Pomegranate Pink Tonic Mocktail Recipe––an Aperitif for People Who Hate Bitter

The pomegranate pink tonic mocktail looks cool. Let’s show it off!

Tonics and aperitifs get a bad rap for their awful flavor and association with medicine. If you’re a drink, you stay away from medicine. Dr. Pepper still has it rough even now, with only medium-sized niches praising its perfect combination of 23 flavors. But well-balanced drinks like the pomegranate pink tonic mocktail are changing that narrative.

A tonic or aperitif helps prepare your appetite and is a super healthy miracle juice––right? Wrong! Can’t you see the image above? Look at that light, clear magenta color. It’s the cartridge your printer keeps asking for. That galaxy frappucino recipe Michaela taught you to make in 2016. A show-off at a potluck. It’s the pomegranate pink tonic mocktail. And best of all, it’s not too bitter.

This drink is for people who hate bitter flavors. It’s not an easy task to make a pleasant pairing to such a harsh flavor as a bitter tonic. But with some flavor counterbalancing, attention to garnish and the company of friends, any base ingredient can become a fine pairing for an evening get-together. That’s what we’re going to do with this mocktail. Let’s make it.

Aperitif Mocktails With Juices Counterbalance Their Bitter Flavor

Adding juices to your tonics seems like an obvious fix––just add sugar so your aperitif tastes good! But it hasn’t been easy getting people around to the idea. “Aperitifs have that flavor to stimulate your appetite, so even the slightest alteration would make it useless!” Well, that just isn’t the case.

Aperitifs have a mixture of botanicals and herbs that make them bitter as a by-product. It’s not the bitterness itself but just their presence that causes an increase in appetite. So counteracting that bitterness doesn’t affect its effectiveness. If you want to read more on how aperitifs work, here’s how to counteract that bitterness.

Many people, myself included, think aperitif bitterness goes so far it makes you want to do the opposite of eat––hurl! So masking that flavor with other pleasant natural flavors can even amplify these appetite-inducing effects.

Now, people are more willing to spritz-ify their aperitif. They add some sweet syrups or flavorful spirits. Often times it ends up like putting chocolate chips on those cookies your girlfriend accidentally made with salt instead of sugar. But sometimes, they’re on to something.

And by on to something, I’m exclusively talking about the pomegranate pink tonic mocktail. I still retain my initial statements on the majority of sweetened aperitifs. This drink is the only one that isn’t too sweet or, god forbid, under-sweetened. And its choice of juice just happened to pair beautifully with its base tonic.

Pomegranate Pink Tonic’s Beautiful Body Color Pairs Well With Contrasted Garnish

Just look at that beautiful magenta color—a cocktail with a body so vibrant yet clear pairs well with contrasting yet natural garnishes. You don’t want anything as saturated as the magenta body, but not so dull it looks like you slathered mush around the inside of the glass. The pomegranate pink tonic mocktail strikes a perfect balance with its garnish and color.

But you’re a Cocktail.com Vision love to give alternatives. Using lime instead of lemon can look straight along the rim, but that wouldn’t always go well with the cucumbers because it would just be all green. So replacing those cucumbers with bright red pomegranate seeds will result in a perfect tri-color combination––magenta, red and lime. 

My friends at the Lighthouse, this drinks originator, said they also like including maraschino cherries. But in my opinion, it’s too red. The reddest I’d go for would be with those pomegranate seeds. They’re pretty vibrant, but they keep that natural, almost matt or pastel-like finish in their color. That, as opposed to a comically bright, shiny maraschino cherry. I swear, they look like they’ll give me diabetes in one bite.

This Mocktail Is From Lighthouse Boutique Hotel

The wonderful pomegranate pink tonic mocktail is from the Lighthouse boutique hotel in Paarl, South Africa. This Hotel is quite recherché, and I don’t expect every person reading this article to go there. But if you do want to, here’s a link to their website. So, whether are you making this at home or fixing to ask your butler when you visit the Lighthouse, I hope you enjoyed the read!

And don’t forget to tag us on social media if you make it! (@cocktail_web)

Ingredients

 

Directions