The primary ingredient of any tonic water, syrup, or concentrate is Quinine. It has long been used as a medication to treat malaria and babesiosis, though its use a first-line treatment is no longer recommended by the WHO as of 2006.
The Quinine compound was isolated in 1820 from the bark of a Cinchona tree, an evergreen tree native to the Andes, Congo, and Indonesia. Organic extraction of Quinine have been used since the 1600s until a chemical synthesis process was developed in 1944 by American chemists R.B. Woodward (see photo above) & W.E. Doering.
Quinine is considerably bitter and needs to be sweetened in order to make it palatable for consumption. According to popular belief Quinine tonic was used as an anti-malarial medication for British colonialist troops. The taste was so aggressively bitter the troops would use their gin rations to make it more palatable. Thus the Gin and Tonic was born!
