You know how to make coffee, hot chocolate, tea, milk shakes, chocolate milk and other similar drinks, but do you know how to make homemade root beer? If you don't, soon you will—because I'm going to share with you exactly how to make your very own homemade root beer! This is also a really fun learning experiment for kids to help with.

You get root beer with a mixture of chemistry and physics. Wait! Don't run away just yet! Don't let the mention of chemistry or physics scare you—I promise this will be an experiment both you and your child will enjoy!

Most sodas are created with five key components: high-quality water, sugar, coloring, flavoring, and just a bit of carbonation.

Before we get into the process of making root beer, I want to really stress how important the kind of water is to the end result of your root beer. For homemade root beer, you have to use distilled water (no exceptions). Distilled water consists mainly of just water and very little of anything else. Minerals, chemicals, and other dissolved materials are removed by distilling and that's exactly what you want for great tasting root beer.

Now, the part you've been waiting for! Let's jump right in!

Here's What You Need to Get Started!

INGREDIENTS:

Root Beer Extract Flavoring

Distilled Water

Red & Green Food Coloring (only for creating the brown coloring. If you don't want to use food coloring, you'll have clear root beer.)

Sugar

Dry ice

Rubber gloves

Protective eye ware

Tongs

Funnel

Ladle

Glass soda bottles & caps

Homemade Root Beer Recipe and Process

1. Start by adding your root beer extract flavoring to the distilled water and stir thoroughly.

2. Add one cup of sugar to your root beer extract and water solution. Stir the sugar in until it dissolves completely.

How to Get That Warm Brown Root Beer Color

In order to create that delicious brown root beer coloring, you'll need to mix green and red food coloring into your root beer flavoring, distilled water, and sugar mixture. You'll need to add approximately two times more red than green. It doesn't take much, so start off by adding two drops of red and one drop of green and continue using this ratio of red to green until you get the desired brown coloring.

Stir your mixture well to make sure that you have completely distributed all the food coloring and any remaining undissolved sugar. This is the perfect time to taste test you mixture to make sure it meets your taste standards.

Wearing rubber gloves and safety goggles, use your tongs to place the dry ice into your mixture.

*Please, Please, Please use extra caution when using dry ice! Never touch dry ice with you your bare skin.

Immediately after placing the dry ice into your mixture, a thick, white cloud will begin to come from your bowl (just like from a fog machine at Halloween). What you'll be seeing is a mixture of water vapor and CO2.

Let the dry ice boil and bubble in your solution while you move on to the next step.

Bottles & Caps

In my opinion, root beer tastes best when you drink it from an ice cold glass soda bottle. So, make sure that you have some glass bottles and caps available before you decide to make your homemade root beer. You can find clear glass soda bottles at your local Michael's store or Michael's online.

Your glass bottles, caps, funnel, and ladle should be thoroughly clean and completely dry. I always wash everything first and then quickly submerge them in boiling water to sterilize everything. Place the bottles upside down to dry.

Cooling & Carbonating

The dry ice helps cool and also helps carbonate your mixture, turning it into soda that's filled with bubbles of CO2. *Your dry ice needs to completely dissolved before you can move on to the next step.

Once your dry ice has completely dissolved, place your funnel into one of your glass bottles and fill it with your homemade root beer using your ladle. Take your time with pouring and make sure to slowly pour your root beer into the bottle to avoid losing the carbonation. Pop you cap on the bottle tightly and immediately place your sealed bottle in the refrigerator to retain the carbonation. Repeat this step until you've completely used all your root beer.

The Magic Behind the Making

Your root beer will no doubt be very tasty, but may not taste exactly like store bought root beer. Don't beat yourself up over it. You just made HOMEMADE ROOT BEER for goodness sake! Give yourself a pat on the back and be proud.

Remember, you don't have the big expensive machinery like soda factories use to create root beer. Plus, you know exactly what went into your root beer!

The most noticeable difference you'll most likely taste, is the loss of carbonation. Without the use of special pressurizing machines, unfortunately, there's really no way to avoid this. So, instead of pouting—enjoy your root beer right away! If you drink it right away, there's still a really yummy way to enjoy your root beer even though it lost some fizz. Make a root beer float! Once you add your root beer to your ice cream and see that delicious creamy foam, you won't care too much about some missing fizz. ;)

SAFETY INFORMATION

Keep the kiddo's away from the dry ice.Never, ever put dry ice in your mouth or on bare skin.Wear protective safety goggles anytime you handle dry ice. Shards of dry ice are extremely dangerous to your eyes. If you have to break apart your dry ice, place a towel over your dry ice before you start breaking pieces off.DO NOT  store your dry ice in any kind of an airtight container. When dry ice transforms from its solid state to a gas (vapor), pressure builds up from the gas and your container will explode. When storing your dry ice, use a container that is well-ventilated or has a lid that fits loosely to allow the sublimation to be released.DO NOT, I repeat do not store your dry ice in your freezer. Storing dry ice in your freezer will cause your freezer to actually become too cold, which could result in your freezer turning off. (However, if you remember this tip—it could come in handy if you lose power for any extended period of time.)If you unfortunately end up getting a dry ice burn, make sure to treat it immediately and properly. Dry ice burns are treated the same way heat burns are treated.

Are you excited to make your own homemade root beer? With Valentine's Day coming up, you may want to think about making some homemade root beer for Valentine's Day dessert (root beer floats) or you can even make root beer as part of your Valentine's party!

If you end up making your own homemade root beer, come back here and let me know what you think. Did you find it to be an easy process or was it a disaster for you? Let me know by leaving me a comment below. I always love hearing from you!

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