Saul’s Restaurant & Delicatessen

and Diet Coke—they’re sticking around. But don’t be afraid to get innovative with everything else.”

Popular sodas at Saul’s Restaurant & Delicatessen include, left to right, celery, blueberry, cream, strawberry and ginger.

beverages in restaurants. “When we first
opened Starbelly, I thought it was strange
that at the grocery store you could get a
wide variety of nonalcoholic beverages,
but not in a restaurant,” she says. “This is a
huge area of opportunity for restaurateurs,
because people want an alternative to
water or tea, and the market for homemade
sodas is currently under-tapped.”
Mexican aguas frescas, making them
with soda to give them a little twist. They
provide interesting alternatives for people
who don’t want water, alcoholic beverages
or regular sodas,” Sandoval says. “They’re
more popular than the regular sodas, and
though they’re not a big moneymaker, our
housemade sodas do help bring people in.”
There’s a fine line, however, between
innovative and challenging, Wolf cautions,
and it’s something restaurateurs need to
be wary of. “We don’t go to a restaurant
to be challenged. We go to be fed and to
feel better.

“We’re all interested in mixology and fresh
ingredients. If we’re going to so much
trouble for the food we put on our plates,
why not go all the way to soda?”
That’s because people like to try different
things, says Carducci. “Innovative sodas
bring attention to a restaurant in the form of
press and marketing, which brings people
through the door. The key is to create
flavors that are new and original without
being too foreign or unconventional.”

Lauren Kramer, an award-winning writer based in Vancouver, Canada, is passionate about gourmet food and delights in tasting it and writing about it.

LATIN VIBE IN A GLASS At Mercadito, a chain of cantinas in Chicago, Miami and New York, diners can choose from Mexican-style sodas in flavors such as tamarind, grapefruit, mandarin, pineapple and mango, which range in price from $4 to $5 per glass. They can also choose imported Latin versions of big-name cola brands.

It’s good to add variety, but restaurateurs who are paving the way with innovative sodas still believe some of the staples have to stay put.

Darjeeling Black Tea Cocktail

Starbelly
San Francisco
Yield: 1 cocktail

The program was developed for Mercadito six years ago by Tad Carducci and Paul Tanguay, beverage directors at Tippling Bros. ( www.tipplingbros.com), and has been popular, particularly at lunch, according to Patricio Sandoval, culinary director/owner.

“We will never be able to compete with Coke,” says Sandoval. “But it’s our job in the hospitality industry to offer guests a choice.” Wolf agrees. “I think Coke should stay. It’s like ketchup. Occasionally, you’ll go to a restaurant that makes its own ketchup. That’s great, but unless it’s brilliant, it can be annoying to have a variation.

2 oz. Darjeeling tea
1 oz. lemon juice
¾ oz. agave syrup
¼ oz. egg white
3 basil leaves (crush between fingers)
Bitters, for garnish

“In Mexico, it is popular to find fruit waters
(aguas frescas) made at home, so at
Mercadito, we tried to reproduce the
“When it comes to sodas, I always
recommend that people stick with Coke

Method: Combine tea, lemon juice, agave syrup, egg white and crushed basil leaves. Dry shake 6 seconds; ice shake 6 seconds. Garnish with a few drops of bitters.