Ginger Beer

[Brew_for_Buttons]

Thinking of putting on a batch of ginger beer in preparation for that holiday in December whose name i dare not mention yet.
I found the below recipe on another forum, was going to swap out the rhubarb with apples as its one of the few things i cant stand.

Has anybody made any ginger beer that they were really proud of ? Would like to compare this recipe with others have done.

Fiery Ginger Beer 5 gallons
2 kg Fresh grated peeled ginger
3 Stalks chopped rhubarb
3 Unwaxed lemons sliced
2 kg Sugar
200g Honey
1 tsp Yeast nutrient
1 tsp Pectolase
1 tsp Gervin ale yeast
6 Cloves
1/8 tsp Ground black pepper. I estimate this as 10 grains/pieces.
1 tsp Cayenne powder

[irish_goat]

Here's a link to mines, got good reviews at the 3 meetups I brought it to.  http://www.nationalhomebrewclub.com/forum/index.php/topic,51.msg41523.html#msg41523

Looking at yours I'd say you've a heck of a lot of ginger there. Maybe scale back by 1kg.

[Brew_for_Buttons]

Was thinking there was allot of ginger in it myself but there is also no ground ginger. I don't want it to end up like water with a hint of ginger but would have my concerns about a full 2 kg. Possibly 1.5 kg

[irish_goat]

Maybe fire a bit of malt extract in to add a bit of body?

Also if you have clear bottles the ginger beer can look really nice in them.

[Brew_for_Buttons]

Sounds like a good idea. Have some nice 1 and 2L clear swing tops I will dig out when bottling. Was trying to avoid the DME on this batch, trying to go cheap and cheerful with it. Will keep it in mind for a future batch though, thanks

[Shanna]

Thinking of putting on a batch of ginger beer in preparation for that holiday in December whose name i dare not mention yet.
I found the below recipe on another forum, was going to swap out the rhubarb with apples as its one of the few things i cant stand.

Has anybody made any ginger beer that they were really proud of ? Would like to compare this recipe with others have done.

Fiery Ginger Beer 5 gallons
2 kg Fresh grated peeled ginger
3 Stalks chopped rhubarb
3 Unwaxed lemons sliced
2 kg Sugar
200g Honey
1 tsp Yeast nutrient
1 tsp Pectolase
1 tsp Gervin ale yeast
6 Cloves
1/8 tsp Ground black pepper. I estimate this as 10 grains/pieces.
1 tsp Cayenne powder

I did a batch earlier in the summer and I can say that 2kg will produce something that only somebody with a cast iron stomach will be able to drink. I used 1kg of grated ginger and the beer was toxic for the first three months. The kick in the ginger will get less over time but I would think 2kg would push that out for a really long time. I would also switch it the sugar with extra light dme.

Shanna

[Brew_for_Buttons]

Had you any ground ginger in it Shanna or was it all root.

[Shanna]

Had you any ground ginger in it Shanna or was it all root.

I don't think I used ground ginger. I did create a giant muslin bag and filled it with the  residual ginger and fruit that was left over from the boil.

Shanna

[Eoin]

In fairness it does call itself fiery ginger beer. The black pepper is gonna kick that up a notch. Just short of adding some hot sauce.......

Sent using a complex system of semaphore and ninjas.

[Greg2013]

Thinking of putting on a batch of ginger beer in preparation for that holiday in December whose name i dare not mention yet.
I found the below recipe on another forum, was going to swap out the rhubarb with apples as its one of the few things i cant stand.

Has anybody made any ginger beer that they were really proud of ? Would like to compare this recipe with others have done.

Fiery Ginger Beer 5 gallons
2 kg Fresh grated peeled ginger
3 Stalks chopped rhubarb
3 Unwaxed lemons sliced
2 kg Sugar
200g Honey
1 tsp Yeast nutrient
1 tsp Pectolase
1 tsp Gervin ale yeast
6 Cloves
1/8 tsp Ground black pepper. I estimate this as 10 grains/pieces.
1 tsp Cayenne powder

I have done two of these ginger brews now and i have a couple of suggestions if you don't mind ? As Shanna eluded to unless you have a very cast iron stomach or you deliberately want "burning ring of fire" i would cut the root ginger to 1kg. If you intend adding ground ginger as well then i would suggest dropping completely the Cayenne and Black pepper. I would also swap out completely the sugar for dry malt extract and maybe use 2-3kg of this instead.

The major issue i had with both my GB brews was they were both very thin and watery to taste, i used sugar in both to boost alcohol as i had no malt, this was a mistake, i should have used all malt for better mouthfeel.

[irish_goat]

Using all DME will result in you having "beer with ginger" rather than "ginger beer" à la Hollows/Crabbies.

Mines needed backsweetened as well so I simply served it up with some sugar syrup (4 parts water:1 part sugar) and this gave it a little body in the glass as well.

[Shanna]

Using all DME will result in you having "beer with ginger" rather than "ginger beer" à la Hollows/Crabbies.

Mines needed backsweetened as well so I simply served it up with some sugar syrup (4 parts water:1 part sugar) and this gave it a little body in the glass as well.

My own effort followed your recipe fairly closely but I had a major fuck up where I got the weights of the sugar and dme completely arse ways. When I measured the og in the fermenter it was 1.020 and I ended up having to boil up a couple of bags of sugar and adding it to the fermenter. Basically I panicked and way over did it on the white sugar. I ended up with a 1.070 monster ginger beer that tasted awful (had to throw 3/4 of the first bottle away) as the ginger burned on the way down.

Thankfully it has mellowed out with age and might actually be drinkable by Christmas time. Issue with the weights turned out to be a dodgy scale that alternately over and under reported weights depending on how much weight was applied.

I had only ever tasted Irish goats ginger beer. It had a nice kick of ginger but not like my own effort that felt like it was trying to dissolve my stomach lining. If I was to do it again I would maybe do a 60/40 split of DME to white sugar and not put the left over fruit/ginger in to the fermenter. It seemed like a good idea at the time but it just served to amplify the already strong ginger component in the beer.

Shanna

[TheSumOfAllBeers]

I have done two of these ginger brews now and i have a couple of suggestions if you don't mind ? As Shanna eluded to unless you have a very cast iron stomach or you deliberately want "burning ring of fire" i would cut the root ginger to 1kg. If you intend adding ground ginger as well then i would suggest dropping completely the Cayenne and Black pepper. I would also swap out completely the sugar for dry malt extract and maybe use 2-3kg of this instead.

The major issue i had with both my GB brews was they were both very thin and watery to taste, i used sugar in both to boost alcohol as i had no malt, this was a mistake, i should have used all malt for better mouthfeel.

I recommend the same. I have done a few sugar ginger beers, and they always tasted like cheap alcohol.

Once I switched to malt, they massively improved. Once I switched to making a ginger beer like a pale ale, i.e. all grain, with careful hopping, the beer was competition worthy. One of the best brews I ever made, and the recipe was simple:

- all pale malt
- 1 kg root ginger, boiled with runoff added into the boil, solids bagged and added into FV
- about 1 Oz each or northern brewer and saaz at 30 mins
- nottingham yeast ( i think)