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If you like root beer, you like sassafras. And making your own root beer syrup is super easy.
The aromatic bark, leaves and roots of this little tree are believed to be the first plant exported from North America to Europe, back in the late 1500s. All parts of this little tree make for delicious — and different — teas, sweets and other confections, and sassafras commanded exorbitant prices in Europe… until everyone started drinking sassafras tea to cure their syphilis. Soon no one wanted to be seen sipping their syphilis cure in public, and the sassafras trade withered.
More recently, sassafras has been getting a bad rap by the folks at the USDA, who say that the active component of sassafras, safrole, is a “known carcinogen.” Why? They gave tons of pure safrole to rats and the rats got cancer. Later researchers noted that, like the whole saccharine scare in the late 1970s, safrole seems to cause cancer in rats — but not people.
Still, many people still think that sipping sassafras tea or eating sassafras ice cream will doom you to a date with your oncologist. Just know that there are many times more “known carcinogens” in a bottle of beer than there are in any homemade sassafras product you might make. By one calculation, you’d need to drink 24 gallons of sassafras root beer a day for an extended time to get the amount of safrole fed to those rats.
And if you drank that much soda, you’d have lots of other problems to deal with…
I collect sassafras on Cape Ann, where my family lives. It’s easy to spot its telltale mitten leaves. Sassafras is unmistakable. It is a spindly, shrubby tree that lives beneath larger trees. Its upper bark is green, and the leaves come in three varieties, often on the same branch: a mitten, a three-lobed leaf, and a simple spear-shaped leaf.
The way you collect sassafras is to pull seedlings right out of the ground. I know, it sounds destructive, but it isn’t. Sassafras grows in clumps, and the parent tree sends out suckers under the ground, which then become seedlings; it’s a lot like mulberry.
You find a clump — look for at least 8 to 10 treelings scattered about — go to one about 2 or 3 feet tall, grasp the very base of the tree and yank it straight up. You should come away with the seedling and about 10 inches’ worth of the root.
You did not get all of the root, you know, and this is a good thing. It will regrow later. So what seems a little destructive is actually good for the sassafras cluster — it lets the surrounding seedlings grow with less competition.
All parts of this tree are useful. Notice I did not say “edible,” because the leaves are the only part you actually eat. You know them as filé powder, and without sassafras leaves gumbo just isn’t gumbo.
Roots on the left, twigs on the right. What’s the difference? They make very different teas. The twigs have a lemony-floral flavor and aroma that one author has compared to Froot Loop cereal — not exactly a selling point in my book, but they are lovely. The roots, however, are the “root” in root beer.
I am not a tea drinker. Coffee is my breakfast drink of choice. So I was not about to switch for sassafras. But I do like using flavored syrups from wild ingredients; I recently made a delicious fir tip syrup from the young tips of a Douglas fir tree. I then use these syrups to glaze meats, make homemade sodas, sorbets or ice creams. Sassafras is a prime candidate for this treatment.
To make a twig syrup, you peel back the green bark a bit to expose it — the bark is what has most of the flavor — then simmer the twigs in hot water. The brew quickly turns a pretty amber, a little like cola. Let it steep overnight and then strain it through cheesecloth and mix it 1:1 with sugar to make a simple syrup. It is outstanding. I mean, really outstanding. Think root beer with a lot of lemon in it.
To make root beer syrup, the first thing you need to do it chop the sassafras roots.
Sassafras is the prime flavor in root beer, but not the only one. Root beer is a concoction of many things. My recipe is heavy on the sassafras roots, plus some burdock root, molasses for color, one clove, a star anise, some coriander seed and one drop of wintergreen extract.
It really does taste like store-bought root beer! Maybe not the root beer you get in a can now, but then that no longer has any real sassafras in it. It is warm, and zingy, and, well, deliciously rooty.
If you live near sassafras trees — and you do if you live east of the Great Plains, south of Quebec and north of Orlando — by all means make this root beer syrup. If you don’t live there, or don’t feel like foraging, you can buy sassafras root bark online. You’ll never go back to store-bought root beer again.
When you make your root beer, start with a tablespoon of this syrup to a pint of seltzer water. You can adjust the strength of your drink from there.
Homemade Root Beer Syrup
Ingredients
- 6 cups water
- 3 ounces sassafras roots
- 1 ounce burdock or dandelion root
- 1/4 cup molasses
- 1 clove
- 1 star anise
- 1 teaspoon coriander seeds
- 2 drops wintergreen or peppermint extract
- 6 cups sugar
Instructions
- Chop the sassafras and burdock roots into small pieces, about 1/2 inch or smaller.
- Put the roots in a medium-sized heavy pot with the clove, star anise and coriander seeds and cover with the water. Cover the pot and bring it to a boil. Simmer this for 15 minutes.
- Add the molasses and simmer another 5 minutes.
- Turn off the heat and add the wintergreen or peppermint extract. Put the cover back on the tea.
- When the mixture cools, strain it though cheesecloth to remove any debris.
- Return it to the pot with an equal amount of sugar. Stir to combine. Bring it to a simmer and cook it for 5 minutes, uncovered. Pour into quart mason jars and seal. Keeps a year in the fridge.
Notes
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I’d like to make this recipe, but I want to force carbonate it with CO2 instead of adding it to seltzer water. About how much rootbeer would this full batch of syrup make if I were to add it all to water at the time of making it?
Mike: I have no idea.
The state of Alabama expanded a freshwater lake for Gulf Shores State Park back in the late 60s or early 70s. As a kid I promptly named it Root Beer Lake because they obviously went through a sassafras area. And the lake was very brown. I quite enjoyed it. We had long used the sassafras that grew at our grandmother’s place in south Louisiana — no additives for the tea, just cream and sugar. That area of Louisiana and Mississippi had been home to the Choctaw tribe. As an adult I bought a fantastic walking stick made from sassafras in Vermont.
I was on a Forest Camp in Tennessee . Back in 1970 to see the only Extracting Mill for Sassafras oil left in the US . It was located in a “small” town named Hickory Valley south of Bolivar , Tenn. We got to smell it but that was enough . A smell would knock your head off . It was ” intense” .
Very good info, clear explanation,Thank you for sharing
People tend to waste the sassafras leaves and the sassafras flowers. At different stages–and sizes–of the leaves, they can be used for a variety of purposes.
The green twigs can be cleaned and dried, turned into whittlings, bagged as used as clothes fresheners like lavender or mint. I used to hang a bag on my truck rear-view mirror as a car freshener, too.
I like to prune my sassafras trees in the spring ( no, they’re not wild, they grow in my garden and in some places become invasive ). When I prune them, I prune the buds like a Japanese gardener, pulling off the young, expanding leaves and flowers. You can use these as garnish or dry them and add to them to foods for flavour.
As the leaves become a little larger, they are good to eat for a snack since they are very lemony at this stage and quite refreshing and not at all bitter. They have a mucilaginous quality like okra if you eat a bunch of them and also freshen your breath.
If you dry the leaves, then grind them up in a mortar and pestle, you have file’ powder.
Full-size leaves are also good lightly steamed or parboiled or briefly microwaved, used as a food wrap for meat and rice mixtures or other ingredients. In mid-spring through through early summer, we frequently collect larger sassafras and grape leaves to stuff. Chicken and pork are good fillings.
Fresh roots are best for good teas, but when are preparing the flower beds and ‘harvest’ a lot of the fleshy roots that have meanwhile ‘invaded’ them, we also dry a bunch for use later. Just be sure they are thoroughly dried prior to storage or they will mould. When we use the dried roots, we use a lot, simmer it a long time to make a stronger liquor, then dilute it as needed. If you simmer it into a syrup, it can be lightly sweetened with stevia or other sweeter and used over ice cream or as a glaze.
Sassafras is a good blood-thinner and diuretic. Since I spent a lot of time outdoors over the winter, my blood thickens, so sassafras tea makes a good spring tonic to prepare me for warmer weather. This is how the Cherokee and Shawnee used it and probably who originally taught our family all about it.
Looks like you’re using fresh roots, so are those measures wet weight for the roots? I’m traveling in the east now, got some sassafras roots today!
Andy: Yes, but it’s not rocket science, so just add a bit more for dried roots. Thanks for the catch on that!
I’ve been looking for a root beer syrup recipe for a LONG time!
Getting away from pop/soda (esp. high fructose corn syrup & artificial sweeteners) has been a perennial goal of mine, with wins and loses. Most substitutes I’ve found lacking, cucumber waters, cider vinegar concoctions, etc. Lemongrass tea has been my most enjoyable cold drink, so far. I can’t wait to try this recipe!!! 🙂
Thank you!
I’m so glad to have found your website and look forward to checking out more articles and your podcast, it’s right up my alley!
My goodness does this bring back memories. My late maternal grandfather, who had a little 10-acre spread in Louisiana after he retired, taught me (among other things) how to forage for sassafras, which grew in abundance on their property. Taught me how to snap a tiny piece of twig and check for that lemon aroma (much of their land was a tangle of various plants, including polk salad, and the smell test was the easiest way to confirm you had the right plant). Taught me how to infuse the root for tea, and grind the leaves for file (but I mostly just made the tea, which I thought was nifty in that it tasted like root beer). You would’ve liked him, Hank. He would hunt (and eat!) just about anything (always double-check before tasting whatever was on the stove–my mom was less than thrilled once when she discovered she’d been eating racoon).
This! THIS is the reason I’ve found your blog so consistently interesting and surprising over the years.
Totally out of left field topic made manifest and relevant by detailed and succinct writing. I’ve loved sassafras for years (esp. as candy when I was a kid) but never would have thought to write about it.
Thanks!
can i use the dried chickory root (i think chickory is burdock?) that is used in place of ground coffee?
it may be roasted..
would it work or should it be fresh root from a field somewhere?
thanks
Johanna: No, it will be overpowering. I’d get a fresh root. And no, chicory is not burdock, although they might be close enough in flavor to work as a substitute.
oh my gosh i love this!!! thanks so much!
perhaps it’s the season, but i am really in the mood for a cooling rooty drink-
Sassafras root ground up in gumbo file! It’s a thickener.
Ragin: Actually no. File is ground up leaves from sassafras, not the root. But I like both!
For those with access to the Chaga mushroom (Inonotus obliquus) that grows in the northern white birch forests, I’ve found that adding it to a herbal root brew such as yours is mighty delicious. Chaga naturally distills the essence of Birch by feeding off the sugars and medicinal saps (betulinic acids) coursing through its bark, tapping into the immune system of this highly resilient tree that survives the coldest winters.
Both flavor wise and color wise, it gives a depth (think, cured oak barrel or a cork off a vintage wine) that mirrors molasses.
Thanks for the tip!
Hank,
I’ve done that too with wintergreen. Sort of, I used Everclear instead.
I totally forgot to mention (remind folks) that wintergreen isn’t particularly soluble in water. Boiling doesn’t work so well. The way I learned to make wintergreen tea is to ferment the leaves in water for like a week or something like that. It’s been years since I’ve made any so I don’t remember details. I just remember that to make wintergreen tea the leaves need fermented in room temp. water not steeped in hot water.
Just made this. its delicious. Thanks Hank!
Any ideas on how to get a stronger flavor out of this? I’ve made this recipe every year for the past 4 years, but I always wish I could make it stronger. Obviously I could add less sugar, but it would be less stable and it would water down my drinks.
I’ve also tried basically the same recipe steeped for a few months in Everclear and the mixing with a bit of the syrup. This produces an amaro-like drink, but it still isn’t quite as strong as I would like. I’ve also tried boiling it down, but this didn’t seem to work.
Daniel: Maybe double the ingredients?
We have groves of Sassafras trees that die on a regular basis. I was at a talk where the extension agent said Sassafras was a long lived tree. When I explained to him how our clumps were dying while still relatively young he explained to me what was happening. Apparently someone had cut the mother tree some time back and what we have growing in clumps are the sprouts that grew up from her after she was felled. These sprouts (now the size of full grown trees) are short lived. But the roots are still pure Sassafras 🙂
I do have a question about your recipe. Could wintergreen leaves be used instead of extract? If so, how would you use them? Wintergreen leaves are even easier to find around here than sassafras is.
Tim: Yes, but I’d bee leery about boiling them — might extract too much tannins. You can do what I do: Gather a bunch of wintergreen leaves and berries ans steep in vodka for a few weeks, then add that to taste in the root beer syrup.
One more note, I didn’t eat the leaves if I did this. The leaves and skin just got tossed into the fire or buried in the ground outside of camp along with the bones.
Here’s one of my favorite ways of using sassafras leaves. When out camping and flyfishing for trout, I’d eviscerate and behead the trout then wrap the trout up in fresh sassafras leaves. I’d wrap it up with a rather thick layer of leaves. How thick? Hard to say but easy to demonstrate. Maybe I’d crumble up a few leaves and also put them in the visceral cavity.
Then, I’d roast the assembly over a bed coals till the leaves got mostly shriveled and brown, preferably not burned. Usually, I’d find some discarded grill to support the assembly up off the coals. Never did I place it all directly onto the coals. I would flip it over to roast both sides thoroughly. Steam should be visibly coming out of the the assembly. Then, I’d unwrap the leaves from the fish. In so doing, the skin should stick to the leaves and peel off with the leaves leaving the meat behind on the bones.
If its thoroughly done, the meat easily falls from the bones. The sassafras imparts a lemony flavor to the fish; the coals imparts a slight smokiness. Very yummy. Its basically steaming the fish while wrapped up in leaves. Sometimes, I’d submerge the assembly in water then drain it a bit before roasting in order to help with the steaming, but its not important usually.
BTW: its true that sassafras will sprout back up from just a tiny root.