# Ginger beer recipe



## Pirate Pete (25/3/13)

Just made a ginger beer (one week in the fermenter). Recipe as follows:

Into the food processor and then into a large pot went the following

500 grams fresh ginger root (washed but not peeled)
250 grams honey
One kilo of brown sugar and 250 grams of raw sugar
2 or birds eye chilli (small hot ones from my garden)
3 medium lemons (peel and juice)
3 litres of tap water (Canberra so good water) added to above


Brought this slowly to the boil constantly stirring and simmered for one hour. Left over night covered to cool. Next morning, reheated to get to around 30 degrees. Poured this unstrained into my 23 litre Coopers fermenter. Added another 12 litres of water for a total of around 15 litres. Pitched with bread yeast (maybe 10 grams). OSG was 1055. Got it down to 1025 after 5 days and not much has happened to it since then. Will bottle and carbonate with Coopers drops tonight.

Have already been drinking a bit from the fermenter and it is great. Slight carbonation from fermentation. Have poured over ice. This is nice already. Strong ginger taste, a hint of lemon and brown sugar and a slight chilli kick to it. Not too dry and not too sweet. My thinking is to strain, bottle and carbonate about 12 litres and drink the rest of it as is. It tastes that good after a week in the fermenter and alcohol content is around 3.5 percent.

Next time I will keep the same general proportions but brew a full 23 litre batch. Will use beer yeast (open to advice here) to get a higher alcohol content (5 or 6 %). May experiment with some spices like nutmeg, cinnamon and cardamom.

Peter


----------



## bum (25/3/13)

ptfcrowley said:


> Just made a ginger beer (one week in the fermenter). Recipe as follows:
> 
> Into the food processor and then into a large pot went the following
> 
> ...


Recipe looks good (I'd consider swapping the ratios of your fermentables around a bit though, that's just me).

I see a couple of issues which I have made bold in your post.

Cooling in this way is basically begging for an infection. You only boiled 3L, right? You could drop this to the 30C you wanted in a sink of cold water in under 15 minutes.

Bread yeast! I dunno. Does bread yeast bought from a supermarket (assumption) even make great _bread_? Why use it in your beer? Ginger is way more expensive than most beer ingredients - why would you risk it by using crap yeast?

I've read of blokes brewing GBs with bread yeast getting the FG down very low. bottling at 1025 is the worst idea ever. Do not bottle tonight. Rouse some yeast, warm it up, leave it longer. Do not bottle tonight.

When you say "strain" I assume you don't mean "filter with purpose built brewery equipment", yeah? Another pointless infection vector here. Let it sit longer afterg FG for the stuff to settle out. It'll bottle fine after that.

As for yeast suggestions for the next one, I've used tonnes of different yeasts and with my typical ginger addition (~2kg) I can't really tell the difference all that much except for one I made with S04 (but I'm not a fan of that generally so maybe I just decided it was no good?). If you've got some Cooper's lid yeast lying about they do a great job (assuming fairly fresh, etc).


----------



## Pirate Pete (25/3/13)

Bum

Thanks for sharing your experience with me. I take your points re boiling and let sitting. Previously I have boiled about 3 litres of mash cooled it down by adding cold water and added yeast right away. I used brewers yeast last time and got a much stronger ginger beer. Will take your advice on stirring up the yeast a bit and getting FG down further to around 1010. 

What do you suggest re the fermentables?

Peter


----------



## bum (25/3/13)

My real suggestion is that if it tastes good keep doing it.

I prefer most of mine to be raw sugar and a bit of dark brown sugar (3 parts raw to 1 part dark brown). A little bit opposite to what you've gone for but there isn't anything wrong with that at all. The whole point of this game is tailoring to personal preference.

[EDIT: typo]


----------



## Airgead (26/3/13)

Yeah.. as Bum said... bottling at 1.025 is a bad idea. Chances are it will keep fermenting slowly and you will end up with bottle bombs.

As for bread yeast, I know some people swear by it for some stuff but the main issue I have with it is that its not a consistent strain. Even yeast from the same company can vary significantly from pack to pack. What makes great gi9nger beer today could make something vile next time. you just don't know.

For making bread, that doesn't matter. You are doing a really tiny amount of fermentation to generate some gas to raise the bread. Any old yeast will do that and not enough fermentation is done for any off flavours to become a problem. For beer, its a whole different situation. You need a reliable, clean fermenting yeast that works the same way every time. They have been farming pure strains of yeast since the dark ages. A barrel that made good beer would make good beer again. A barrel that made bad beer was thrown out. They didn't know it but they were farming consistent yeast strains.

For the couple of bucks a decent brewing yeast costs, its just not worth using bread yeast. You really aren't saving any money.

Cheers
Dave


----------



## benno1973 (26/3/13)

bum said:


> I prefer most of mine to be raw sugar and a bit of dark brown sugar (3 parts raw to 1 part dark brown). A little bit opposite to what you've gone for but there isn't anything wrong with that at all. The whole point of this game is tailoring to personal preference.


I prefer 1:1:1 [honey:brown sugar:raw sugar], although I see Chappo's famous recipe uses 1:2 [honey:brown sugar], and lots of people swear by using most (if not all) only dark sugars. Personally I think the flavours that the dark sugars impart detracts from the ginger flavour if used in large amounts, but as bum said, horses for courses. If you're finding lots of treacle notes, consider subbing out some of the dark sugar for raw sugar and see how it goes.

Aside from that, bum and Airgead have some valid points about cooling and yeast.


----------



## bum (26/3/13)

Airgead said:


> For making bread, that doesn't matter. You are doing a really tiny amount of fermentation to generate some gas to raise the bread. Any old yeast will do that and not enough fermentation is done for any off flavours to become a problem.


Cheers for that. I'm not much of a baker.


----------



## Airgead (26/3/13)

bum said:


> Cheers for that. I'm not much of a baker.


 :icon_offtopic:

For the serious bakers out there I should clarify that statement to read - Any old yeast will do that and not enough fermentation is done for any off flavours to become a problem *except if you are doing sourdough.*

In that case you are doing a much longer fermentation (usually 24+ hours for at least some of the dough instead of <1 hour) using a specific mix of yeasts and bacteria so that fermentation products do become noticeable. In this case, noticeable as the distinct sour taste in sourdough. There is also a French technique called the autolysis method which uses a cool, retarded fermentation to develop additional flavours in the finished bread.

But in general... for your basic, yeasted bread. Any old yeast will do.

Further discussion of bread is probably now best left to the brew food section to avoid completely dragging this thread off topic.

Cheers
Dave


----------



## Pirate Pete (29/3/13)

Bum

Took your suggestion and rekindled the fire by adding a bit of yeast. Got the final gravity down to about 1005. OSP was 1055. So that should give me a touch over 7% alcohol content. Not for the kids this one.

Peter


----------



## bum (29/3/13)

Glad to hear it, Peter. COuld have been very nasty had you bottled then.

I hope she ends up a cracker for you.


----------



## manticle (30/3/13)

20 gravity points?

Bum may have saved your eyes.

Or those of your children. You owe him a beer.


----------



## Pirate Pete (30/3/13)

I think this will turn out nice. Drank the left overs from the bottling exercise and it was pretty good.

Thanks for all of your advice

Peter


----------



## LiquidGold (26/4/13)

i wonder how this turned out. have you had a taste since you bottled yet? i got inspired by your recipe and gave my first GB a crack with a few changes. haven't bottled yet but it's sitting on 1012 on day 12 at around 20C. tasting delicious but will leave it a bit longer.

cheers for the inspiration!


----------



## TheJokerElf (8/9/14)

I just gave this a go. Just took my final reading after fermentation had finished and by calculations it is 17.77% 
I only wanted about 7%. 
Will see how it tastes in about 2 weeks after I bottle tonight. Hopefully next batch will be around 7%


----------



## calobes (8/9/14)

TheJokerElf said:


> I just gave this a go. Just took my final reading after fermentation had finished and by calculations it is 17.77%
> I only wanted about 7%.
> Will see how it tastes in about 2 weeks after I bottle tonight. Hopefully next batch will be around 7%


I think your calculations are off. Og and fg?


----------



## TheJokerElf (8/9/14)

Og 1.043
Fg 0.92
That was 5 days ferment. 
Just bottles and not very much ginger flavor


----------



## calobes (8/9/14)

Think you read your fg wrong. If its not carbed yet, take another reading


----------



## TheJokerElf (8/9/14)

Only did fg before I just bottled. 
Bit needs way more ginger I think


----------



## TheJokerElf (8/9/14)

Did 3 readings today to make sure


----------



## TheJokerElf (8/9/14)

I think I put too much sugar in to start with.


----------



## calobes (8/9/14)

What yeast did you use?


----------



## TheJokerElf (8/9/14)

Beer yeast


----------



## TheJokerElf (8/9/14)

I will see what it tastes like when carbonated and try again with a different yeast.


----------



## Batweed (6/11/14)

Was just wondering if this has a ginger kick to it? We like the crabbies ginger beer and would like to find a recipe that's close to that taste..


----------

