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THEVISTA University of Central Oklahoma
The Student Voice Since 1903
‘25 Things to Know About Broncho Football’ contdown continues with facts 15-11 • Page 7
WEDNESDAY • June 27, 2012
Feature
Tiny bubbles: local brewery keeps the soda flowing for Route 66 icon The Huebert Brewing Company manufactures Round Barn Root Beer for sale at Arcadia’s landmark restaurant, Pops.
Rows of empty bottles within Huebert’s brewhouse wait to be filled with his signature Round Barn Root Beer. Photo by Trevor Hultner, The Vista
Bryan Trude
Senior Staff Writer On Route 66, just off the fringe of Edmond’s city limits, sits Pops, a soft drink fanatic’s paradise and a modern icon of the mother road, whether people call it soda, pop, or some combination of the two. Among the over 500 varieties of soda sold at Pops, only a few select brands are sold under the Pops name itself. One of those brands, Round Barn Root Beer, is produced by the Huebert Brewing Company, located in the heart of Oklahoma City’s Capitol Hill district. “We’re the oldest production brewery in the state,” Rick Huebert, the company’s founder and owner, said. “We opened about 12 years ago when we bought this building we’re in.” Root Beer, one of the most popular varieties of soft drink in North America, takes its name from the root of the Sassafras tree, the drink’s primary ingredient. Though artificial sassafras flavoring is normally used today – the real ingredient is considered carcinogenic – different varieties can use ingredients such as sarsaparilla, wintergreen, birch resin, dandelion root and anise.
According to Huebert, the process for making root beer is similar to the process used for its alcoholic counterpart. “We start back in the brewing vat. The sodas and the beer all go through the same equipment, the same processes,” Huebert said. “The sodas just skip the fermentation process.” For the hard root beers – Huebert also produces an alcoholic root beer that is also sold under the Pops brand – the mixture will sit in one of five 500-gallon vats for up to a week to ferment, producing enough drink to fill a standard tanker truck in about two weeks. Whether fermented or not, the finished product is then stored in a commercial refrigerator until it is ready for bottling by the plant’s automated bottler, which can run at a capacity of around 700 bottles a minute. In addition to alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks, Huebert also produces beverages for Tulsa’s Hard Rock casino, pioneering a technique for carbonating a drink that did not rely on kegs or mixing syrup with soda water at the tap, as with most soda fountains found in most stores. “We brought carbonators in that carbonate the drink at the tap handle,” Hue-
bert said. “It was developed in Germany to replace kegs, so that they could transport beer in bags without worrying about carbonation or keg returns.” Soft drinks, which refer to any nonalcoholic beverage containing carbonated water, sweetener and a flavoring agent, first appeared commercially in the 17th century. When England’s Joseph Priestley discovered a method to artificially produce carbonated water in 1767, soda water’s popularity grew until it exploded in the 1830s, with the rise of the soda fountains and the marketing of the drink as a health tonic. For students interested in a career in brewing, Huebert says the opportunities for education in the art are few and far between. With schools found in California, Chicago and Germany, the best chance for learning the craft is to get a job at a brewery and pick it up there. However, Huebert warns that such job opportunities are also few and far between. “If you want to get in, you just got to be at the right place at the right time,” Huebert said. For more information on the Huebert brewery, visit their website at www.huebertbrewing.com.
Soda production at Huebert Brewing Co. begins with the brewing vat (top). Once the mix is complete, the soda is then bottled (middle), and finally the product is packaged and shipped to retailers (bottom). Photos by Trevor Hultner, The Vista
Metro
OKC honored as ‘America’s Manliest City’ The number of steakhouses, trucks, and hardware stores solidified OKC’s ranking as the nation’s most masculine.
According to the Mars Chocolate Company and Combos Snacks, Oklahoma City was ranked America’s Manliest City for 2012. Points were awarded based on manly contributions to the city, and deducted for more feminine factors. Photo by Kat Wells, The Vista
M.A. Smith
ContributingWriter Being a man comes naturally in the big OKC. Or, at least, that’s what the Mars Chocolate Company and Combos Snacks claims. Combos recently chose Oklahoma City as “America’s Manliest City” during its fourth annual competition to determine who the man is. “The results don’t lie; the manliest place to be is the city they call OKC,” Craig Hall, Mars Chocolate North America general manager, said in a press release.
“From its stellar hoops team to its love of pickup trucks, Oklahoma City exemplifies the best of being a man,” he said. Many may ask, “What exactly qualifies a city to boast its masculine abilities?” Red meat, trucks and, of course, hardware stores are a part of the calculation Combos used to standardize manliness. During the competition, Combos and “Best Places to Live” research expert Bert Sperling ranked the 50 largest metropolitan cities on the U.S. census according to their manly qualities. “Each metro area received a ‘manliness rating’ between zero and 100 based on how well it performed in each of the study’s manly categories,”
according to a press release from Mars. Points were awarded based on which city had the most home improvement stores, steak houses and other “manly” contributions in the city. Sorry ladies, Combos say there is no place for frills in its competition. “But, even if a city has a fair share of manly traits, unmanly or ‘girly’ factors, like a high concentration of nail salons and fancy shopping boutiques can bump cities to the bottom of the list,” the Mars release reported. According to the head-count, Oklahoma City was followed by Columbia, S. C. in second place, Nashville, Tenn. in third and Birmingham, Ala. in fourth. Oklahoma City residents say they aren’t surprised. “It figures,” Matthew Yarborough, Oklahoma City resident, said. “Everywhere you look there is a steak house, sports bar or Home Depot.” “And, of course, we have the Thunder,” Yarborough said. “What is more manly than your own NBA team?” And, speaking of basketball, as for the Miami Heat, they may hold their own on the court against the Oklahoma City Thunder, but, according to the Combos study, the city just doesn’t cut it in a man’s world. Miami ranked only 36th on the list of big men, according to contest results. The least manly of them all, San Diego, Calif. came in at 50th place on the list.
Top
25 Manliest Cities 1. Oklahoma City, OK 2. Columbia, SC 3. Memphis, TN 4. Nashville, TN 5. Birmingham, AL 6. Houston, TX 7. St. Louis, MO 8. Toledo, OH 9. Cleveland, OH 10.Charlotte, NC 11. Louisville, KY 12. Cincinnati, OH 13. Indianapolis, IN 14. New Orleans, LA 15. Dallas, TX 16. Pittsburgh, PA 17. Atlanta, GA 18. Dayton, OH 19. Milwaukee, WI 20. Kansas City, MO 21. Jacksonville, FL 22. Richmond, VA 23. Tampa, FL 24. Providence, RI 25. Phoenix, AZ