Ginger Beer
Ginger beer is a strongly spiced, fizzy non-alcoholic drink brewed or flavoured with ginger, offering a much sharper, spicier bite than milder ginger ale. Its punchy heat stands up well against strong spirits. It is a defining mixer in many spicy, refreshing built cocktails.
Common uses
- tops off built cocktails for a spicy kick
- pairs with vodka or dark rum
Buying & storage
Months once opened: Keeps for months once opened, but it does change. Nothing urgent; worth finishing within a season.
Buying: Heat varies enormously between brands. Taste before building a drink around one, and prefer a fiery one for mules — a mild ginger beer makes a Moscow Mule taste like sweet lemonade.
Storage: best used soon after opening, as carbonation fades quickly
In depth
Understanding ginger beer
How it is made, where it comes from, what it pairs with, and how it behaves in an alcohol-free drink.
How it's made
Traditional ginger beer is fermented; almost everything sold under the name today is carbonated and flavoured rather than brewed, which is why heat levels vary so wildly between brands. Ginger ale is a different and much milder product — sweeter, paler, and not a substitute in any recipe that relies on the heat.
Origin
Brewed ginger beer is documented in Britain from the eighteenth century; the modern carbonated soft drink is a twentieth-century industrial descendant of it.
What it pairs with
Lime above all, then rum, whisky, vodka and mint. Its sweetness and spice mean it can carry a drink with almost nothing else in it, which is exactly what makes it valuable when there is no spirit.
In alcohol-free drinks
- The single most useful mixer in alcohol-free drinking: ginger produces a genuine physical heat at the back of the throat, which is the closest thing available to alcohol's warmth
- Carries the Alcohol-Free Mule and the Ginger Lime Fizz almost single-handedly
Recipes
Cocktails containing this ingredient
Stand-in
Where ginger beer is a recommended substitute
Recipes that name it as a swap for something else, with what it replaces.
- Kombucha Mulein place of ginger kombucha
- Whisky Gingerin place of ginger ale
Swap it
Possible substitutions
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