Ginger Beer - First attempt. Help please....

[Jim79]

Hi Guys,

I have only recently started brewing and have had some good beers come out of my FV so I decided to try a ginger beer.

After reading through a few of the recipes I decided on one to try.
The recipe is as follows,
I started out by boiling these ingredients on a slow blow for half an hour,

2 whole cloves
221g of raw grated ginger
5g of ginger powder
2 cinnamon sticks
2kg of raw sugar
250g LDM

after the boil I added the Morgan's Ginger Beer Kit then sat aside to cool down to room temp.

I transferred to my FV after straining and added a small amount of the grated ginger (approx 15g).

It fermented away vigorously for about 5 days and smelt great whilst doing so, I had an OG of 1044 and finished with a steady FG of 998. After testing today, I noticed that it smelt quite sour, and also tastes very bitter as well. Can anybody help with this problem? Will it settle down after bottling? I was aiming for a bundaberg GB flavour but i'm not sure if it will turn out like that. Also do I prime the bottles as per a normal beer kit?

Sorry for such a long winded question but i'm not sure where I have gone wrong and am hoping someone may be able to help me.

Cheers,
Jim.

 

[BrosysBrews]

Re the bitterness Bundaberg has a fairly sweet flavor, pretty well all the sugar you added to your boil will of fermented out. Next time you can try some Lactose if you like as it is non fermentable sugar. Some people sweeten with sugar syrup/cordial etc to taste in the glass so that may also be an option. Generally yes all brew mellow with age. No idea re if there is any differance with priming this but I would imagine it would be as normal.

 

[leighaus]

priming is as normal. Backsweetening is the general method for cider/gingerbeer sweetness... Obviously it's not doable with bottling.

The other option besides adding lactose next time;

pastuerize your brew. This is not really an easy thing to do either.


Or just move on to kegs and enjoy the simple life

 

[Jim79]

Thanks for the replies guys, is it possible to add the lactose now to sweeten it up. It is still in my second fermenter after racking.

 

[leighaus]

lactose wont ferment... no harm down. how clear is your secondary? did you crash chill ?

 

[Jim79]

So how much lactose should I add? Do I dissolve it first before adding?
The secondary hasn't cleared too much yet, but it's only been in for a day. It's only the second time I've transferred to a secondary (the first being a CSA which came out really clear) so I thought I would try again. What are the benefits of crash chilling? Does that just mean to cool the brew before racking to secondary?

 

[annapham]

You should not add lactose. because it cannot ferment. It does not help in your ingredients