Ginger Beer and OzTops yeast

[DavidP]

Hello everyone!
I'm a bit confused with whats going on with my giger beer!
I used Morgans as the Kit and then added my own ingredients.
450 Fresh ginger
500 Brown Sugar
150 Honey
700 Dextros
150 Golden syrup
500 light malt
8 cloves
1 cinamon stick
3 table spoons of ginger powder
Problem is..I used Oztops yeast No 1
and at 22 degrees it fermented in 3 days flat.
thats 1040 to 1010 in 3 days! While fermenting it had heaps of brown scum on top which I just assumed was from the yeast chewing up the sugars.
I used this same yeast in my black rock cider with apples in the fermenter at 22 degrees and that took a whole month!!!
so I bottled the ginger beer after getting the same 1010 for 4 days in a row.
I used the coopers carbonation drops ...8 hours later there is scum in the top of the bottle and the ginger beer is fully carbonated...OVER carbonated!
when I open a warm bottle it spews out..when I open a cold one it doesn't spew out.
it does have a little bit of a strange smell..but not strange enough for me to be convinced it's an infection. it actually tastes ok.
so I can't figure out whats going on? have I got an infection? is that why the yeast is being so aggressive with the sugars?
or is the oz tops yeast just a super quick fermenter? but goes slow with the cider because of the apples in the fermenter?
have I bottled prematurely?( I don't think so because I got the same readings 4 days in a row)
has the mixture and amounts of fermentables got something to do with the speed of fermentation?
I've got photos of the scum and the spew and the yeast if that helps anyone with advice!

[DougFiasco]

Dude! How much sugar do you want in that?!
I'm not experienced enough to tell you what the problem is(if there is one).

But you're using a LOT of sugar in that! What is your batch volume?

Definateley use brown sugar for ginger beer. I like it.[/b]

[DavidP]

Doesn't seem like that much sugar to me?
og was 1040 and fg was 1010 ..that puts it around 4% I beleive.
I've seen ginger beer recipies with more than 2kgs of sugar.


Turns out...as dodgy as this brew seemed it's turned out pretty well!
no bottle bombs....no other funny symptoms.
tastes pretty good now!

[DavidP]

batch volume was 22 liters

[DougFiasco]

Yeah, I probably just got a bit excited seeing the variety of sugars, and thinking how alcoholic it could be...

I think the main problem with the kits is sachrine. The artificial sweetner taste ruins it for me. I need to find a kit without sachrine, otherwise I am going to go oldschool and make a "ginger beer plant".

[DavidP]

yeah I'm not keen on the sachrine! but in all honesty I havn't found that sickly artificial sweetner taste in my ginger beers. but I don't think my taste buds are that good! I think thats why I like tons of ginger in my ginger beer!