Ginger Beer

[DREADSKIN]

well just tasted the ginger beer after the addition of the raisens. tasted better, more body etc, but thinnish. as for flavour its lovely. first chilli power( you can taste the wee evil green finger chilli straight away) then nice mellow gingery beery taste. i have poured off abottle for later tonight, but i have spiked it with sugar syrip and it tastes feckin great now. tastes better than that firey jamican ging beer you get in the shops. plus its got booze in it. lots of booze! SWEET!

as for this post, just fantastic. my god, Darwin himself would be amazed by evolution in action! thanks autro, i shall try this extract bru next time. now however i have 20 ltrs of spray, dark, honeyed ginger bru to happily work my way thru first! yeee haaaarrrr! ten-four!

[arturobandini]

Glad to hear it Dreadskin. Experimentation is what this forum is all about and you're an "Other Brews" pioneer!

[TC2642]

Yeah definitely worth finding out your heat scale. I would say do what I did and boil it up as it sanitises the root ginger and you're also replicating the process you would do in a boil. My ginger beer was quite delicious but lacked body and sweetness whereas your plan sounds like a malty winner. Definitely let the people know your findings! For my next trick I was going to steep some crystal in the ginger boiling pan to extract some malt sugars and hopefully and some residual body and sweetness.

Right, going to make another change since my sister doesn't like wheat beer so I'm thinking an all pale malt beer and maybe 90gms (or possibly 60) at the start with 60gms in the last 15mins and maybe a pinch of cardamom? She really likes ginger and I don't have much time until her Birthday so I'm flying a bit blind but I'm thinking this should give enough heat for 25ltrs.

I'll keep an update and post the recipe once I've sorted out my Belgian dubbel!

[TC2642]

Did this yesterday,
4.5Kgs Pale
150gms Crystal
Pacific Gem 17.8% AA 7.5gms 90min
Cascade 5.8% AA 21gms 90min
Fresh ginger 60gms 90min
Fresh ginger 60gms 10min
Coriander 5gms 10min
S04

SG 1043

For 25ltrs.

Just added the crystal for a bit of colour (I couldn't really think of a ginger beer being pale) and I needed to use up those hops. Quite a pronounced ginger taste but will have to wait after fermentation to judge if it was the right amount.

[arturobandini]

Looking good mate.

[batemans fan]

I've been thinking about making a ginger beer based on the old 'ginger beer plant' recipes for quantities of powdered root ginger. I'm considering making up with sugar (maybe brewing sugar) to get an OG for the strength I require (about 4% - 1035?) and then adding a non-fermentable sugar to get the sweetness. Lactose is the obvious one to go for, but I was wondering about artificial sweeteners such as Candarel. I never have sugar in my coffee and so don't know what these artificial sweeteners taste like. Nor do I know if they will change flavour in a brew - nor if they will ferment (but I suspect not). What I'm aiming for (if I ever get round to it) is something of the ilk of Idris ginger beer.

Has anyone got any information/opinion on using artificial sweeteners?

[Tequilla6]

I have been reading the forums to find a "Ginger Spiced Beer" recipe and this thread seems the most likely. Specifically TC2642's recipe.

It has been over a month so the results on the 120gm Ginger addition should be in now. I had come to the conclusion that it would be around 0.75gm of Ginger per litre of wort.

TC2642, Can you confirm how the Ginger came across on the brew after the conditioning? Would you reduce or increase the amount of Ginger used?

As the Ginger is actually a good bittering root, did you find the amount of bitterness too much? Looking at the Hop and Ginger schedule it seems a tad bitter, what was the estimated EBU from the hops?

Cheers

[TC2642]

I have been reading the forums to find a "Ginger Spiced Beer" recipe and this thread seems the most likely. Specifically TC2642's recipe.

It has been over a month so the results on the 120gm Ginger addition should be in now. I had come to the conclusion that it would be around 0.75gm of Ginger per litre of wort.

TC2642, Can you confirm how the Ginger came across on the brew after the conditioning? Would you reduce or increase the amount of Ginger used?

As the Ginger is actually a good bittering root, did you find the amount of bitterness too much? Looking at the Hop and Ginger schedule it seems a tad bitter, what was the estimated EBU from the hops?

Cheers

Hi there Tequilla6, yes this was the right amount of ginger for me and for most of the people who tried it so I would use this as a baseline. There was no noticeable hop taste (not sure of the IBU's, I wouldn't think it was above 20-25 IBU's though, seemed about the right amount and this was the leftover hops I had in the freezer at the time. I'm not at home at the moment and not near any beer software! could possibly do so in a week or so) If you really like ginger then up it, it wasn't 'hot' as such but very well pronounced and full bodied. It needs to be drunk within about a month to six weeks since it started to lose the gingerness after this time. All in all a success.

[Tequilla6]

Very nice to hear and I'm glad yours was a success in your eyes it gives me confidence to up the quantity a little bit. I'm in no rush as my brews of Elderflower Champagne and Red wine and Barliman's Best Ale are hogging all the FV at the moment so I'm on hold for another brew for a week I guess. The actual EBU's would be appreciated for completeness but no rush.

Thanks for your prompt reply.

DOH!, You gave us the full recipe for **!!~ Sake, I'll put it in Beer Engine and see for myself.

[Tequilla6]

It was 27 EBU plus what ever the ginger added to the bitterness

[wgardner]

I'm making my first ever brew next week, and it's going to be from a kit...

Has anyone got any ideas how I would infuse a ginger taste in to the brew? I'd like a beer which is like Badger's Blanford Fly.

Thanks in advance