I make wine, my husband makes beer. I just bought one of those soda
making extracts for the kids. I've been assured that they have so
little alcohol when you make them with yeast, that it's undetectable.
So I am carrying on with the "experiment"
I was wondering if any of you guys make soda as well as wine? what are
your experiences with it....does it taste good? did it carbonate well?
Best Extracts? Best recipes? any information would be great!

I still love making wine, I just didn't want the kids to be left out of
the whole " home made beverages" process

"tessamess" > wrote in message
ups.com...
>I make wine, my husband makes beer. I just bought one of those soda
> making extracts for the kids. I've been assured that they have so
> little alcohol when you make them with yeast, that it's undetectable.
> So I am carrying on with the "experiment"
> I was wondering if any of you guys make soda as well as wine? what are
> your experiences with it....does it taste good? did it carbonate well?
> Best Extracts? Best recipes? any information would be great!

One of the best things my Dad did for us when we were kids was to make root
beer. It is extremely easy to do and tastes so much better than the stuff
in the stores you won't believe it!

He used the Hiers extract that you should be able to find in any homebrew
shop, sugar, Fleischman's yeast and water. The directions are on the box.
Follow that and you won't go wrong. You need to use beer or champagne
bottles to handle the pressure, sealed with crown caps. Your kids will
*love* the stuff - trust me! They might even let you have a taste. :^D

BTW, it's my understanding that the alcohol generated in the process is on
the order of ½% or so - not enough to give them a buzz.

Tom S
www.chateauburbank.com

> The directions are on the box. Follow that and
> you won't go wrong..... BTW, it's my understanding
> that the alcohol generated in the process is on
> the order of ½% or so - not enough to give them a buzz.

"Following the directions" being an importat part of
this advice. A Mormon friend of mine once tried to
make ginger beer from a recipe. Since she didn't
want the beer to be alcoholic (being a Mormon), she
added very little sugar in the initial fermentation, but
then quadrupled the amount of sugar she added
while bottling because the beer wasn't sweet enough.

Luckily, she asked me for advice about this before
any of the bottles exploded.

Cheers,

I make root beer all the time. The best advice I can give you is make
sure everything is clean. The URL below is the recipe I use and is
also the website where i get many of my wine and beverage supplies.

Thei extracts are greatr. I also found a manufacturer of commercial
extracts, but the ones on this site are fantastic. Good luck!

http://www.leeners.com/rootbeer.html

Thank you all
This sounds like it will be great fun!

Tom S wrote:
> "tessamess" > wrote in message
> ups.com...
>
>>I make wine, my husband makes beer. I just bought one of those soda
>>making extracts for the kids. I've been assured that they have so
>>little alcohol when you make them with yeast, that it's undetectable.
>>So I am carrying on with the "experiment"
>>I was wondering if any of you guys make soda as well as wine? what are
>>your experiences with it....does it taste good? did it carbonate well?
>>Best Extracts? Best recipes? any information would be great!
>
>
> One of the best things my Dad did for us when we were kids was to make root
> beer. It is extremely easy to do and tastes so much better than the stuff
> in the stores you won't believe it!
>
> He used the Hiers extract that you should be able to find in any homebrew
> shop, sugar, Fleischman's yeast and water. The directions are on the box.
> Follow that and you won't go wrong. You need to use beer or champagne
> bottles to handle the pressure, sealed with crown caps. Your kids will
> *love* the stuff - trust me! They might even let you have a taste. :^D
>
> BTW, it's my understanding that the alcohol generated in the process is on
> the order of ½% or so - not enough to give them a buzz.
>
> Tom S
> www.chateauburbank.com
>
>

My dad used to make an A&W style root beer for us kids using water,
sugar, Sarsaparilla extract, Fleischman's bread yeast, a dash of oil of
wintergreen and a dash of anise extract. Don't know the detail
quantities, but oh we enjoyed it immensely.

Gene

Althoughm you will get result with Fleishman's yeast, I found the best
yeast to use when making root beer is a champagne yeast or other good
wine yeast like ec-1119.

I think you and the kids will enjoy it. I made root beer in the past and it
was great. Have not made it in years. Should do it again.

Ray

"tessamess" > wrote in message
ups.com...
> Thank you all
> This sounds like it will be great fun!
>
>