Drinking Vinegar

Cocktail Culture has come a long away, almost full circle. Bartenders and Mixologists are working to find new ways of enjoying cocktails and they're looking to the old methods. Today, we look to the old preservation technique of Drinking Vinegar otherwise known as The Shrub.

I know it sounds pretty foul, drinking vinegar, almost seems like a punishment akin to washing soap out of ones mouth. However behind the bar, this technique has a huge upside in sustainability allowing for us to preserve fruits and creates an amazing drink and the byproduct can be dammmm good as well.

Unlocking depths of flavor that can reach every part of the palate while extracting a sweet/tangy syrup or free-spirited base. When making shrubs and drinking vinegars it takes a little bit of patience, a good shrub takes about a week to really extract and marry flavors.

The foundation of this lightly fermented drink requires 3 things Sugar, Vinegar and a some kind of fruit/vegetable. The sugar can range from white granulated sugar to maple syrup, the vinegar can be just as variable from Apple Cider to red wine vinegar, i would just avoid the distilled whites.

When making a shrub you gotta make sure your vessel is sterile, of course. When making anything fermented or "living" you must make sure that bad living stuff does not get involved with the good living stuff. Its really easy for mold and other bacterium to grow if your vessel is not sterilized. I like to use mason jars personally, easy to clean, tight seal and they can handle temperatures well but honestly anything with a good seal will do.

Apple Cardamom Shrub going to be a staple in our new cocktail Menu!

When making shrubs i like to keep pretty close to an even ratio of ingredients (1:1:1 Sugar : Fruit : Vinegar), obviously adjust it to your liking. Add your sugar, chop your fruit into manageable chunks so that the vinegar can do its thing.Fill your vessel then store in a cool, dark place like the pantry. Shake it once a day to make sure everything is well mixed, after 3 days, taste and adjust by the 7th day strain the fruit and refrigerate the liquid, itll last for years! with your fruit byproduct you can do many things with it. Chop it up into a relish-like consistency and put it on toast or your charcuterie board. Another option would be to blend it up slather it down on a sheet and dehydrate into a fruit leather (Comment down below if you wanna tutorial). Of course you can always just eat it the point is that the fruit after fermenting is very versatile so play around with ingredients.

This week while working on our first cocktail menu of 2026, we created a shrub with apples, cardamom, and chianti red wine vinegar. Give it a couple of days to ferment and ill tell yall what it tastes like. Hell, I might even tell you what drink we're using it in.

Now remember to call your mama, if you cant do that make her proud, if you cant do that go plant a tree and

SIP SLOW,

Mixo Rix