How To Make A Southwestern 'Dirty Soda' Bar At Home

While the Dirty Shirley is basically just a boozed-up Shirley Temple, the equally trendy dirty soda was created with the opposite intent. These drinks, which consist of sodas with mix-ins, were originally intended as an extra-fun mocktail for Mormons. (The Church of Latter-day Saints not only forbids alcohol, but also coffee and non-herbal tea.) Thanks to celebs like Olivia Rodrigo and drink enthusiasts on TikTok, dirty sodas are now on everyone's radar, which is good news for anyone throwing a party. A dirty soda bar, after all, is cheaper and easier than mixing cocktails, and you won't need to confiscate anyone's keys at the end of the night.

To set up your soda bar, take a cue from Swig, the Utah-based chain that claims to have pioneered the dirty soda concept. Swig's menu features both Coke and Pepsi, along with Sprite, Dr Pepper, Mountain Dew, Fresca, orange soda, and ginger ale. For mix-ins, it offers numerous flavoring syrups, while pureed fruit and dairy products like flavored coffee creamer, coconut cream, whipped cream, and milk are also available as add-ins. They do garnishes, too, like boba pearls, cinnamon sticks, and gummy sharks. You can select as many or as few of these as you wish for your home bar, but a selection of sodas, creamers, and syrups would be a good place to start. You'll also need plenty of ice and some large plastic cups for guests to blend their custom concoctions.

While dirty soda shops may stick to offering the popular soda brands that everyone's familiar with, you can create a more sophisticated setup by branching out to include sought-after craft sodas in flavors like lavender, elderflower, and celery (yep, that's real — Dr. Brown's Cel-Ray, available at your nearest Jewish deli). You can also opt for plain seltzer and use flavoring syrups to create DIY Italian sodas. If these sodas are insufficiently dirty for you and your guests, flavored creamers can be used to muddy the waters.

Another European take on the dirty soda, the French soda, is basically an Italian soda with added half-and-half. Try making one with orange syrup — it tastes just like a fizzy Creamsicle! One thing to look out for when you're making French sodas, though, is that even when you pour the syrup and half-and-half into the glass first (as you should), the seltzer bubbles may go bonkers once they hit the dairy. This means it could take some time for the foamy head to subside and allow you to add more than an ounce or two of soda.