1. Make Fluffier Pancakes. Instead of adding milk or water as the recipe directs, use club soda. The carbonation will help make the pancakes lighter and airier.

2. Make Fluffier Matzoh Balls. As Jewish grandmothers know, seltzer does the same for matzoh balls.

3. Make Fluffier Scrambled Eggs. Our mom used a few splashes of milk to make her scrambled eggs fluffy. Mom’s eggs were great, but carbonated water produces the same results.

4. Make Tempura Batter. The magic of tempura coating is helped by substituting club soda for the water.
 
 
CLUB SODA AFTER EATING

5. As A Digestif. Club soda and bitters are a time honored, non-alcoholic digestif, (A digestif is an alcoholic beverage served after a meal to aid digestion). Similarly, sipping on club soda can soothe an upset stomach; feel free to add the bitters, an herbal distillation.

The overall category is carbonated water, also called soda water: water into which carbon dioxide gas under pressure has been dissolved, causing the water to become effervescent.

Carbonated Water: In the U.S., carbonated water was known as soda water until after World War II, due to the sodium salts it contained. While today we think of “soda” as a carbonated beverage, the word originally referred to a chemical salt, also called carbonate of soda (sodium carbonate, sodium hydroxide, sodium monoxide).

The salts were added as flavoring and acidity regulators, to mimic the taste of natural mineral water. After the war, terms such as sparkling water and seltzer water gained favor. Except for sparkling mineral water, all carbonated water/soda water is made from municipal water supplies (tap water).

Carbonated water was invented in Leeds, England in 1767 by British chemist Joseph Priestley, who discovered how to infuse water with carbon dioxide by suspending a bowl of water above a beer vat at a local brewery. Carbonated water changed the way people drank liquor, which had been neat, providing a “mixer” to dilute the alcohol.