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A Soda to Ring In the Lunar New Year

Long-life noodles.

Check.

A whole fish.

Check.

Red envelopes filled with lucky money.

Check.

If you’re celebrating Lunar New Year in San Francisco, though, don’t forget to include a bottle of Belfast Sparkling Cider in your Year of the Ox festivities starting Jan. 26.

The non-alcoholic soda, with Irish origins, is the oldest-continually bottled soda made in California. And inexplicably, it’s the city’s Chinese-American community that has kept this brand alive for generations.

You’ll find the golden-colored, delicate flavored soda on lazy Susans at Chinese restaurant banquets for New Year’s, weddings, births, and other important celebrations.

You can read more about this iconic soda in my story in the January issue of San Francisco Magazine. Pick up a copy at your favorite newsstand.