Homemade soda is very easy to make and is a great science project to do with the kids! They learn the basics of how yeast eats sugar to create CO2. An easy, fun, and rewarding way to make root beer is the “old-fashioned” way, similar to the way grandpa use to make root beer. He would mix water, extract, sugar, and yeast. Then, he would fill bottles with the mixture and place the bottles in the fridge to chill. The yeast of choice was champagne yeast. However, this yeast created serious problems. The problem with champagne yeast is that it likes to work when it is cold, causing the bottles to over carbonate, and turning them into grenades! We have found and recommend ale yeast because the cold generally stops the yeast from over-carbonation and prevents the bottles from exploding.
We have put together a complete 5-gallon Root Beer Kit which makes it easy to make root beer (kit can also be used to make our soda flavors). It comes complete with everything you need to make up to 5 gallons of root beer: 5 gallon food-grade plastic bucket drilled for a spigot (spigot included), plastic bucket lid, tubing, bottle filler, root beer extract, yeast, bottle caps, bottle capper, and complete easy to follow instructions. You, also, get your choice of root beer flavors. Using our kits and soda flavors, you will make the yummiest soda that you have ever tasted. For ultimate convenience, choose one of our root beer kits that includes a soda siphon, CO2 cartridges and flavoring.
Do you want to make root beer, but you don’t have time to wait 3-7 days? We have the solution, a soda siphon and our flavorings! The soda siphon, also known as, a seltzer bottle has been around since the early 1800s. It is a container that is used to force carbonate a liquid using a disposable 8- gram CO2 cartridge and also act as the dispenser for the carbonated liquid.
Other methods to carbonate root beer and soda include kegging and dry ice. Both methods eliminate having to use yeast. To make root beer and dispense from a keg, you will, also, need a Cornelius keg, regulator, CO2 tank, and roughly 20’ of 3/16th tubing. These items can be a bit more expensive than using our soda siphon. Using dry ice is fun, but you need to use with caution because the temperature of dry ice is -109º F, which is cold enough to freeze skin cells causing an injury similar to a burn.
Our soda flavors include: Barking Birch Beer, Black Dawg Cherry, Cream Soda, Dr. Cherry, Ginger Snap Beer, Grape-licious, Kool Cola, Orange Cream Soda, Raspberry Ginger Ale, and Sassy Sarsaparilla. Our root beer flavors include: our original flavor #1 which has a very strong, spicy “micro brew" style root beer taste similar to IBC’s Root Beer (makes 5 gallons), old fashioned #2 tastes similar to Old Hires or Dad’s style root beer (makes 2 ½ gallons) and #3 has a sweet and creamy gourmet taste like Thomas Kemper, Henry Weinhard’s, Stewarts’s, and Dog n Sud’s Root Beer (makes 5 gallons) and Natural Root Beer Cream is root beer with a hint of cream.
Besides drinking your homemade root beer over ice, there are other yummy and creative ways to use it. You can make: root beer ice cream, root beer floats, root beer hard candy, root beer frosting, root beer syrup on pancakes, root beer cookies, root beer cakes and muffins, root beer popsicles, glaze for pork, chicken, and bar-b-q ribs, root beer baked beans, and more.