Hard Root Beer recipe

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Is everyone that had seperation using the same brand extract

Seems to be pretty consistent across the board, regardless of extract. I can confirm separation with both McCormick's and Zatarain's.
 
I used Watson which is clear. About 1/3 of my bottles had some sedement in the bottom which I thought was separation. But the reast seem to be fine.
 
Got super stoked about this recipe by reading through the first few pages of the thread, and brewed a 5 gallon batch 2 days ago. Since then, I've read through ALL 41 PAGES of the thread, and uncovered all the issues with separation. Lucky me that I uncovered the issue before proceeding with the addition of root beer extract! I did a little digging, and found a recent Hard Root Beer recipe from BYO:

"Ingredients
4 lbs. (1.8 kg) pure cane sugar
1 tablespoon (15 mL) molasses
½ tsp. yeast nutrient
Root beer extract (quantities vary based on extract)
2-4 tsp. baking soda (added to taste)
Clean fermenting ale yeast (Champagne works well also)
2 lbs. (0.91 kg) sugar to backsweeten (added to cold keg)

Step by step
Bring sugar, molasses, and water to a boil for 15 minutes. At flame out add yeast nutrient. Once cooled to yeast pitching temperature, add the yeast and allow the temperature to rise naturally to the upper limit of the yeast’s range; you want a good and fast ferment. After 10 days, cool to near-freezing to drop out as much yeast you can. Transfer the clear finished beer into an empty corny keg and add in the root beer extract and baking soda to taste. Finally, add the sugar (dissolved in 1 qt./1 L boiling water) to backsweeten. Mix all this very well or the dense sugar syrup will drop to the bottom and make for an awkward first pint.This beer likes to be well carbonated — try 2.4-2.7 volumes — and will stay good for quite a while in a kegerator."

A couple of things stand out to me here. First, the primary is allowed to go for 10 days. Second, they recommend cold-crashing the beer to near-freezing to precipitate out as much yeast and other solids as possible. Third, they recommend baking soda to reduce acidity. I'm going to try employing all of these techniques to my batch which is roughly based on the original recipe, and I'll keep you posted.
 
Ladies and Gentleman, the culprit for all the separation is the yeast! All the yeast needs to be filtered out of the beer before the extract is put in. Using a sanitized 30 micron filter will do the trick. Then you can add the extract and sugar to back-sweeten.
 
and how did this turn out for you??



Got super stoked about this recipe by reading through the first few pages of the thread, and brewed a 5 gallon batch 2 days ago. Since then, I've read through ALL 41 PAGES of the thread, and uncovered all the issues with separation. Lucky me that I uncovered the issue before proceeding with the addition of root beer extract! I did a little digging, and found a recent Hard Root Beer recipe from BYO:

"Ingredients
4 lbs. (1.8 kg) pure cane sugar
1 tablespoon (15 mL) molasses
½ tsp. yeast nutrient
Root beer extract (quantities vary based on extract)
2-4 tsp. baking soda (added to taste)
Clean fermenting ale yeast (Champagne works well also)
2 lbs. (0.91 kg) sugar to backsweeten (added to cold keg)

Step by step
Bring sugar, molasses, and water to a boil for 15 minutes. At flame out add yeast nutrient. Once cooled to yeast pitching temperature, add the yeast and allow the temperature to rise naturally to the upper limit of the yeast’s range; you want a good and fast ferment. After 10 days, cool to near-freezing to drop out as much yeast you can. Transfer the clear finished beer into an empty corny keg and add in the root beer extract and baking soda to taste. Finally, add the sugar (dissolved in 1 qt./1 L boiling water) to backsweeten. Mix all this very well or the dense sugar syrup will drop to the bottom and make for an awkward first pint.This beer likes to be well carbonated — try 2.4-2.7 volumes — and will stay good for quite a while in a kegerator."

A couple of things stand out to me here. First, the primary is allowed to go for 10 days. Second, they recommend cold-crashing the beer to near-freezing to precipitate out as much yeast and other solids as possible. Third, they recommend baking soda to reduce acidity. I'm going to try employing all of these techniques to my batch which is roughly based on the original recipe, and I'll keep you posted.
 
Anyone try to make their own extract or start with a homemade root beer base from sasparilla/sassafrass ect?
 
Turned out great. I'm cold crashing 3 gallons of my recipe now to filter it. After that I'll do force carbonating.
 
This would be the final recipe. I'm thinking next time to add a vanilla bean in the primary and also hops, most likely Willamette. I feel as though this would be a lot easier in a keg, but you could skip stabilizing it, bottle, and put in the fridge to stop fermentation.

Grandpa Willies Hard Root Beer

---Primary---
1 tsp yeast nutrient
1/2 tsp yeast energizer
4 oz brown sugar
4 oz lactose
1 pound light DME
Nottingham Ale Yeast

Boil DME, brown sugar, and lactose with about 4 cups water. Pour in primary. Add nutrient and energizer. Top off. Let cool and pitch yeast. Ferment for 5-7 days. Stabilize (if kegging). Wait another week.

---Before Kegging---
1 cup sugar boiled in 1 cup water
5 1/2 oz wildflower honey
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp root beer extract (McCormick)

Boil sugar and add to bottling bucket. Then add honey (warm it so its easier to pour) and the extracts. Let cool and add primary. Pour in Keg or bottles.
Im coming in late on this thread ,but with this recipe ,what is the total volume /how much water do you use?
 
I love me some hard Root Beer! I thought about doing this years ago when the post was first put up but totally forgot about it! I am SO GLAD to see it pop back up!
I will be giving this a go!

Cheers
Jay
 
Hi,

I've been wanting to give this recipe a shot - never brewed root beer before. Can anyone confirm using a 30-micron filter resolves the separation issue?

My plan would be to force carbonate in a keg, then use my beer gun to put it in 16 oz plastic bottles. How long does it take for separation to occur - I'd probably need a week or so in the keg before filling the bottles. If I got separation in the bottles I'm hoping I could gently shake them to mix everything together before I open them, but I'd really like to not have separation at all.

Thanks for your help!
 
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