this one a drink for the true ginger aficionado.

Fresh Ginger & Lime Tonic Soda

Don’t even think about guzzling it or you might just choke on the spice. This is a drink that needs to be sipped so the spice doesn’t get to be unbearable.

How to juice ginger without a juicer

If you have a juicer, you can certainly use it and save yourself some time. However, a juicer is not required for this recipe.

I recommend peeling and freezing your ginger. Not only does it preserve it, but frozen ginger blends up significantly easier than fresh. It’s almost like the ice crystals break up the tough fibers that make fresh ginger hard to work with (the same goes for grating ginger, it’s much easier to do when previously frozen). Why? No idea. All I know is I’m definitely going to be keeping a large stash of fresh ginger in the freezer from here on out.

For ginger juice, simply blend your semi-frozen ginger (I recommend thawing it for 10-15 minutes out of concern for your blender) and then liquefy it with a bit of water. Then strain out the pulp and voila! Ginger juice without a juicer.

Jack Rudy Tonic Syrup

This is Taylor’s magic tonic syrup. He heard about it from Alton Brown, who claims that most pre-made tonic sodas are pure crap and that club soda mixed with this artisan tonic syrup is the way to go. Ok, whatever you say dear. We live and die by the Alton Brown gospel in this household, and I’m not one to argue with him.

Fresh Ginger & Lime Tonic Soda

Can I just say I adore these straws? They are Kate Spade brand (bet you didn’t know Kate Spade my straws, did you?) and made of acrylic, which puts the paper straws to shame. These you can leave in your glass for hours and hours and they won’t get soggy. Not that a glass of this spicy mocktail will last that long, but still. Acrylic is totally the new paper.

Fresh Ginger-Lime Tonic

A drink for the true ginger aficionado: with extra spicy fresh ginger, fresh lime juice, and topped with tonic syrup and soda water for a tart and refreshing non-alcoholic drink (or feel free to add some gin or vodka too!)

Did you make this recipe?

Ingredients:

  • 2 ounces fresh ginger, peeled and frozen
  • 1/2 cup filtered water
  • 1/4 cup lime juice (from 2-3 limes)
  • 2 (8oz) cans club soda
  • 1 ounce tonic syrup*

Directions:

  1. Combine frozen ginger and water in a blender. Turn on and gradually increase speed to high; blend for 30 to 60 seconds or until no large chunks remain. Pour mixture through a fine mesh seive set over a bowl, pressing out liquid with a spoon or spatula. Rinse out the blender with another few tablespoons of water and pour through seive. Discard solids. You should have just over 1/2 cup of juice.
  2. Fill 4 12-ounce glasses with ice. To each glass, add 1 ounce (2 tablespoons) ginger juice, 1/2 ounce (1 tablespoon) lime juice, and 1/4 ounce (1/2 tablespoon) tonic syrup. Stir to combine. Top with 3-4 ounces of club soda. If you find this too spicy, add a splash of simple syrup to sweeten the drink.

*Tonic water can also be used in place of the tonic syrup + club soda.

All images and text © / Love & Olive Oil

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30 Comments

  1. Is the 2oz of ginger pre or post blending? Or does it matter? Love the idea of freezing ginger! Thank you!

  2. Your recipes are mostly wonderful but you do realise not everyone lives in the USA right? That there are other countries in the world? And about 99% of those countries use a different measurement system – one that actually makes sense? Seriously, how hard can it be to add metric measurements to your recipes for those of us not still living in the dark ages? Ok, sorry, rant over – and sorry for the sarcasm – but it really gets my goat that 95% of American recipe sites do not seem to understand that people from other countries might also want to try their recipes and that adding the metric equivalents might be a really nice, helpful gesture and keep people coming back for more?.

    • All of my newer recipes have metric measurements! Just haven’t had the time to go back and update the old ones (with over 1000 recipes on this site it’s no easy task). Also conversions are usually just a quick google away, for a short recipe such as this you probably could have found the equivalents in the time it took you to write this comment. ;)

  3. I added 2 tablespoons of Agave syrup. It was very tasty.

  4. I am a beginner and I am totally confused about the ginger. How do you grate it? Are you just including frozen ginger juice or also including some of the grated ginger. A step by step photo of everything would be really helpful!

    • This recipe doesn’t call for grated ginger. Just peel it (scrape it with a spoon rather than using a peeler), cut into chunks and toss in your blender!

      When I do have to grate ginger (for stir frys and such) I like to use a microplane grater like this: https://amzn.to/2UaE9rC. It’s much finer result than chopping!

  5. Oh my goodness!!!! I was looking for a great recipe for ginger instead of using the supplements. *BINGO* Thanks so much!!! Plus, now I can use the tonic water that’s been hanging out in my fridge lol

  6. No to acrylic! Acrylic takes 450 years to decompose so it is not the new paper. Please don’t suggest using it!

  7. Great recipe but please skip the acrylic straws. Acrylic is plastic. It never biodegrades.

  8. Bring on the spice! And then dump some booze in this, because it looks soooooo good. I’ll just be over here having one in the corner while dreamig of summer, thanks.

  9. Wow this drink looks truly amazing! I love ginger – maybe it’ll be a great medicine for my cold – don’t you think? :P

    /F

  10. Looks delicious and refreshing. 

  11. Gorgeous drink! Love the tip to freeze the ginger, now I’m gonna stock on ginger!

    PS: Wait, what? Kate Spade brand straws?? Love them!

  12. This drink is amazing!! My husband made these for us tonight and we LOVED them!! We went a little lighter on the ginger juice than the recipe suggested and even our kids enjoyed them (minus the gin we had in ours!!) It is light, crisp and flavorful – can’t wait to make them again!! Do you know how long the ginger juice will last sealed in an airtight container in the fridge?

  13. It truly is a refreshing drink. I would like to see more variety in restaurants for mocktails too. I am often the driver and I have to be more than modest, but I like to join in.

  14. I follow you on  Instagram and decided to come check out your blog. I love ginger and actually have some in the freeze anyway! Lisa

  15. I love Ginger, everytime I goback to Sri lanka, I order GingerAle .-)

  16. This looks SO good! Thanks for the mocktail recipe – being pregnant, I’m always looking for something yummy to sip on and I can’t wait to try this!!

  17. Oh man.  I didn’t know anyone could love ginger like me.  This sounds absolutely fabulous! (Also, great find with those acrylic straws!)

  18. The stronger the ginger the better, I say! This cocktail sounds so zingy and delicious. Yay!

  19. Never enough ginger! Right now, I have a fresh hand of ginger on my counter, a stash in the fridge, and a stash in the freezer. I just made chai this morning with it, but now I’m off to make this. Long live mocktails–you’re the best!

  20. What a gorgeous drink! Talk about feeling refreshed just by looking at these crisp, clean, stunning photos….I would love to have a few of these :)

  21. This looks like a great alternative drink to mojitos that uses limes. They’re selling for 10 cents each or less lately so good timing!

    By the way, did you have the same experience as the reviewer on Amazon that said the stripes wore off on the straws after only the first use? They’re really fun but I’d hate for that to happen!

    • Taylor washed them by hand and the stripes are still there. Maybe just don’t put them in the dishwasher or scrub them with anything abrasive? I have a tiny brush straw cleaner that makes cleaning the inside of the straws pretty easy.

  22. Yum! I am definitely making this… and trying that tonic. I love ginger and lime and tonic and vodka and grapefruit… Can you tell you’ve hit the spot with this one. I know there’s no grapefruit, but I thought it needed to be mentioned and not left out of the conversation. Thanks for sharing.

  23. This looks amazing! I agree, I love the restaurants that are coming out with fancy housemade sodas/shrubs/mocktails.  So fun!  I honestly never thought to try making this sort of thing at home though…definitely needs to happen!

  24. Ah, I love the Pinewood Social. And ginger. Cheers!

  25. Not only does this sound like a delicious recipe for a mocktail but it sounds like it would be almost healthy + cleansing too (apart from maybe the club soda part)!  Love it!

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