#raspberry shrub

Pure: syrup. Do not drink. Maybe pour over ice cream. Would ice cream work with a hint of vinegar?

50/50: so sweet I was too busy watering it down to take a picture of my glass of neverending shrub.

70% water, 30% syrup: still too sweet.

80% water, 20% syrup: drinkable, but still on the very sweet soda level, despite having only the same amount as a medium sweet soda. Using the thick straws for ease of cleaning.

There's suggestions you can drink this pure. There's suggestions you can mix it 50/50 with sparkling water. It's a recipe from a time when the treatment for diabetes was carb loading your way to a swift but happy grave, so maybe that's the issue here, but sweet, sweet mercy, I want to live.

I had to ask my wife to taste my 50/50 mix of vinegar syrup and the tartest, sparkliest water I could find, just to make sure it wasn't Metformin side effects that was making this eye wateringly saccharine. By the time you water it down to 20-25%, you only get the taste of raspberry lollipops. I've got nothing against those, but I was rather expecting more tang. This is just... Soda.

I checked the video, I checked the quantities, they sort of make sense, but they do not fit with any modern recipe and I'm really really struggling to see what the moderately difficult to find vinegar is supposed to bring to this party. It's not flavor. The sugar is a preservative. The raspberries have electrolytes similar to acetic acid. Water is cheaper.

This is a recipe I have made before and found it wonderfully delicious!  It makes a marvelous, refreshing summer drink.  You can serve it over crushed ice or mix it in to ginger ale, tonic water or soda water.  For a grown up drink you can mix it with Mix Party Wine Cocktail Raspberry or their Sparkling Wine, like Bubbles (Rose) that contains real edible 24 carat gold flakes.

This particular…