Rosemary Gladstar’s Favorite Homemade Root Beer

I wasn't a big soda girl when I was growing up but I did love root beer. In fact when I was young root beer still contained real sassafras. I still love the flavor of sassafras and sarsaparilla and all those wonderful roots. It's a true American drink. Root beer was a formula. I'm sure the native people who lived both on the both coasts made it gathering roots in the spring of the fall in the year and when the early settlers came along with their consuming consumption of huge amounts of hard cider they also made these root beers and they drank them. They're tonics. They're wonderfully nourishing and cleansing but they often were used for medicine because they help to quote-unquote cleanse the blood. What do we mean by that? It's a really kind of nebulous term that herbalists have used for a long time and it just basically means a mixture of roots and barks, seeds and nuts that are very high in minerals that feed and nourish the blood and they also have action on the liver. They help with digestion and with movement of food through the system but the main reason that we're making this old what I call my old-fashioned root beer tea is because of flavor. It is a medicine for certain but it's a wonderful summer drink. It's one of those great drinks on a hot summer day that you can make yourself. So we're going to start with sassafras and I hope I don't shock anybody with this because sassafras actually even though it has a long, long history of being used as a blood cleanser and an alterative, an herb that helps to alter the system for the better and even though it's a traditional drink that was drank by the native people for we don't know how many hundreds and hundreds of years and was certainly drank by thousands of early settlers here, in the 1950s our food and drug decided that sassafras wasn't safe to drink and so it actually you can still buy it. It's still sold but it's supposedly sold for non-human consumption. If you like this formula but you don't want to use the sassafras in it which would be very too bad because the sassafras adds such a great taste and also such a good medicine in there, then you can make this very same recipe without the sassafras but I'm going to start by adding three parts of sassafras. By the way, I want to let you know that I don't just you know disregard those studies that are done on the toxicity of plants. Some of them I pay close attention to but when I looked at the traditional studies or the traditional uses of sassafras and then I look at the modern research and what was done, in my mind it's a really safe herb to use because the studies were done actually in the lab in a petri dish not on human beings at all and it wasn't done with the whole plant which is what we're using, the whole plant. It was done by the single isolate, the saffron, which by itself extracted from the sassafras and injected into laboratory rats caused carcinogenic cells. I think you could inject anything into rats in laboratories and probably have something bad grow but when we boil sassafras, when we simmer it and cook it, the saffron is hardly water soluble. You get minute amounts of it and it was interesting when those studies were done in the 1950s on sassafras the lowest rate of throat cancer in the country was in the area where people drank sassafras as a regular food and by the way it's as a regular drink and by the way it still drank in the whole southeastern part of the United States as a really good medicine and it was a good herb. So it's native to the northeastern, excuse me, the southeastern parts of the United States and it grows as far north as Massachusetts. We're a little too far north for it up here. So there's sassafras. It was a main ingredient in the root beer that I drank as a child but in the 1950s our government took it out of our drinks and they allowed the companies to use synthetic sassafras which I'm sure is really good for us. I'll take the herb any day. The other herb that I'm going to add is another traditional herb that's used is sarsaparilla. This particular sarsaparilla is a Jamaican sarsaparilla which is considered one of the most medicinal sarsaparillas and like sassafras it's also another blood tonic, another herb that is used for the liver and it's also used a lot in formulas for men to enhance vitality and as an herb that's really good for the hormonal system of both men and women but in particular it was used for men. But the sarsaparilla that I really love and the sarsaparilla that was used in all of the early root beer formulas was our native sarsaparilla which grows prolifically in the northeast, both the northeastern part of the United States and the southeastern United States. It's a member of the Aurelia family, the same family as ginseng and it actually has a lot of those same properties. The difference being is that it's very very prolific. So we're going to add an equal amount of the sarsaparilla. I can tell you in those early formulas that the pioneers and the native people did they didn't use the Jamaican, they used the native sarsaparilla and it's very underused our native sarsaparilla. I don't know why but not very many people are using it. I feel it's going to be one of those soon-to-be-rediscovered herbs. So we're going to use equal parts of the sarsaparilla and then we're going to add a birch bark. Birch bark was also another major ingredient in the old formulas of root beer. It's not a root for sure, it's the bark and it has a wonderful delicious kind of wintergreen-like flavor to it and that it's the inner bark. Again it's native to the northeastern and southeastern parts of the United States and it also has blood purifying properties. It's officially classified as an alterative and I'm going to use, I just put in two parts but our recipe calls for one part. So we're going to put a little of that in and then the rest of the formula I just kind of use the herbs I have on hand in this particular formula because I want to make a tea that's not only really really tasty and has that old classic root beer flavor but I also want to use herbs that are really good for my liver that help energy move and help with digestion. So I'm going to use dandelion and we're going to use the root in this formula. The root and leaf of the dandelion are both used medicinally but they're used actually, they have different properties and we're going to use just one part. The part I'm using by the way is my tablespoon here so because I don't want to make a huge amount, just enough for a nice pot. So we're going to add the dandelion and we're also going to add a bit of licorice root. Licorice because it adds that wonderful licorice-like flavor and it goes along really well with the sarsaparilla and the sassafras. Not everybody loves licorice. I'm a huge fan of licorice. In fact licorice candy is like my favorite candy in the world, good licorice, real licorice that's made with real licorice extract. I love the flavor but it's an interesting herb because there's some people that just actually have an adverse reaction taste-wise to it. It's used a lot in formulas for women's health because it's one of those herbs that helps with the adrenal glands. It's really excellent for the endocrine gland system and it also helps with hormonal balance as well. But there's some women who really just don't want to taste that plant so you always want to ask. We're going to also add a little bit of fennel. Fennel also adds that licorice flavor. If you don't like the taste of licorice, if you have an adverse feeling to that, then you can add a little bit of fennel. Though it will give it that licorice flavor but for some reason people who don't like the taste of licorice do fine with the taste of fennel. So we're going to add fennel. The medicinal uses of fennel are it's really good for digestion. It's one of the primary herbs actually used for expelling gas. That just lets us know people have always had gas when they digest, so do animals, and that there's a whole group of herbs that are called carmimitives and their classic action in the body is to expel gas which they actually do, they expel it. So you actually get, you sound a little more gassy but the gas at least is outside and not inside for better or worse. And then I love these Chinese star anises. These are definitely not local, they come from China. They possibly can be grown but I don't know anybody who is growing them locally but they're just beautiful. They're almost like little magical stars and they have a very anise-like flavor, very much like the fennel. And I really just add them, I mean you don't really need to add them other than they add so much beauty. Like just putting those chunky little pieces in I think looks so nice. And then I add a little bit of ginger and we'll say about a quarter part of ginger, this is a teaspoon. I love the flavor of ginger but it can be very hot and overpowering. And here in this formula I want it just to kind of be a secondary flavor. So that's the basic formula. Oh we have to add burdock too. This is a really good medicinal formula that's not only tastes good but we can actually recommend this to people who are having liver difficulties. How do we recognize liver difficulties? Well you can have liver problems that work through your skin, poor elimination. You can have, as I said, problem skin and a problem with the hormones too are often traced back to the liver. Such a major important organ to the physiological workings of our body. So what we're doing here is we're blending this fabulous tea that's going to taste so good that you can serve it to people just as a wonderful refreshing blend but also has these very good medicinal properties. We could call this tea finished now, the basic formula, but I always like to add a little bit of stevia. Stevia is a natural sweetener. It actually has over 50 times more sweetness in it than sugar does but it has no calories. It's absolutely not going to cause any problems with your teeth. There's no problems with teeth, no calories and it's also an herb, even though it is very sweet, it doesn't digest like regular glucose or sugar and it's actually really good for the pancreas and for people who have diabetes and other problems with blood sugar. This is a sweetener that's recommended. You often find it now in stores as a white powder. I always am a little bit mindful and concerned about white powders. A white powder means, well it can mean a lot of things. It can mean something to be deadly afraid of actually but usually it means something that's extremely purified and so I really like using it in the powder form. This is just powdered leaf or even just the whole leaf. It's very easy to grow stevia. It's an annual here and we grow it in pots and then usually just one or two plants gives me enough stevia for the whole year. I dry it in the end of the year but during the season you can just add the fresh stevia. The one problem with stevia because it is so sweet, remember it's at least 50 times sweeter than sugar, you have to be very careful of how much you add to a formula. In this formula because it's dry herbs, I usually say just add a pinch or it's about five percent of the entire formula. So we're going to add just a small amount. If you add too much stevia it becomes cloyingly sweet, too sweet and people don't like that flavor. You just want it to again come up like the ginger to come up behind you so you're not really sure what that sweet taste is but it's in there and it's delicious. So that's our blend. With roots what I like to do is I like to simmer them because roots are a little bit like a like a rooty vegetable. You can steam them if you chop them up really finely but if you slow simmer which is like a low boil you break down all those cell walls and you bring out all the deep constituents that are in the root. Some people like to just put the herb in a quart jar or half this is a half gallon but say in a jar and cover it with boiling water and let it sit overnight and that works as well but I'm again a lot of it is who you study with there's there's no right or wrong way it's what works for you. In fact I grew up being taught by my teachers to keep the lid on the pot when you're cooking not to let any of that steam evaporate unless you're trying to do a reduction like unless you were trying to make a syrup but one time one of my very favorite herbalists a credible clinician and a great character Phyllis Light actually her name is Phyllis Delight and she's delightful she came up here she's from the south she lives in Arkansas and she's like third or fourth generation herbalist in her family she's a community herbalist and she came up here she was teaching my advanced students and she brought with her this great big sassafras root. Sassafras is a medicine down there they use it all the time they don't pay any attention to those rulings that say that saffron was toxic especially when you can't even get it out in water that's sort of a silly thing isn't it and so she was going to make a great big pot of the sassafras and she had a boiling big pot because it was a big root she had it boiling on the stove and I went over and I said oh Phyllis let's cover the pot up don't you want to cover it and she looked at me we never cover these pots and so you know she was boiling it away but and I wasn't gonna either argue with her or try to teach her because this is a this is an herbalist who absolutely knows what she's doing and she makes really this incredible sassafras just boiling it away so what's the point of that story really it's just to show you that again over and over and over again this is an art we don't want to see it standardized in such a way that there's one way to do it in fact one of the great things I love about this art is that everybody who practices herbalism is a real character and in fact I would say in all the years that I practice herbalism I've heard opinions about everything which I always find so interesting because I have my own of course and probably the only thing that every herbalist that I know absolutely agrees on is don't use aluminum pots and pans everything else is open for discussion and really for you who are just starting your herbal work that can be confusing but I might say it's a lesson about life it's how life is it's not like standardized life is a is a lesson and it's learning and more than anything it's learning to trust that inherent wisdom in ourselves so you know I'm going to cook this with the lid on and Phyllis is going to cook it with the lid off and we're both going to end up with a really fabulous brew so we're going to simmer it for at least with roots I like to simmer them for about a half an hour sometimes 45 minutes simmering here is a low boil it's not a really rapid boil one of the things I find really interesting with sassafras and you might have noticed this too sassafras is high in saponins saponins have a cleansing action in the body and plants that are really really concentrated in saponins could also if they're super concentrated in saponins can also be toxic so sassafras doesn't have that many saponins in it but when you boil sassafras you'll notice sometimes that it boils over really quickly and I wondered why that was you know why it was that you know I could leave other plants on the stove other herbs and they wouldn't just boil over but sassafras if I forgot to watch it for 10 minutes it would start to boil over and that's really the saponins in the sassafras when they get activated by that hot water they start bubbling and they bubble more so just a little chemical treat a little lesson in the chemical constituents so let's boil that and get it going so we can have our root beer tonic so I think that's been boiling uh sufficiently length of time smells delicious we're going to strain it the strainer that I like the best are these stainless they're double stainless steel strainers they just get all the particulates out of it so we're going to strain that it's nice root beery brown perfect and we just plop there you go and I'm one of those people I just like to do little tastes as I go along that stevia was just perfect that little bit of stevia and then we're going to turn this you could drink it this way you can have it a nice hot drink if you want but we're going to put this in we're going to make root beer seltzer like a real sparkling root beer and so we're going to put that in you saw how nicely that double stainless still strain there was very little particulates left in there and then what I do I add about not quite you know uh the same amount maybe uh half the amount of a sparkling water a seltzer water usually I just get plain sparkling water but I couldn't find it at my co-op yesterday and they had this uh this old New England seltzer which is just sparkling water with a little bit of natural orange juice and or orange flavoring so I thought we'd try that and see because actually orange is a good flavor to put in here so this is a bit of an experiment I absolutely know with the just natural uh seltzer that it turns out so good and delicious so we're just going to put that in about that amount and we're going to do a little taste and uh here's a nice cup here and we're gonna make sure that it's perfect oh my god it's so so good it's especially good with that little natural orange flavoring I thought it might be I'm going to add a little bit more because I want it to be this is very concentrated and I want it to be kind of a light summer drink we could serve it over ice with some little lemon slices in it this is organic lemon it's important when you use lemon and orange especially with the peel that they be organic especially with the citrus because these peels will hold all of those chemicals so let's give it a good shape look at that doesn't that just look like root beer well I'll tell you it's the best root beer you're going to buy these days you're just not going to stuff like that's as good natural and good for you as this hey John come on over here and try some here he is the cameraman it's amazing it's actually better than any root beer you can get in the store even with those new fancy ones that are like three dollars a bottle well they're too sweet they make those too sweet yeah right it's not too sweet I love the stevia in there and the seltzer it's actually really nice that great yeah I love it I know and the more you drink it the more you study the medicinal uses but you you can have some you can go next it's good isn't it would you like to try some another good teaching about the herbs in here is when you understand even just a little bit of the chemistry of plants you don't have to be a chemist understand it but because your your mouth your body will tell you but sassafras is very astringent and so if you drink a lot of astringent herbs it actually is drying sometimes people go well I drink all this green tea or I drink all this black tea or I drink all this herbal tea and if it's an astringent drying herb it actually isn't moisturizing your body at all it's drying which if you understand those properties is good for you that's a good thing but if you don't and you you don't aren't paying attention to that taste and what it's doing to you it can actually be drying and dry you out I got to have some too this stuff is way too good smells delicious yeah it's good so root beer party well we need a root beer toast bulla bulla let's see for those of you have not watched the comic that'll make sense oh that's good I think I'm going to use that orange seltzer water all the time isn't it delicious