Introduction: Zombie Soda

By Something Labs
About: Hi there! Hopefully these guides can help inspire you to tinker, be curious, play, contribute, and learn. If you're here for pandemic-related PPE and want more, check out our Something Labs website at somethin…

Sure zombies may love eating brains, but what will you serve them to drink? Hosting the undead just got a lot easier with Zombie Sodas! You won't just survive the zombie apocalypse, but enjoy it, too.

These are great for your regular mortal friends and kids as well. I love making these, and it's a super easy way to carbonate a beverage and send a glove flying across the room at the same time. It also doubles as an accidental lesson in states of matter and freezing points, too. Oops! Science!

Never has communing with the netherworld been this tasty.

  • What: Zombie Soda
  • WHAT!?: It's ALIVE!
  • Concepts: states of matter, sublimation, gasses, zombies
  • Time: ~ 1 minute to make
  • Cost: super cheap
  • Materials:
    • Plastic Cups (wide-rim, SOLO work well)
    • Straws (thin elbow straws are great)
    • Dry Ice
    • Nitrile Gloves (latex also works, but watch out for allergies)
    • Juice (orange, lemonade, apple, POG, anything!)
  • Tools:
    • Hammer or Mallet (optional)
    • Thick glove (optional)

WARNING: Okay, so dry ice. While totally safe for zombies and ghosts, it needs a warning with mortals like us. It's cold stuff! No good for the long touchy. Please exercise caution when using dry ice, especially with children. If you touch it too long, it can burn (freeze burn). If you put it in a container and seal it, it can blow up (which if done safely, is fascinating). Especially with dry ice beverages, please only use big chunks of dry ice with very narrow straws to avoid possibility of ingestion. If you want when you're ready to drink, you can scoop the dry ice out of the cup for extra safety. If it has frozen in to the cup, that'll make it extra safe, too!

Okay, let's haunt!

Step 1: Mix Your Juices

To each their own! Grab a plastic cup and mix your juices to a zombie's liking. A Filet Braignon pairs well with a mix of orange juice and lemonade, but feel free to add whatever juices and other mixings you want! Mint, thyme, guava juice, no gift is too great to keep your zombie guest from turning on you.

Step 2: Throw in a Dry Ice Chunk

Break up your dry ice with a hammer, or just slap the bag against a table. You want chunks the approximate volume of a ping-pong ball, and throw them in the cup. Better hurry up, your zombies are looking parched.

If you want to use a thick glove, feel free! I find that if I move relatively quickly and don't squeeze, I can safely place dry ice chunks in the cups. If you have a bunch of impressionable young zombies (kids) with you, you may want to use a glove just to model that care and safety around dry ice.

Step 3: Top Off With a Glove

Zombie time! As the dry ice sublimates from solid to gas, the concoction bubbles and your hand will begin to fill with carbon dioxide. It gets larger and larger, until just at the perfect moment, it pops off in a cloud and goes flying in to the air. Neatly, the glove helps keep a little more of the carbon dioxide dissolved in the juice, which will add to extra soda fizziness!

If you want to go for another round, put the glove back on and do it again. Or throw another dry ice chunk in if your hand-inflation boosters are low! You can also get some great photos and slow-motion video of the blast-off, too.

Step 4: Mmmmm....Zombie Soda!

To keep it safe, place a skinny elbow straw in and enjoy the sweet nectar of the undead. Be safe and have a ball! Zombie Soda is just one of the most delightful things, regardless of age or zombie affinity! Guaranteed two brains up.

Neatly, if you want to check out some SCIENCE for a second, you can look around at what happens to the dry ice as it continues to sublimate. Sublimation means that the solid is turning directly into a gas. As you can't see gasses, it is a wee confusing at first, because then what is that stuff pouring out of the drink? That mist is frozen moisture from the air around that comes off with the carbon dioxide as it sublimates. If you look around, you can see other events of frozen water including on the outside of your cup and even starting to pack in your dry ice inside your cup. This is "wet ice" and is much less cold than the chilly -109 degrees fahrenheit that dry ice can get to. This is also a great way to capture carbon dioxide (in the glove) if you want to do C02 experiments like putting out candles or changing the pH water.

For some other dry ice experiments to do with your remaining ephemeral chunks, check this out and this, too.

Have fun, happy haunting, and I'm excited to see where you go with it! Share your ideas and drink recipes below!