Free yourself from the international beverage cartel
  • Free yourself from the international beverage cartel

There's a soda fountain renaissance growing nationwide, according to the NY Times, as restaurateurs and their thirsty customers rediscover the joys of made to order fizzy beverages and the wide palate of old and new flavors that opens up. Concoctions ranging from the traditional egg cream to the long-lost cherry phosphate, to my own home favorite: the lightly sweetened cranberry-jasmine-tea fizz.

Yeah, that's right, I'm a trendsetter—an amateur soda jerk of sorts—who has been making my own seltzer and other fizzy drinks at home for over two years. My initial motivation was cost and convenience. At two to three liters of seltzer a day, we quickly amortized the initial $240 investment, and no longer have to lug home bottles from the supermarket. But we've also had loads of fun experimenting with all kinds of carbonated goodies. It can be surprising. For example, cheap white wine can make an unexpectedly passable "champagne."

Anyway, the soda fountain rage has already hit Portland, so it's only a matter of time before it arrives in its culinary copycat neighbor to the north. So when Tom Douglas starts plying you with five dollar egg creams, remember, you heard it here first.