Yes its that time of year for having your friends over… the big-screen TV…  the nacho’s and guacamole dip…

How about a unique gift for your soda & seltzer loving partner? Something they will appreciate and enjoy throughout the year?

Get them a Home Soda Maker now - starting at just $79.95, a great idea and gift

A Home Soda Maker would be a great addition to your kitchen or living-room and family.

Benefits [...]]]> Valetine’s Day is fast approaching

How about a unique gift for your soda & seltzer loving partner?
Something they will appreciate and enjoy throughout the year?

Get them a Home Soda Maker now - starting at just $79.95, a great idea and gift

A Home Soda Maker would be a great addition to your kitchen or living-room and family.

Benefits Include:

• Over 30 different flavors
• Huge savings
• Environmentally friendly
• Convenient
• No more car trips down to the store
• Be the envy of your friends

And especially for Valentine’s Day - get this Romantic Red Genesis Machine

Use the MAKESODA coupon at checkout for a $10 off savings

See original posting here: http://gifts.marthastewart.com/steamy-kitchen.aspx

Ginger ale soda pop recipe

It’s time to learn how to make soda. And with none other than one of our favorite herbs, ginger. This is a great soda pop recipe.

An extremely brief and interesting history of soda pop

Back [...]]]>

I tried this ginger ale soda pop recipe from family herbal remedies and kinda liked it!

Ginger ale soda pop recipe

It’s time to learn how to make soda. And with none other than one of our favorite herbs, ginger. This is a great soda pop recipe.

An extremely brief and interesting history of soda pop

Back in the late 1800’s, many pharmacists experimented with herbs as tonics. They boiled the herbs, added lots of sugar to mask the taste and to make a long story short, added fizzy water somewhere a long the line.

People had JUST figured out how to contain the sparkling waters that were so popular in natural springs spas at the time. Now, drug store owners could administer medicine for common ailments as a delectable drink to draw people into their stores.

Root beer, Dr. Pepper, ginger ale, and even Coca-Cola had it’s origins in the drug store.

Well, these drinks did catch on. However, as you now know, all those healing herbs were removed for artificial flavorings, colorings and even more sugar.

Well, the good news is that these wonderful tasting and fun to make tonics can have a come back in your own kitchen! If you want to learn how to make soda, it’s easy!

Here’s what you’ll need:

- 2 to 3 ounces of fresh ginger root (depending on how strong you like it)

- 3 tablespoons of lemon juice

- 3 tablespoons of orange juice

- 3⁄4 cup of sugar (nice to blend white with natural cane sugar if you have it)

- 4 1/2 quarts of water

- Some yeast from the supermarket. Bread yeast will work, but if you happen to have a homebrew store around, get a small packet of ale yeast. It’s cheap.

- Bottles: see below. This recipe will make 8, 16 ounce bottles.

Try it and let me know what you thank thanks family herbal remedies!

Check the article out NSW turns down bottled water

Bottled water, labelled an environmental and economic [...]]]> A new trend is forming where countries are identifying the problems of the bottled water industry and showing a proactive solution to drinking from the tap. All the more reason to buy home soda makers, and make flavored beverages from the tap.

Check the article out NSW turns down bottled water

Bottled water, labelled an environmental and economic “menace”, has been officially banned from the shelves and fridges of shops in Bundanoon, in NSW’s Southern Highlands.

The ban, co-organised by environment action group Do Something, and local resident Huw Kingston, is believed to be a first for Australia, and possibly the world.

In July, residents voted 355 - 1 to end the sale of still bottled water, sparking publicity around the world.

Those involved in the ban maintain that commercially bottled water creates large amounts of waste that ends up in landfill. They are also concerned about the large amounts of oil used to create the bottles, which are trucked and flown across Australia and overseas, creating greenhouse gases.

At the hip-pocket level, the ban’s organisers say that people have been sucked into a marketing ploy - paying more for bottled water than petrol despite the easy access to tap water and refillable bottles.

Full Article: NSW turns down bottled water

An unexpected scene, So get busy with the fizzy, SodaStream. Big or small, Get busy with the fizzy, Short or tall, You get a fizzy flavour with water from the tap, Press the magic button, And shake it like that. Fix a little mixture And add a little dash, No trouble with [...]]]> Words to the classic SodaStream Advert from the 80’s - Get Busy with the Fizzy

An unexpected scene,
So get busy with the fizzy,
SodaStream.
Big or small,
Get busy with the fizzy,
Short or tall,
You get a fizzy flavour with water from the tap,
Press the magic button,
And shake it like that.
Fix a little mixture
And add a little dash,
No trouble with the bubbles,
Splish a little splash.
It’s a fizzy stream,
So get busy with the fizzy.
SodaStream: that’s fizzy!

Here are some statistics that should make you think [...]]]> With the average American consuming 600 cans and bottles of soda a year, there must be some kind of solution to all this waste of plastic. Does the average consumer realize the amount of effort, natural and physical, that is put into creating a plastic, carbonated drink?

Here are some statistics that should make you think twice before drinking your next plastic bottle of soda. It takes at least 3 liters of water to produce your one liter plastic water bottle. 1.5 million barrels of oil are used to make plastic bottles each year. There are many more frightening statistics, which are not important for now. What is important is how to overcome this problem and improve your lifestyle, while still enjoying the pleasure of drinking soda and seltzer.
What are the solutions that can be done? Well, the obvious is to drink tap water and reuse your plastic bottles. That is a good start, but the usual response is but I enjoy my cola and seltzer. Therefore, the other option is reduce your transport miles by not going to the store to buy car loads of bottles and soda cans, instead make your soda and sparkling water at home. Home soda makers are a solution to this and adding a flavored syrup gives you that recognizable taste everyone craves.

It can be seen as DIY soda, in these economic times more people are staying at home. So this is great for the household, family and for entertaining. An easy and convenient solution. Put simply, make your own soda at home. Protect the environment and the planet.

J Kinger
www.makeyoursoda.com

The biggest growth in bottled beverages isn’t beer or soft drinks or juices. It’s tasteless, colorless and sugarless water. And while that can mean fewer cavities and slimmer waistlines, it irritates [...]]]> Good article from MSN on plastic bottle wastage and how recycling rates are no where near plastic bottle consumption. Solution: Make your soda at home.

The biggest growth in bottled beverages isn’t beer or soft drinks or juices. It’s tasteless, colorless and sugarless water. And while that can mean fewer cavities and slimmer waistlines, it irritates Patricia Franklin to no end.

The director of a nonprofit group that promotes recycling, she spends her workday thinking about the bottles, cans and other container waste that most Americans take for granted.

The boom in plastic water bottles has her especially frazzled because while the recycling rate is extremely low, the demand from recyclers is actually quite high.

Channel News Asia writes about “New Thinking needed for bottled Water”

SINGAPORE: The ubiquitous bottle of mineral water that many of us can’t seem to do without — especially in this heat — has come under the spotlight following [...]]]> Friends, this is becoming more popular around the world and we will look out for articles covering this

Channel News Asia writes about “New Thinking needed for bottled Water”

SINGAPORE: The ubiquitous bottle of mineral water that many of us can’t seem to do without — especially in this heat — has come under the spotlight following a rural Australian town’s decision last month to ban bottled water in its district.

And at home, Professor Tommy Koh, chairman of the Governing Council of the Asia-Pacific Water Forum, also touched on the hazards of importing and drinking bottled water in an article he co-authored for the PUB magazine, Pure.

In the article, Prof Koh urged the Ministry of the Environment and Water Resources to write to all ministries, statutory boards, agencies, Temasek-linked companies and educational institutions to consider stopping the practice of serving bottled water.

Given the growing concern about the environmental impact of bottled water — among other things, discarded plastic bottles end up as litter or go into landfill — will businesses and organisations in Singapore review their use of bottled water?

The Public Utilities Board (PUB) said it is re-examining the ways it distributes Newater in order to reduce its use of plastic bottles.

Instead of giving out bottled Newater at events, one alternative being looked at is to use a water dispenser, a PUB spokeswoman told Today in response to queries on its use of plastic bottles for Newater.