Hello all,
I am new to the forum here, but happy to see a forum dedicated to Root Beer!
My brother-in-law and I are going to have our first crack at making some home brewed root beer. We have bought most of the ingredients need (still waiting on the sassafras root and glass swing cap bottles to show up in the mail). We have some recipes we can start from. My question is about the equipment/process we should use on our first pass.
Equipment I have:
30qt boiler and burner setup
https://goo.gl/TAUx7t
5 gallon Carboy (not sure if I need or if I should go straight to the bottles)
https://goo.gl/9VxvMQ
12 750ml swing cap bottles
https://goo.gl/RR5mBZ
Recipe we are starting with:
2 ½ gallons of filtered water
1 cup Sassafras
½ cup Sarsaparilla
1 cup Wintergreen Leaf (I’m unsure here some recipes call for a little some for a lot, says it’s a strong flavor if we err on the side of caution we should use ¾ teaspoon)
2 cups Sucanat
3 Cinnamon Sticks*
¼ cup Licorice Root
2 pods Star Anise (once again unsure but we can err on the side of caution)
¾ cup Molasses
¾ cup Lime Juice
1 ½ tsp Allspice*
3 Vanilla Beans*
4 tbs Wild Cherry Tree Bark*
2 ¼ cup Ginger Bug
Asterisk (*) = exotic flavors not necessary for a base flavor
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Any advice on if we should use the carboy after the boil or should we go straight to the bottles?
Any ingredients we should keep out? I want a good base product that we can maybe add ingredients as we see fit in future batches.
Our intent is to eventually make a product we can put on tap at a local brewery and maybe bottle at some point.
Thanks for any advice in advance!
CHEERS