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I was raised to love ginger. It’s part of my Caribbean cultural upbringing, my mom would have it no other way. In Trinidad around the holidays — before arthritis made it more challenging than she could bear — my mom would dedicate an afternoon to making traditional ginger beer. Freshly grated ginger left to ferment until it has a cloudiness and a foamy head. I somehow remember her using cream of tartar in her recipe, but my mother’s method wasn’t dissimilar from this recipe from Thelma Golden (I need to try her ginger beer!)
Moving to the Midwest showed me that my love of ginger drinks wasn’t necessarily just a Caribbean thing, it might be endemic to the diaspora elsewhere as well. My Midwestern and southern folks LOVE some ginger ale and there are passionate opinions about which varieties are worth trying. I tweeted about ginger ale once and it set off a robust discussion of ginger beverages I’ve tried and ones I need to hunt down at the supermarket. My Georgia people made me put Southern Red Rock ginger ale on my list to try, and everyone in Michigan insisted that I need to get some Vernors ginger ale in my life. I’m working on it.
