Bottle Conditioned Ginger Beer

[shoobs]

I'm looking to put down a ginger beer this weekend, and I like the sound of Chappo's recipe in this thread: http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...showtopic=30492

My only concern is that it'll end up too dry after bottle carbonating/conditioning. I have no keg setup, so I can't kill the yeast and force carbonate, nor can I just cold crash and drink from the keg. To counteract the potential dryness, I've modified the recipe by taking out the honey and replacing it with some malt, hopefully leaving behind a bunch of unfermentable sugars. Here it is:

1.5kg Fresh Ginger
2.0kg Dark Brown Sugar
1.5kg Pilsner LME
0.5kg Light Crystal Malt
4 Cinnamon Sticks
6 Large Lemons
2 Birds Eye Chillis

I plan on steeping the Crystal Malt in one pot, then adding the remaining fermentables and boiling. In another pot, I'll boil the ginger pulp, lemon juice and zest and chillis. I'll chill and mix them in the fermenter, then pitch some US-05.

I'm looking for some feedback. Will I have too many fermentables in there? Does anyone have any experience fermenting Chappo's recipe out entirely and bottling? I'm aiming for 6-7% ABV, but I'd like it to have some residual sweetness and a decent body rather than just being insipid swill.

Thoughts?

 

[kymba]

you will have to taste some (or as other call it - take gravity readings) every day - so make 3L more than you intended. once you get to the desired dry/sweet level then bottle. over the next week or so refrigerate and pop 1 bottle a day until you achieve your desired carbonation level

after that put as many of them in an esky and keep pouring jugs of hot water on them...get em as hot as you can with hot tap water then start to use boiling water from the jug - don't use the boiling straight away as the thermal doovawhatsies might just crack/explode your bottles

don't ever compromise on the flavour...kill the yeast before doing anything drastic like that!

let us know how it goes with the crystal


um, and why does AHB think i spelled flavour wrong?

 

[shoobs]

you will have to taste some (or as other call it - take gravity readings) every day - so make 3L more than you intended. once you get to the desired dry/sweet level then bottle. over the next week or so refrigerate and pop 1 bottle a day until you achieve your desired carbonation level

after that put as many of them in an esky and keep pouring jugs of hot water on them...get em as hot as you can with hot tap water then start to use boiling water from the jug - don't use the boiling straight away as the thermal doovawhatsies might just crack/explode your bottles

don't ever compromise on the flavour...kill the yeast before doing anything drastic like that!

let us know how it goes with the crystal


um, and why does AHB think i spelled flavour wrong?

Hmm. This is doable, but I'm worried about the glass bottles exploding due to the increased pressure of CO2 at 60-70 C.

Can I not just ferment the brew out entirely, bulk prime and then bottle? Will there be enough residual unfermentable sugars to make it comfortable to drink (not too dry)? Can I add lactose to sweeten it? I'm not a fan of artificial sweeteners.

 

[super_simian]

Here is a thread detailing my experience with in-bottle pasteurising.
http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...02&hl=cider