This post is inspired by the discussion about limited possibilities to buy original ginger ale in Russia and Ukraine.

I just walked to supermarket positioned itself as an elite food and drinks shop and bought there a bottle of Schweppes Canada Dry Ginger Ale, the only original ginger ale brand I ever see in Moscow.

I wanted to make a simple long drink with ginger ale, and Moscow Mule was the first recipe came into my mind. But later I read some articles and I didn’t like that I found out about this drink. Then I just browsed CocktailDB and found a simple and nice cocktail similar to Tom Collins. It’s called Leap Frog Highball.

I abandoned my plan to make a version with homemade ginger ale because I’m sure that it will be much better than fcommercial one, and this post is about ginger ale bought in a shop, not home-made.

The second abandoned plan was to use vodka instead gin. I felt that vodka will do for ginger ale perfectly but the recipe recommends gin so I’ve decided to follow it.

So there is Leap Frog Highball recipe:

• 45 ml gin,
• 30 ml fresh lemon juice

built in highball glass and filled with ice and ginger ale.

The result was very nice – sweet and sour drink but without ginger flavour.

Then I reduced slightly the quantity of lemon juice (20-25 ml) and took more gin – 50-60 ml.

It helped to control sourness and gave a possibility to feel weak ginger-like flavour. And the main advantage was a bit synthetic aftertaste of gingerbread.