Jenna: My road trip is coming to an end
in Hot Springs, Arkansas,
the only place in the world where beer is brewed
using thermal spring water.
Keep watching to learn how it's made
on the season finale of Travel Dares: Season US.
(upbeat music)
Last episode, I got my final clue
for where I'd end up on this episode.
Check out these hoppy hot springs.
So now I'm here in Hot Springs, Arkansas.
This city may be known for its world famous bathhouses
and National Park, but today,
instead of bathing in thermal spring water,
I'm going to be drinking it.
I've been to Arkansas before,
but I've never been to Hot Springs.
I am so excited to be making beer today.
Hey, I'm Jenna.
Rose: Hey Jenna, I'm Rose, and welcome to Superior.
Jenna: What a beautiful space.
Rose: Thank you very much.
Jenna: So I'd love to know a little bit of history
about this place.
Rose: Superior Bathhouse was built in 1916.
And it's pretty interesting:
It was on the site of a previously built bathhouse
that had been built in the late 1800s.
In the '60s and '70s,
most of these bathhouses closed to the public.
So the Superior closed in 1983,
and then in the early 2000s,
the National Park Service started a program
to attract small businesses to take over the buildings.
So I'm one of the adaptive reuse projects
here in the National Park.
Jenna: What inspired you to want to make beer?
Rose: Well, I've always loved beer,
and I used to be a home brewer.
When I moved to Hot Springs in 2011,
I was surprised that there was not a brewery here already.
Hot Springs National Park is famous for
our thermal spring water because you can drink it.
So I figured if you can drink the famous water,
you might as well make beer out of it.
Jenna: That's great, I love that.
Well, I'm really excited,
I would love to see how you guys make beer.
Rose: Well, today's brew day,
so let's head on down to the warehouse and get started.
Jenna: Ah, yes.
(upbeat music)
(truck engine roaring)
Rose: Let's line that up.
Rose: All right, let's hop up on the brew deck,
and I'll walk you through the process.
Jenna: Sounds great.
Rose: Now the first step in making beer is to heat up,
like I said, a lot of water.
Once we mix the grains with the hot water,
the goal is to extract the flavor and the color
and the sugar from those grains.
That's why we had to crush them earlier.
So now they're at the perfect consistency,
perfect size to get that flavor out of the grains.
And when that's done, it gets pumped over to this vessel.
This is called the boil kettle.
So as you can probably imagine,
this is where we bring the future beer to a boil.
Once it comes to a boil, we add hops.
Hops are like the seasoning in beer,
but they provide bitterness, and traditionally,
they provide kind of a preservative effect to beer.
So that's why they've always been used in beer.
But today, we use hops as a flavoring.
Jenna: I did not know that.
Rose: So after we're done over here today,
we pump the liquid, it's called wort at that point.
Once the wort is in the fermenter,
that's when we add the yeast,
yeast provides flavor to the beer,
it produces CO2, which is the bubbles, the carbonation,
and most importantly, yeast makes the alcohol.
What we're making today will be ready in about two weeks.
But if you want, we can go try one from the last batch.
Jenna: Yes.
Rose: Yeah.
Jenna: I would love that.
Rose: All right, let's go.
(lively music)
All right, Jenna, well, I'm enjoying my elixir,
but if you don't mind,
I went ahead and ordered you a flight
so you can sample a couple of our beers.
Jenna: Thank you so much.
Rose: Oh, you're welcome.
(both laughing)
Jenna: That is quite the flight.
Thank you so much.
Waitress: You're welcome.
Rose: Well, we call this a beer bath.
It is a flight of all 18 beers that we have on tap.
Jenna: 18 different beers.
Rose: So I would love for you to try our oatmeal stout,
that's called the Foul Play Stout.
Jenna: Oatmeal.
Rose: Oatmeal stout.
Jenna: OK.
Rose: Here you go.
What do you think?
Rose: Nice and chocolatey. Jenna: Oh, I love that, yes.
Rose: OK, if we want to create some contrast from that,
you need to try our Dill Pickle Sour.
Jenna: Pickle?
Rose: Mm-hmm, yep, it's going to be tart and tangy,
but a definite distinct flavor of dill pickle.
Jenna: Dill pickle.
Rose: Dill Pickle Sour.
Jenna: That is pickley.
Rose: Taste that pickle?
Jenna: I really like that.
Rose: I know it's sour and it's kind of salty, too.
Jenna: Yeah, that is really interesting.
Rose: Do you want another crazy one?
Jenna: Yeah, oh yeah.
Rose: OK, try our Spicy Ride.
That's number four, right here.
It's the ride and it's spicy, I guess.
Jenna: That is, it lives up to the promise.
Rose: It does, we use a whole case of jalapeños per batch.
The cool thing about beer is
you can create any flavor your mind's eye can come up with.
It's like being an artist,
we have a palette of ingredients to work with,
different grains, different yeast, hops,
and different, even vegetables, in this case.
Jenna: So what do you want people's takeaway to be
when they come here and visit?
Rose: Well, I'm so happy you chose Hot Springs
as part of your trip because I take every opportunity I can
to tell the world about what a fun
and funky little town we have here.
And this town is all about the water.
So the water is the reason we have a National Park,
and it's the reason this bathhouse exists,
it's the reason we have a brewery here.
So that's the reason you're drinking our beer.
It's all about the water.
And the water has brought people together
for centuries here to this area.
It's so cool that today, this is a place
where people can come and just have a great time
in our small town.
Jenna: That's so cool.
Jenna: Cheers to that. Rose: Cheers.
(bright music)
Jenna: I had such an amazing time meeting Rose today
and the amount of passion she brings
into the craft of making beer is so inspiring.
This is definitely one of those experiences
you can't miss out on.
This road trip has been incredible.
It's hard to say what my favorites are.
The most eye-opening part about this trip
was probably Qualla [Arts & Crafts Mutual] and learning
about a culture that's so different than my own.
I think the most exciting adventure
I've had was guitar making.
It was awesome.
And as someone who plays an acoustic guitar,
getting an opportunity to play an electric with a legend,
uh, I loved every second of that.
The most thrilling part of this road trip was
definitely Ruby Falls,
trekking through a cave so far underground
to come upon this breathtaking, majestic waterfall
was an experience I will never forget.
And I think the most surprising part of this road trip
was President's Park.
Coming upon those giant president heads was like,
whoa, I had no idea that even existed.
I hope this season of Travel Dares has inspired you
to go on your own road trip.
There are so many incredible places in this country
worth seeing for yourself.
(bright music continues)