A Beginners Guide to Drinking Shrubs

What is a “shrub” for drinks?

Shrubs, also known as drinking vinegars, are concentrated syrups used in beverages. They’re most commonly made from vinegar, fruit, aromatics, and sugar. Many shrubs use apple cider vinegar as the base and then use fruit and herbs to create unique sweet and sour flavors.

Mad Maiden Shrub makes Cranberry Shrub and Ginger Shrub year-round. We offer seasonal shrub flavors like Mulberry & Friends, Plums & Friends, Raspberry & Ginger, and Rhubarb & Honey, as fresh ingredients are available from our growers throughout the growing seasons. Many other shrub flavors are available commercially in the U.S., and many folks make their own shrubs.

Shrubs are often seen on cocktail menus but also make refreshing mocktails or zero proof drinks.

Using a shrub can be as easy as mixing it with still water, tonic, sparkling water, and juice to make a thirst-quenching drink on a hot day or after working out. We encourage you to experiment with your favorite evening and weekend cocktails and mocktails, replacing your usual ingredients with shrub, OR creating your own unique beverages using shrub as an anchor ingredient.

History of Drinking Shrubs

Today’s drinking shrubs evolved from 17th century England, when vinegar was used to preserve fruit and berries for the winter. This practice was brought overseas to America by new immigrants. By the 19th century, shrub recipes called for pouring vinegar over fruit, and allowing the mixture to steep for a few days. 

After steeping (hot or cold,) the shrub maker would then strain out solids, and mix with a sweetener. The infused vinegar would then be added to water, soda water, or cocktails. Drinking shrubs are common ingredients in bars and restaurants, where talented, knowledgable bartenders and soda jerks would concoct delicious drinks for guests.

Drinking vinegars fell out of fashion with refrigeration until around 2010, when they began to resurface again on cocktail menus which revived old fashioned drinks.

Shrubs feature the Health Benefits of Apple Cider Vinegar

Mad Maiden Shrubs use apple cider vinegar because it’s made from organic Wisconsin apples and we like to support local farmers. 

Apple cider vinegar has been around for thousands of years and has been used to treat many health issues. Many of these applications are somewhat anecdotal and not backed up by scientific studies. When you do take a look at the existing science, most of the studies are small and don’t offer much conclusive/convincing data. Some of our customers report health benefits from drinking our shrubs, but we make drinks for fun and do not make any specific health claims. 

Apple cider vinegar is fermented, and eating fermented foods before a meal can cause salivation which cues the stomach to release acid, which could be helpful for preparing the body for digestion. 

As Michael Dietsch shares in his book, Shrubs: An Old-Fashioned Drink for Modern Times, “Salivation not only makes you feel hydrated, it stimulates the appetite. Salivation usually indicates to your stomach that food is forthcoming and therefore it primes our digestive juices to get ready to work. Drinking shrubs are the perfect cocktail to prepare you for a night of fine dining.” 

How to Use Shrubs in Non-Alcoholic Drinks

Shrubs are mixers, which means they’re an ingredient in a drink, not something you would normally drink on its own. Luckily, drinking shrubs are versatile, so they pair well with lots of other ingredients.

Overall, we recommend using a 1:5 ratio of shrub to another (or several) ingredient(s). For Seasonal Shrub, use a ratio of 1:4 of shrub to another (or several) ingredient(s), as it is a little weaker than our Honey Ginger or Cranberry shrubs.

For a cold drink, we love mixing Mad Maiden Shrubs with:

• Still water for a quick refresher

• Seltzer or club soda for some fizz

• Juice for some sweet flavor (we prefer white grape or apple and cranberry mixed with apple)

• Kombucha for some earthy tea flavor

• Tonic for some bitter herbal flavor

You can garnish your drink with orange or lemon peel, or a squeeze of lime juice for some additional aroma and flavor.

Janet, the Mad Maiden, often makes this favorite recipe for a non-alcoholic shrub drink:

Apple Shrub
2.5  fresh apple juice
2.5 oz water
2 Tbsp Mad Maiden Shrub

We encourage you to try various combinations of shrubs and complementary ingredients in different ratios to find out what your favorite recipe might be!

How to Use Shrubs in Cocktails

The simplest way to use shrubs in cocktails is to make your favorite cocktail recipe just as you always do and add a splash of shrub at the end for a bit of sourness. 

A local bartender from our hometown of Madison, Keezing, created this Bees Knees Shrub recipe using our Cranberry Shrub.

Bees Knees Shrub 

1.25 oz Gin
1 oz Mad Maiden Cranberry Shrub
.25 oz Lime
.25 oz Lemon
Barspoon Honey Syrup

Shake
Strain into glass
Garnish with Lemon Peel/Wedge

Now that you understand what shrubs are, let the experimentation begin! 

We suggest ordering our Tasting Set to provide you a few options when diving into creating your own concoctions!