Ginger Beer Questions

[Newbiebrewer]

I am putting down a ginger beer today and I have a few questions.

1. The recipe I am using tell me to leave it in the fermenter for three weeks before bottling. Can I leave the ginger beer for an extra week in the fermenter like I do with my regular beer, or will it affect the final taste?

2. The recipe also says to bottle for six weeks before drinking, and I would be disappointed if at the four week mark if the bottles exploded, so could I cut the amount of priming sugar that I use in anyway to prevent said explosions (the side of the kit says to use 6g of sugar for tallies so I was thinking maybe half that)?

thanks in advance

 

[bum]

If you ensure your primary ferments out completely there is no reason to fear bottle bombs. GBs are in reality no more prone to over priming than "normal" beer - just for some reason people don't seem to pay them due care. GBs do take a little longer and do ferment much lower and I think perhaps that people get a little impatient. Every second or third batch I do is a GB and I've never had a bottle bomb. If you're careful there's no reason to think you'll get one (baring infection).

The extra week in primary should be fine (and will help combat the bottle bomb risk too) but for me I don't think it is necessary. GBs are supposed to be cloudy so you don't need to try to clear it out, IMO. Hopefully your kit will have a pretty neutral yeast in it and you won't need to worry too much about clearing out yeast flavours.

Best of luck with it.

 

[Newbiebrewer]

Yeah that was why I wanted to keep the gb in the fermenter longer, to make sure the fermentation was indeed finished. That and I think I got a show to attend that weekend. thanks for the words of wisdom.