Jeffrey Morgenthaler Bartending and Cocktail Advice Since 2004

Sometimes we just end up with syrups that aren’t quite right. Before creating the Universal Syrup Calculator, I made honey and agave syrups by volume – two parts honey to one part water, for instance. The problem with this method is it assumes your honey (or maple, or agave, or cane syrup) is 100% sugar, which it typically is not. So I quickly wrote this little guy for myself so I could fix the gallons of honey syrup in my bar’s freezer. And now I’m sharing it here with you.

Warning: This calculator is not super robust, so it will give you errors if you’re entering weird values.

Step One: Weigh your syrup that needs to be fixed, and enter that number here.

Step Two: Measure the existing Brix of your syrup that needs to be fixed, and enter that number here.

Step Three: Measure the Brix of the undiluted sugar you’re using to fix your syrup, and enter that number here. For pure white sugar, enter 100. For all liquid sugars, use an optical refractometer.

Step Four: What’s your target Brix? For 1:1 syrups, enter 50. For 2:1 syrups, enter 67.

Calculate