Kitchen & Bar

On this phone

How to get around

The bar under the name is the map. Swipe it sideways if a destination sits off-screen. On Tonight, the button pinned to the bottom cooks the lead dish.

  1. Tonight — What you can cook first, plus drinks that fit the same shelf.

  2. This week — Five dinners from the shelf, urgent things cooked first.

  3. Shelf — Edit what you actually own.

  4. Written methods — Every dish and drink with a method somebody wrote out.

  5. The pantry — Start from one ingredient: what it does, and everything built on it.

  6. Out of it — What to use instead, judged by the job the missing thing was doing.

  7. Photo review — Review a demo shelf photo and confirm every item before adding it.

  8. Flavor Lab — Pairings with a track record: classic matches and the mixology behind them.

  9. Wild cards — Combinations with no tradition behind them, only shared aroma notes.

  10. Send to Occasion OS — Prepare confirmed shelf availability for Occasion OS.

  11. The field — The gap this layer owns.

Keep it on the home screen

  1. iPhone — tap Share, then Add to Home Screen.
  2. Android — open the browser menu, then Install app or Add to Home screen.

After that it opens as Kitchen & Bar, not a browser tab. Inventory stays on this device.

Substitutions · 96 dishes here use it

Out of soda

Carbonation is a texture and it is the first thing you lose. Build in the glass, pour it down the side, and stir once at most — every extra stir is bubbles you paid for and threw away.

Everything below is judged against that job. A swap that covers it is a swap; one that only looks similar is not.

17 of the 96 dishes here that mention soda list it as optional — 18% of them. In those, the correct substitution is nothing.

What to reach for

Instead · 1

tonic water

one for one

What it gets you
The bubbles and the same dilution, which is the mechanical half of the job.
What it costs you
It is sweet and bitter. Any drink you build on it needs less sugar and will taste of quinine whether that suits it or not.

Instead · 2

sparkling mineral water

one for one

What it gets you
Everything soda water does, and often with a firmer bead that holds up longer in the glass.
What it costs you
A faint mineral taste, which in a delicate highball is noticeable and in most drinks is not.

What none of them do

Flat water is not a substitute. The bubbles are carrying aroma up out of the glass, and a highball made with still water is a diluted drink rather than a long one.

Where you can just leave it out · 17

These dishes list soda as optional. They were written to work without it, so no ratio is needed and nothing has to be bought.

Where the swap will be tasted · 70

These need it and are short enough that nothing hides: 4 required ingredients or fewer, which makes soda a quarter of what is in the pan. Make the swap a decision rather than a repair.

Showing the 30 shortest of 70.

Check what else is in the pan

The company soda keeps in this library, counted off required ingredients. A swap that argues with the top two is the wrong swap, whatever a chart says.

What to make with sodaRank what I can actually cookAll substitutions