Food - Drink
Making Your Own Root Beer Is A Lot Easier Than You Might Think
By LISA CURRAN MATTE
Fermented roots, barks, berries, and flowers flavored with sassafras, wintergreen, and sarsaparilla was first consumed by Native Americans as a sort of tea, then turned into "root beer" by European settlers. Culinary advancements have come a long way since then, and now, you can easily create this beverage in your own kitchen.
If you think that home-brewing root beer sounds odd, know that until the 19th century, root beer was a beverage that families made on their own. One of the hardest parts is sourcing tree bark for your brew; after that, you can experiment with various spices and herbs of your choosing, but there's one flavoring that is an absolute must.
The flavor of sassafras is synonymous with root beer, but the actual plant was banned from the U.S. in 1979, so if you live in America, just mix artificial sassafras flavoring with water, sweetener, ale yeast, and other flavors. Root beer prep for most recipes takes less than an hour, but fermentation can take up to 60 hours.