Root Beer Beer

ABV: 6.7% IBU: 34.1 SRM: 36.2

As I mentioned in my previous post I brewed a Belgian Dark Strong Ale and added 4 liters of root beer to it.  I’ve always thought it would be a cool idea to make a root beer beer.  I’ve never seen one before and thought it would be fun.   A lot of people who homebrew also make legit root beer, but real root beer doesn’t have any alcohol, and let’s be honest, what’s the fun in that?  So this is my attempt to combine the flavor of root beer in a beer that’s fairly strong and easy to drink.  I was pleasantly surprised by the results actually.  It was very dark, probably darker than the “measured” SRM because I can’t add the root beer addition to my recipe in Beersmith.  One other interesting thing about this beer was the head retention.  Out of the tap it had a nice big frothy tan head, but after two or three sips it was gone.  If I had to guess, I’d say the root beer addition was the culprit.  The aroma and flavor profile both showcased the root beer.  The root beer did a great job at hiding the alcohol as well.  The finish was very dry, 2 lbs of Candi sugar and 4 liters of root beer would do it.  All the flavors were there, I just wished it would have hung out on the palate a little bit longer.  This was a very fun summer beer.  I meant to put ice cream in it at one point to see if that was any good, but never did.  The next time I make this one I want to try different hops, something with a little more bite to it, and I also want to mess around with trying dry ingredients and/or root beer extract.  I think such a large addition of root beer gets the point across, but I think there’s got to be a better, more efficient way to accomplish the same goal.  There are other tweaks to the recipe I might try, but for a first attempt I’m very happy with the results.

Cheers!

Root Beer Beer
Batch Size:  6 Ga
List of Ingredients:

10lbs Pale Malt 2 Row

1lb C80

.5lb Special B

.25lb Pale Chocolate

1lb Amber Belgian candi sugar

1lb Dark Belgian candi sugar

2oz Fuggles (pellet) hops 60mins

1oz Fuggles (pellet) hops 15mins

1oz Fuggles (pellet) hops Flameout

4 liters of Mugs Rootbeer (de-carbonated) @ flameout – There’s not a lot of literature out there about this addition, but one forum post I found said if added fully carbonated you’d get a massive boil over.  I just shook the bottles and let the gas out over and over again until they were flat.  I didn’t have any problems.  Also, the root beer will lower the gravity of the wort so you’ll have to account for that in the recipe.  You’ll also have to account for the extra volume – which Beersmith and I also didn’t do.  So this recipe is for 6 gallons even though I only fermented 5.

Belgian Strong Ale – Wyeast  #1388

Dough In: 19 Qts

Strike Temp: 165F

Mash temp: 152F for 60 mins

Batch Sparge: 20 Qts

Sparge temp: 170F

Boil:  60 mins

Cool, and transfer.

Ferment for three weeks

Beginning Specific Gravity: 1.061

Final specific gravity: 1.010