Ginger Beer

grandslamsmith

Hey - looking for a little advice/help.
I've made a Ginger beer recipe (below) that was on Hugh Fearnley W's website - pretty easy and straight forward.

Left it for about 5 days in a plastic bottle - which went as hard as a rock with the production of gas (I presume) - but when I opened it there was zero fizz in the actual liquid. Tasted great mind you but just like flat Ginger beer - any of you specialists have any idea why no fizz?

Ta

Slam


Ingredients

• ¼ tsp brewer’s yeast
• 225g caster sugar
• 1½-2 tbsp finely grated fresh root ginger
• Juice of 1 lemon
• 1 good tbsp honey

Method: How to make ginger beer


1. Add the yeast to the bottle. With a funnel, pour in the sugar.
2. Mix the grated ginger with the lemon juice and honey.
3. Pour the ginger mixture through the funnel into the bottle. Now fill the bottle about ¾ full with water, put the cap on and shake the bottle until all the sugar is dissolved.
4. Top up the bottle with water, leaving a 2.5cm gap at the top, to allow for production of gas. Cap the bottle tightly, then place it somewhere warm. Leave it for about 48 hours. Once the bottle feels very hard and has no give in it, your beer should be ready.
5. Place the bottle in the fridge for several hours to stop the yeast working. Once the beer is thoroughly chilled, pass it through a fine sieve and serve.

BeerNut

I'm amazed Hugh hasn't been caught by the anti-terrorism police yet. Between this and his elderflower champagne recipe he seems determined to set up sleeper bomb-making cells all over middle England.

What yeast did you use, slam?

grandslamsmith

Hiya Beernut!


White Wine yeast - which is what he used in his TV episode. Do you reckon that a bogey fro getting fizz?

Slam

BeerNut

Sounds like the yeast just didn't get enough time to take off properly. Thing is, still flat after five days can become explosively fizzy after seven days and a sticky mess on your floor after ten days.

Using primary fermentation as a method of carbonation is a really bad idea. It's much more sensible to ferment the whole thing out in a non-pressurised container and then prime it with a calculated amount of sugar in the bottle. That way you have some control over what's happening with the fermentation.

I'm sure he's a dab hand at skinning rabbits, but Mr Fearnley-Whittingstall is not to be trusted on alcoholic beverages, even if he did acquire his surname in a brewery business deal.

grandslamsmith

Ha, ha! Nice one - I take it your not a huge fan of the man then!?

So you reckon that leaving it a littel longer may have resulted in something fizzy Beernut?

Slam

BeerNut

grandslamsmith wrote: »

I take it your not a huge fan of the man then!?

I've never seen his TV shows, but you're far from the first person to have come to a homebrewing forum asking for help about his unstable homemade booze ideas.

grandslamsmith wrote: »

So you reckon that leaving it a littel longer may have resulted in something fizzy

Probably, as long as the bottle wasn't leaking. But when you're using primary fermentation for carbonation there's no way of knowing when. With normal beer-making you're guaranteed good carbonation in two to three weeks. Leave this recipe for two to three weeks and you'll be cleaning it off the ceiling.

grandslamsmith

Cool.

OK - I'll give you the skinny Beernut - I'm keen on getting into Homebrewing so I'd be enternally grateful if you could point me in the right direction of good resources for the beginner

I'm a wee bit of a beer snob, I like my Belgians and Real Ales - not by any standard an authority!

Slam

BeerNut

grandslamsmith wrote: »

good resources for the beginner

<cough>sig<cough>

Get yourself a starter set from a supplier (eg Homebrew Company, Homebrew West, BestBrew or My Beer & Wine

Here's how to do kits.
Here's how to do extract.

And keep asking questions

grandslamsmith

Nice one Beernut! That'll do me - Christmas present to myself!

Slam

fryup

those coopers ginger beer kits > has anyone used them?

How long does it take to brew, same as regular beer?

and how strong can you make it alc wise?

Degsy

Started a batch on Saturday..a half kilo of root ginger,chopped up and crushed,a bag of sugar and around 7 lemons cut up and squeezed.

Added three litres of boiling water too melt the sugar and get the juices out of the fruit..topped iot up to 12 litres with warm water,added yeast,covered and Bob's yer uncle.
I plan to leave it for around ten days to get a good bit of alcohol and hopefully it'll be enough for teh flavours to infuse too.

fryup

^^^^^^^

so you didn't use the kit i take it?

Degsy

fryup wrote: »

^^^^^^^

so you didn't use the kit i take it?

Kit bedamned..the ingredients for 12 litres cost me just over a fiver!

c - 13

Degsy wrote: »

Started a batch on Saturday..a half kilo of root ginger,chopped up and crushed,a bag of sugar and around 7 lemons cut up and squeezed.

Added three litres of boiling water too melt the sugar and get the juices out of the fruit..topped iot up to 12 litres with warm water,added yeast,covered and Bob's yer uncle.
I plan to leave it for around ten days to get a good bit of alcohol and hopefully it'll be enough for teh flavours to infuse too.

Did similar enough there recently except I used -
600g fresh ginger finely grated
1KG sugar
6 tsp honey
4 lemons
2 lime
1 stick of cinnamon
1 Pack Bread Yeast (Had nothing else)

Boiled the Juice from the lemon and limes, the sugar, cinnamon stick and ginger in about 1 - 2 Litres of water for about 20 mins. Left it cool and then topped up to about 10L before adding the yeast. Fermented like mad and bottled after about 8 - 10 days with about 3/4 tsp sugar to prime.

Carbonation is fine but the taste of lemon off it is very, very strong and nearly blocks out the ginger taste. Still quite nice though.

No idea what % i've got as my hydrometer hadnt arrived before I started unfortantly.

Degsy

c - 13 wrote: »

.

Carbonation is fine but the taste of lemon off it is very, very strong and nearly blocks out the ginger taste.

Wonder why that is..i've used a similar amount of lemons in a far smaller brew of elderflowere cordial and i didnt find the taste too much..

c - 13

Not too sure what caused it either - I think the taste is fading a bit the longer I leave it stand

grandslamsmith

Hiya Guys

I reckon I have cracked this one and to honest its down to the time left standing (I'm open to correction as after all I'm a reet novice at this).

I have 3 bottles on the go at the moment with the ferocity of champagne when it comes to carbonation - very impressive!

I initially started thsi project following Hugh Fearnleys recipe, now hes say after 2 days its ready, it's 4%, it's super carbonated.......rubbish. I followed Beernuts suggestion here and left the brew for well over a week and hey presto full on suds!!!

Thanks Beernut!


Slam

cmore_2

Hi all here
First i tried the river cottage Ginger beer if you did nt have any fiz more than likely in some brewers terms compromised as things weren't clean enough one of the major causes of failure
My brew after 2 days had a alc of 2.7% would have been more if I left it longer. I transferred mi e into grolsch bottles and left for another week and added 2 tea spoons of sugar for more fiz
I got my brewing yeast out of a home brew shop near portlouise you can walk in not only an online shop which most are
As well as they sell everything you need all sold separately air locks etc and cheap

I had the coopers brew kit in oz and it's really good has everythi g you need except bottle capper

Degsy

cmore_2 wrote: »

My brew after 2 days had a alc of 2.7% would have been more if I left it longer. I transferred mi e into grolsch bottles and left for another week and added 2 tea spoons of sugar for more fiz

I think you bottled too soon and used too much sugar..you're lucky the bottles didnt explode.
You should alsways let your brew finish fermenting before you bottle it up otherwise you'll get a build up of fizz that can mean you losing all your booze when you go to open it.

c - 13

Tried another bottle of mine last night, the lemon taste seems to have faded a bit now and the ginger is coming through, the only problem is its as dry as a nun's gee, so dry its almost undrinkable.

Anyone have any tips for the next batch as to how to avoid this ?

BeerNut

Splenda.

c - 13

BeerNut wrote: »

Splenda.

I did add sweetner to each bottle, about 3 tablets per bottle - it wasnt splenda it was some local no brand stuff

Mr Benevolent

c - 13 wrote: »

I did add sweetner to each bottle, about 3 tablets per bottle - it wasnt splenda it was some local no brand stuff

It wasn't artificial sweetener was it?

c - 13

Confab wrote: »

It wasn't artificial sweetener was it?

Could have been actually now that you mentuon it. I'd better see if I can find the container I got them in and check.

HMD

i started a batch of this today. Here's the recipe i used, it'sa slightly modified version from here.

ingredients:
350 g ginger root, grated
1 kg sugar
1 lemons, sliced
1 tsb brewers yeast
Approx 5 Litres of water

Instructions

1. Boil as much water as you can get in your stock pot, peel the lemons (avoiding pith), then throw in the peel and squeeze in the juice.
2. Grate the ginger (skin too) and throw in.
3. Add sugar and reduce temp to simmer for about 30 mins.
4. add mix to demijohn. Once cooled to fermentation temp sprinkle the yeast on top.
5. Cover and ferment for 4 days.
6. Strain and squeeze the juice from the pulp and transfer to a clean fermenter until complete (usually about 5 / 7 days).
6. Bottle in strong glass bottles adding 1/2 teaspoon of priming sugar to each.
If you wish to make smaller/larger batches then adjust the ingredients accordingly. This will make a drink of approx 6% ABV. Reduce the sugar if you want to lower the ABV.

HMD

i bottled it the above recipe tonight.
OG = 1060
FG = 1014
ABV = 6.2% +.4% for priming sugar

It tasted good, not too dry. I'll give it until the weekend before i try a bottle.

Degsy

HMD wrote: »

i bottled it the above recipe tonight.
OG = 1060
FG = 1014
ABV = 6.2% +.4% for priming sugar

It tasted good, not too dry. I'll give it until the weekend before i try a bottle.

can you taste much in the way of ginger?

HMD

yeah, you could taste the ginger. It wasn't overpowering. I'll report on how it tastes cold the weekend

HMD

I opened a bottle and it erupted, lost about half of it. I must've put too much sugar in when priming. It tasted nice and gingery and not too dry. If i leave it for a few weeks will it stop the fizz when opening?

Kid Charlemagne

try chilling it, thats calmed fizz down for me in the past.