I saw an ad for Hickey-Freeman clothing, which offered a recipe for a cocktail they call “The Hickey.” Yep, seriously.
“A refreshing blend of gin, lemon juice, simple syrup, dill, cucumber and top soda.”
I can’t find another hit for “top soda” in that context. I suppose it could mean “topped with soda water” for a bit of carbonation, but why not say that?
Is there a bartending meaning that I’m missing or is it really that simple?
I think it’s that simple, a fairly meaningless adjective glossing up the list.
Like “branch water” == plain, still, tasteless water, but I ain’t goin’ there.
Must be top up with soda. There’s a lot of drink recipes that end with that.
“Shake up the gin, lemon juice, sugar syrup, sugar and egg white (if using) in a cocktail shaker with a little ice and strain into a highball glass half-filled with ice cubes. Top up with soda water.”
Must have slipped by all those editors who carefully check every detail of everything posted on the internet.
Here’s the ad. I’d guess they mean to top with soda water.
That’s might be what they meant, but it sure sounds like ‘top soda’ is an ingredient, not a direction or command. It’s a list of ingredients, not a way to make a drink.
If it said ‘tumbler, half ice, add gin, lemon juice, simple syrup, cucumber then top with soda’ that would make (kinda) sense. (And I still can’t get ‘top soda’ to sit in there nicely)
Maybe someone was trying too hard to be classy and end up with crappy unintelligible grammar.
Wait, got it. Some googling revealed other drink recipes that also say ‘top soda’. As it turns out, it looks much better when it’s a list, not a sentence.
For example
The Hickey
-Gin
-Lemon Juice
-Simple Syrup
-Cucumber
-Top Soda
Fill a tumbler with ice, add the din, lemon juice, and simple syrup, top with soda, garnish with cucumber
That makes sense, that’s how I’m seeing it in some recipes, in others it seems to be understood, but it’s still part of a list, not a sentence.
Nm
We have top soda working on it right now.
I’ll say this… I have some 8-10 cocktail books, and not a one lists “top soda” as an ingredient to any of their recipes, whether they’re standard, classic, old-school or tiki cocktails.
They often say “top with soda” or something similar though. My guess is that someone had a sort of shorthand/pidgin cocktail recipe like you or **TriPolar **describe, and someone unfamiliar with cocktails translated that into an ingredient list, not realizing that the term “top soda” meant “top with soda water”, and not a specific ingredient called “top soda”.
WHAT soda?
Top.
Soda.
Once again, bottom soda gets overlooked.
That’s not a hickey, THIS is a hickey:
Of COURSE it’s bloody “top off the glass with soda water.” I can’t imagine thinking it was anything else.
Sounds like a lousy drink, BTW.
When I put “top soda” in Google I got hits for Coke.
I can see people doing that. I really can.
Looks like a variation of a Rickey, an absolutely classic cocktail.
Yes.
But not schmott pipple, like you and me.
The thought of mixing gin and coke is not a pleasant one.
I just came in to say that Cock 'n Bull is my current top soda,
goes great with cucumber vodka.
I was gonna say it sounded like a lime rickey with dill added.
And why dill, of all things?