How 4 Tonic Producers are Taking Mixers in Completely New Directions
Tonic water is a bitter flavored carbonated soft drink made with quinine. It was originally used as a stimulant of appetite and digestion, once popular for medicinal purposes in places including India, it was granted an English patent in 1858 and Schweppes brought it to the United States in 1953. Today is primarily used as a mixer with gin or other liquors. Traditional tonic water is also surprisingly high in sugar and calories.
The craft mixer category
These days tonic water comes in a variety of different flavors. So what do you call flavored tonic waters that aren’t really tonic? Technically they are craft mixers. Within this category, the two biggest subgroups are ginger beers and grapefruit sodas but sometimes the lines are blurry. Fentimans has a grapefruit tonic, which sort of combines two categories, and many tonic makers also make craft club sodas, which usually are extra effervescent.
But this “tonic adjacent” category continues to grow and innovate, and the newer products often almost taste like tonic waters but without the quinine and sometimes much lower in sugar and calories. “When we first came up with the idea for our company, we were calling it a tonic, like a healthier tonic, and we instead changed it to be less focus on the tonic,” says Alec Doman, who co-founded AVEC mixers with Denetrias “Dee” Charlemagne. AVEC debuted with 3 not-tonic but tonic-like mixers including Grapefruit & Pomelo, which is intended for vodka or tequila and “is our version of the grapefruit soda;” a Jalapeño & Blood Orange, which is intended for tequila, mezcal and vodka and “is about mimicking a margarita;” a Hibiscus & Pomegranate, which is meant for tequila or vodka and “is similar to a cranberry juice but much more interesting;” and a Yuzu & Lime, which is meant for gin, vodka and tequila and “is great with vodka and kind of like a tart vodka soda but with a floral note to it.” Both the Yuzu & Lime and Hibiscus & Pomegranate are both very much on-trend flavors. “Our brand is fun, and we saw a big opportunity in this space,” Dorman says, adding that each AVEC contains only 15 or zero (Yuzu & Lime) calories, and each is only sweetened with juice, with extracts adding complexity to the flavors.
Fever-Tree recently debuted its Sparkling Lime and Yuzu, which combines two on-trend flavors, yuzu and lime, and this particular mixer is also low in calories. This elevates a simple tequila and soda, Warrilow says, and tequila is having some extraordinary growth, he says. “I grew up in Japan with a yuzu tree, and the aroma is intoxicating,” says Julia Momose, creative director of Kumiko in Chicago and noted mixologist, who pairs this mixer with Japanese vodka and vermouth, and green tea and shochu. “Fresh yuzu is really difficult to get.”
Q Tonics is now making hbiscus ginger beer. “It’s made with bright, red hibiscus flowers, and adds a tart note of hibiscus but combined with the ginger and the vodka, it’s the easiest thing to make, and it’s just so wonderful on a beautiful afternoon or evening,” Silbert says.
Dorman says AVEC will likely do some kind of tonic, made with either quinine or bitters. “We’re in conversation about what to do at this moment,” he says. “We want to do things that are similar to tonic, but have a bit of a twist, and we don’t want to launch a product that’s exactly the same to what is out there.”
What’s next? More flavors, probably both citrus and red fruits, lower sweet options and on our wish list, a true tonic water that is significantly lower in calories that still mixes like a dream.