Ah Smell that aroma?
Bathtub GIN
Well first you need to collect a lot of bottles, 25 quart size or 75 small bottles. Beer bottles can't take the pressure. So, I think glass pop bottles are best. Don't save screw top bottles, because they can't be capped. This is risky business.
Clean your bottles. A bottle brush, lots of hot water, lots of shaking, inspecting, and rinsing to be sure they are spotless.
You will need a siphon, which is a rubber tube about 4 feet in length. You might need a shower attachment tube. One end will go into the beverage container, the other where you will be filling bottles. The beverage has to be sitting higher than the area where you will be filling bottles. This is a two man job. You need someone to be sure the tube is in the container beneath the liquid, as a sediment floats on top of the beverage liquid.
Seated, with a big bowl on your lap, place a drinking bottle in the bowl, suck on the tube until the fluid starts running, then put your thumb over the opening to hold the fluid, direct the tube into the neck of the bottle you wish to fill, and let it fill. Plug the end with your thumb and reach for the next bottle. When you have all your bottles filled, you need a bottle capper and a box of caps. The bottle capper and bottles are reusable, but the caps must be new.
Leave a 1/2 inch air space in the top of each bottle. Check to see that all the caps are on straight. The sides should be folded down with a slight indentation in the center of the cap.
Wipe off the bottles and put them away. We stored ours in the cellar. One batch we made sounded like the Fourth of July and the verse that says, "Bombs bursting in air."
Fermentation is related to heat. In the winter it might ferment all day and stop at night. In the summer it could cook along day and night. The yeast will ferment as long as it has sugar to feed on. If it does not run out of sugar and stop growing, it will continue until it produces enough alcohol to kill it. A little fermentation will give you that fizzy beverage that all enjoy. A lot gives a strong tasting alcoholic beverage.
If you open a bottle and the fluid comes foaming out that means the pressure is too high. Chilling will slow down the fermentation rate.
Bottling with a cork is ok for syrups, and vinegars. Not good with pop.
ROOT BEER FORMULA
Make your tea of roots, leaves, diluting to taste, leaving it a little on the weak side. 3 tablespoons sarsparilla, 1 tablespoon of sassafras, 1 heaping teaspoon hops, 1/4 teaspoon, coriander ground with a rolling pin. Add two cups water, bring to a boil and simmer 12 hours. To the tea add 2 gallons of boiled water, 3 cups of sugar or 1 1/2 cups of honey, and 1/2 teaspoonful of wintergreen extract. Cool. Add 1/4 teaspoonul of yeast. Stir into the brew. Bottle.
Substitutes could include, hops, burdock, yellow dock, sarsaprilla, dandelion and spikenard roots, bruised. Of each about 1/2 ounce. Boil 30 minutes. Strain and add 8 drops of oil of spruce, 2 tablespoons dry yeast, 2/3 pint molasses.
The plants mentioned above were either wild, or grown. Usually every one knew where certain weeds or herbs were growing wild, and returned to those spots to collect them as needed.
I have no idea where you would get sassafras, or oil of wintergreen. And yes, big preparations of this stuff was often mixed in the big old wash tub, or bath tub.
