Sparkling Raspberry Lemonade

This is similar to the ginger ale I made previously, but is fruity as opposed to floral. The variations to this kind of recipe are endless and a lot of fun as well.

Fresh raspberries picked out of your own back yard make for the best tasting and most satisfying beverage, but this was made with frozen berries and it still tastes fantastic. This particular batch isn't sparkling very much yet, since I added the yeast at a lower temperature. That's fine by me, since the rapid carbonation of the last batch kinda scared me. Bottles can and do blow up, and these are in glass.

One thing that did surprise me is the raspberry flavor is already bigger today than it was initially yesterday. I don't know why, but it could be because when the liquid was strained, it ran through all the berries in the colander again. Regardless, it is very full flavored and hopefully will be fully carbonated by tomorrow.

Recipe

• 1 gallon of water
• 1 lbs raspberries
  
• 1 tbsp sliced or shredded ginger
• 3 cups lemon juice, or to taste
  
• Zest from 1 lemon
• 4 cups Splenda
• 1 cup table sugar
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt, or 1 teaspoon regular salt
• 1 dozen lavender flowers
• 1 packet of Champagne or White Wine yeast
• Two 2-liter plastic soda jugs, or other seal able bottles, clean and sterilized

Proceed in the same manner as the ginger ale recipe here, bottle, let it sparkle, and enjoy!