Ginger Beer

Lgray

Hey guys,
I'm in the process of making a ginger beer ( day 2 of fermenting) I was going to try and work out calculations for bottle priming and predicting alc content using this: http://hbd.org/cgi-bin/recipator/recipator/carbonation.html
what sort of CO2 range would I be looking at?

and If anyone wants the recipe I used;
1lb Grated ginger
1/4 stick of cinnamon
about 6 cloves
8 cups of sugar (1.8kg)
1/4 cup lemon juice
3/4 tsp cream of tartar
and brought the volume up to just below 20ltr
oh and champagne yeast.

I boiled up the ingredients (not yeast) and simmered for 20 mins, pitched the yeast at 34C,(i know it seems high but the yeast instructions said 40C and it's fermenting away at 24-26C.
I've tasted it today-and it's a bit thin- but then so was my last beer attempt at this stage so I'm hoping it will be more full bodied at the end, it does have a nice ginger kick and is quiet sweet at the moment. will wait until it stops fermenting and bottle condition for a couple of weeks. I ammended the recipe I got from the internet as I thought it asked for too much sugar (4kg!) but that recipe said to ferment for 1 week and then bottle (no mention of waiting for it to finish ferment before bottle and no priming of bottles- so I guess more risk of exploding bottles?)
Hopefully it will turn out ok- will keep you posted on how it turns out.:)

Sonovagun

Good luck with that. I'd be interested how it works out as i plan to make ginger beer that way sometime. But i think you haven't used enough of anything to be honest. Seems like a weak brew to me. I'd imagine it would work better for a 10ltr brew not 20.

Lgray

Will do. Why to you think it's not enough ingredients though? I'm not looking for a super strong brew as I think ginger beer is better with about a 4%ish alc content rather than 6 or 7 which is what several posts say the 2kg of sugar will give me.

Lgray

Hi guys,
I'm about to start bottling my ginger beer, it has finished on a fg 0.998, which makes it 4.4% before the bottle conditioning. In hindsight I should have used brewers sugar instead of normal sugar as although it is nice and gingery it is a little thin. Can this be partly rectified with the primer for bottling- i.e using brewers sugar rather than norm sugar. Will this bulk it out even a little bit? I have a couple of options; I have brewers sugar, coopers carbonation drops or I could go and get some glucose or any other suggestions you may have.
Any advise would be appreciated.

Lorna

mayto

When your bottling your beer you are generally using a relatively small amount of sugar. For bottling my latest pale ale I used about 120g of sugar for 21L and carbonated just perfect. You could use dried malt extract (dme) for bottling instead of sugar, but not sure would you notice any difference.

guildofevil

Brewer's sugar is just glucose and will not give you any additional body. If you are making this again, you could try substituting 500g of the sugar with 500g of dry malt extract. This will leave some sugars behind, resulting in more body and a little sweetness.

Lgray

Thanks Guys, will try that for the next batch. I bottled anyway-nothing to lose by waiting a couple of weeks and may even be drinkable!

Lgray

Just thought I'd give you an update on the Gbeer. I bottled it 4 weeks ago with brewers sugar. And as expected I made alcholic water with a slight kick coming in at the rear, it came in at 4.9%. Myself and OH racked our brains to find a pleasant way of consuming this disaster (free alcohol is free alcohol in these desparate times) and eureka! glass with ice, add the GBeer, add dash of Vimto- et voila a perfectly refreshing summers eve drink! just have to wait for the sun:D

Aln_S

Sounds good Lgray!

Does anyone have a tried and tested recipe for ginger beer?

I was going to give this one a shothttp://ezinearticles.com/?How-to-Make-Delicious-Homemade-Alcoholic-Ginger-Beer&id=2944833 It doesn't say how much it makes, but I assume its 10 ltrs?

Also just sprinkling over plain bread yeast? Will this work or should I start the yeast first?