I am never one to vow in vain. So this past Christmas vacation, as I had returned to my homeland, I gathered my brothers to the kitchen to have our second go at root beer brewing. Since the last time was rather less than tasty, I had been pondering deeply on how to make it better. Since it was too watery the first time I started with a full cup less water. It wasn’t creamy as well so I added a tablespoon of vanilla extract to the water. Since there was a distinct lack of spices I added 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon and 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg. I added the spices and vanilla extract to the water and boiled it for a few minutes. I let it cool until it was warm and then we followed the root beer recipe as given in the instructions. The only other change we made was to add a full extra cup of honey. Not just any honey though. We added Hartman Honey. A raw honey sold in 10 pound tubs by a local bee keeper who retired a few years ago. And I must say it is the most epic honey I’ve ever had in my life. But since he has retired, you can’t buy it any more so we were using some of the last in the world. You’ve got to use it for something though. Since my parents were watching the Voyage of the Dawn Treader in the adjacent room, our pageantry was much reduced since our attentions were torn (the Twinners hadn’t seen that movie yet) but it was still a great time. After we bottled it we let it carbonate for two days as before. We enjoyed our creation on my Dad’s birthday with a fine meal of barbecued short ribs, chicken, and all of the fixin’s. I had a second bottle the next day for the official taste test.
The first thing that was noticed was a significant improvement in the Head as seen from the picture below. That picture was also taken about a minute after it was poured so you can get an idea of just how amazing the Head had become. It was very frothy and lingered for a very long time. I suspect it was the honey, which increased the viscosity so the froth lingered more. The extra sugar also increased the carbonation by giving the yeast more to eat. The Body was also much better. It had a medium Body to it though it wasn’t watery. It was also creamy. The honey flavor was a tad too strong and it also gave a hint of fruity to the brew. The Bite was decent from both spices and carbonation, but the spice flavors were a little too strong as well. The Aftertaste was a spicy honey and vanilla flavor.
So this was quite an improvement over last time but it was still a little off. The first time it was lacking and this time was a bit too much of the good stuff. Definitely a step in the right direction in a Newton’s Method sort of way. I must say that I actually enjoyed it with the meal and would recommend it over the original recipe any day. I give it 3 1/2 kegs with it barely squeaking in that last half a keg. Though now that we are out of the Mr. Root Beer kit ingredients, I think that we will start brewing using McCormick extract so look for some more fun recipes in the future.
The epic Head on our root beer. This was taken a full minute after being poured.
Red Arrow is an old brand of root beer that came from Michigan in the 1950s through 70s. According to the bottle “Folklore says that the brand was a tribute to the Red Arrow Brigade.” Now the Red Arrow Brigade was formed in 1967 from the deactivated 32nd Infantry Division. It was made of three battalions of light infantry as well as support and engineer units. The 32nd Infantry “Red Arrow” Division was formed from the Wisconsin and Michigan National Guards in 1916 to serve on the Mexican border. The Red Arrow Division was active through WWII and had many Metals of Honor and other awards. So most likely folklore (or at least the root beer bottle) meant that the brand was named after the Red Arrow Division and not the Brigade. Either way, the brand died out and for decades the only trace of it was old bottles and crown caps peddled by collectors. Then in March 28, 2011, it was resurrected, the recipe having fallen into the hands of a Redmond, WA man who decided it was something the world needed once again.
This is probably the most anticipated root beer I’ve ever drank. Ever since I began reviewing root beers in 1998, people would always ask what I thought of Barq’s. It is the main root beer pushed by Coca-Cola and is sold in McDonald’s restaurants, so everyone knows it. The problem though is that I only review glass bottle root beers and I could never find Barq’s in glass. I searched everywhere, throughout Washington State and all up the West Coast. I even scoured the internet, but alas, it was to no avail. I’d always have to shamefully admit that I’d never tried Barq’s, well at least not since I became The Root Beer Gourmet. I still kept up the search over the years, though I had mostly given it up as a lost cause. Then, a few months ago, I tried again. I searched and stumbled across an old discussion board where someone mentioned a market in New Orleans from which Barq’s in glass bottles could be obtained. I pounced. I quickly called the market where they confirmed that they carried Barq’s in glass bottles. I was overjoyed. At long last, it would be mine. “How much to ship it?” I asked. The reply caught me off guard, they wouldn’t ship it. No matter what I offered, the employee then hung up the phone. What? I wasn’t about to be thwarted so easily. But how. My options were few. Fly to New Orleans (I’ve never gone to such extremes for a root beer but maybe), wait until my travels take me to New Orleans (sooner or later I’ll go everywhere), wait until I have a friend go to New Orleans, or find someone there. Then I remembered, wasn’t my Grandmother born in New Orleans? Don’t I have relatives living there? As an aside, this grandmother was of French descent and I had visited France and the region from whence they came. I saw the house that the family lived in for generations and I even met the decedents of the family that stayed in France so this type of family history is rather important to me, it’s my heritage after all. Well that settled it. I was going to close the missing link in the Constantin (the French relatives) heritage of mine and get my Barq’s in the process. I called my dad who directed me to my aunt who put me in contact with my second cousin whom I’d never met, nor even really heard of growing up, named Cynthia. After several wonderfully informative calls about the family over there, she said she would drop by the store and send me a six pack. After what seemed an eternity, but was more like three weeks it finally arrived. One of the bottles was smashed in shipping but the other five were still in pristine condition. They’re pretty sweet looking bottles at that. They’ve got the same vintage style that they did 50 years ago, maybe even older. I bumped it to nearly the front of the root beer queue and finally, after 13 years of searching, was able to try Barq’s. So thank you Cynthia, you’re the greatest cousin anyone could ask for.
