VeeEight292

Recipes 

I dont believe so, we went to a home brewers looking for DME, dude there said ground malt (real malt grain) is much tastier than DME and also adds the head and body with out the chemicals. We steeped about 1/2 a pound on water (heated to 160 degrees for 30 min) and used it in place of water in our syrup, however after letting the flavors meld for a few days, we realized that wringing our the malt (which was in a muslin bag) was not the best idea, it added too much malt flavor so we are going to cut back the malt to about 1/3 pound and let drain instead of wring it out. Also we are honing the sweetness a little too, I like the sweeter brews, where as my hubby prefers the spicier, so we are trying it with anise essence (an anise oil, not extract) and cutting the butterscotch back about half of the initial recipe. We are also try g Mexican vanilla, after talking to the ladies at the local spice shop (savory spice) we found most conventional vanilla is Madagascar vanilla. Mexican has a More woodsy flavor (Tahitian vanilla is more floral and better used in vanilla creme sodas by the way). We are now on a hunt for wintermint extract.

jimyoung

Recipes 

One year? i am quit sure you cannot. I have heard about apparently-harmless chemicals you can use to kill the yeast, but then you can't bottle it again and let it really carbonate. I get past this by only making 6 of any flavour at any given time. You get used to it and it becomes very quick to whip up another batch

wings9191

Recipes 

Interesting, I guess I was just thinking straight off the bat making Gallons of the stuff and bottling it. Which has not been kind so far.
Think I need to cut back and do smaller batches.
What's about the shelf life of a homemade soda? Roughly

MrFoodScientist

Recipes 

Shelf life is very dependent on your sanitation practices, your storage, and your ingredients.

If you are meticulously clean, store your soda away from light in properly sealed glass bottles, force carbonate instead of ferment and include some preservatives or pasteurize, then you can probably get 6-8 months.

If you're nonchalant about cleanliness, store your soda somewhere where light hits it, use ingredients susceptible to spoilage, or ferment at all, then you're probably looking at a week or two, tops.

If you want to store large batches, your best bet is to hot fill (~160°F) a keg with seals that are stable at that temperature, pressurize it before it can pull a vacuum, then force carbonate. If you do that properly, then it's just like canning.

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Find Recipes on my blog: The Homemade Soda Expert I'd love some feedback!

wings9191

Recipes 

Awesome!
Thanks for the info guys