Should've known better

[Oliver]

I just bottled a Cooper's ginger beer. Smells fantastic. Tastes rank. It's ruined by artificial sweetner. You know that disgusting chemical taste on the back of your tongue ...

Years ago I made a lemonade that didn't taste quite right. Now I know what it was. It's the artificial sweetner.

Won't make the same mistake again. Anyone got a good ginger beer recipe that doesn't call for artificial sweetner?

Here's one I was sent a while ago (from a guy at Cooper's funnily enough!).

Ingredients
3 large pieces of ginger (about a kilo)
1 cinnamon stick
10 cloves
500g light crystal malt (I assume he means light malt)
1kg dextrose
Rehydrated wine yeast

Method
Run the ginger through a food processor then put every thing in a pot with five litres of water and boil with the lid on for an hour. After the boil, add 10 litres of cool boiled water and pitch yeast when it is at the right temp. I left all the ingredients in the fermenter until I racked it into the second one (probably 3 days). I primed the whole thing for bottling by racking a second time and adding the correct amount of dextrose.

I ended up with nineteen bottles of excellent ginger wine / beer. I don't know what the alcohol content was but it kicked arse! The cloves probably had something to do with that. I used cloves in a stout for the first time about four years ago and I overdid it. Two bottles and I didn't want to get off my chair. For hours. Cloves are a natural local anaesthetic, you can use it for tooth ache and stuff like that apparently. Well, it has more of a "general" effect when taken internally, in conjunction with alcohol at least.

Cheers,

Oliver

[Clintsc9]

Brigalow do a can of ginger beer. I did one to instructions and it was pretty good but a bit light on the ginger taste.
I haven't had much of it but there's only one tallie left now so Charleen must have thought it was OK. Got better with age, she reckoned.
Bottled another lot nearly two weeks ago and this time I threw in a packet (220gm) of processed ginger chips, extra sugar and all.
Smellled better on bottling, but the chips got in the way a bit. Racking would have been a good idea but I only have the one fermenter. Another week or so before we try it.
Both around the 5% alcohol mark.

[Dogger Dan]

Oliver

Ginger Snap for 23 Litres

Coopers Nut Brown
500g Crystal 40
500 ml honey
1 kg Pale liquid Malt
24 g Centennial (12 for 15 min, 12 for 1 min)
8 inches peeled fresh Ginger
Cinnimon Stick

Adjust as you like really

Make as normal, add Cinnimon with Crystal malt as bringing to boil, Ginger in the boil (1 hr)

I used a good ale yeast

1.057 opening, 1.011 final

4.7 percent

going into keg today actually

Dogger

[thehipone]

Morgan's makes a decent ginger beer, but I think it also has some artificial sweeteners in it. It was a little more "spicy" and ginger-y than some others. Maybe lactose or maltodextrin could be used if you cook up your own recipe.

[BPJ]

I've looked at Ginger beers, Lemonades etc, and haven't been able to find one without artificial sweetener. My mum used to make ginger beer (Fowlers bottle recipe) when I was a kid using ground ginger, etc. from what i remeber it was great, except with exploding bottles,(unfermented sugar). I tried the same recipe recently and after a few violent explosions tipped it down the sink as it was very dry. Will hunt the recipe down and post it in the next few days.

[Clintsc9]

Well we couldn't wait the recommended three weeks and chilled down a couple yesterday and had 'em yesterday arvo. Only two weeks old.
A lot more gingery taste and a bit sweeter, and Charleen thinks it is great.
It will keep her happy for a month or so while I brew some "proper" beer for me. (It seems I drink about four times as much as her, so one in five brews will have to be the ginger beer.)

This couldn't be easier to make.

One can Brigalow Ginger Beer mix (from any Coles store)
1kg raw sugar
Yeast and improver(?) comes with can.
Follow can directions exactly except add 220gm packet processed Buderim Ginger Chips to the fermenter. (Chips are much smaller than regular-sized ginger pieces so a greater surface area per gram)
Mine was in primary for only 5 days at average 26 degrees
White sugar primer.

SG 1.021 FG 1.000 so only about 3% (shrug)

If you worry about throwing the ginger in the fermenter, I have viewed the processing plant at Buderim and the ginger is boiled in sugar syrup about five times in huge vats before being packaged. This stuff is sterile!!

It is great stuff to have around so that the wives/partners of beer drinking mates can be involved as well.

[Dogger Dan]

Yep,

Concur with that one, I have no issue with the sterility, I do the same thing

Dogger

[BPJ]

Couldn't find Mum's old recipe.

was something like

-1/2 litre water
-a dozen sultanas
-juice of two lemons
-2 teaspoons ground ginger
-1/2 cup sugar
-yeast
Put in a large covered jar, like a starter.
Every day for a weeek add
-2 teaspoons sugar
-2 teaspoons ground ginger

After a week add
-juice of 4 lemons
-several cups sugar (The cause of explosions)
-top up to 9 litres and bottle.
When it didn't ferment out and explode it was very similar to bundanerg ginger beer
I had thought of doing something like this with some lactose for sweetness and fermenting it out fully before bottling

[Oliver]

I realised yesterday when making another beer that I forgot to add the yeast nutrient to the ginger beer

I wonder if that's why it tasted a bit dodgy?

Oliver

[Jeff]

Oliver this sounds like the same problem I posted the other day about the Brigalow Cider. Smells great but the back of tongue taste makes it right for watering the garden!

[Dogger Dan]

Unlikely,

The yeast neutrient only adds enzymes and minerals for a healthy fermentation. If you had the good fermentation then the neutrient wasn't required

Dogger

[Oliver]

Thanks Dogger.

Oliver

[drtom]

My dad's family have been making ginger beer for decades and decades which they always bottled in old Marchants bottles with internal threads.

The recipe that dad makes is:

Boil up a decent thumb of ginger sliced and a sliced up lemon in about 1.5L of water for about 1/2 - 1 hour. Allow to cool, then add 3 cups of sugar. Stir to dissolve then add a sachet of baking yeast (yes, I know!). Stand for an hour or so until frothy on the top then strain and divide between 3 1.25L softdrink bottles. Top up with water, then cap and stand for 12-24 hours at room temperature before chilling and drinking! It'd be interesting to measure the OG and FG of a batch - I don't expect it is terribly alcoholic.

It tends to be rather highly carbonated, so you have to open it slowly to let off pressure. Also, the longer you leave it in the fridge the less sweet it becomes. Having learned quite a bit about brewing, I guess I can see several flaws in the recipe, but I expect you could adapt it to make a more alcoholic version using dex/malt and fermenting out before carbonating.

Tom
(Actually, my gradfathers family emmigrated from denmark to .au during the goldrush and opened a brewery "Cohns" - they moved into softdrinks and in the old wares shops in the old gold mining district (Daylsford, &c) you can still find Cohn Bros softdrink bottles. So you see, brewing is clearly in my blood. )

[chris.]

(Actually, my gradfathers family emmigrated from denmark to .au during the goldrush and opened a brewery "Cohns" - they moved into softdrinks and in the old wares shops in the old gold mining district (Daylsford, &c) you can still find Cohn Bros softdrink bottles. So you see, brewing is clearly in my blood. )

& they were the first Brewery in Australia to brew lagers

[drtom]

Well, well, well. I never expected to learn family history here.

Tom

[flosso]

Here's one I was sent a while ago (from a guy at Cooper's funnily enough!).

Ingredients
3 large pieces of ginger (about a kilo)
1 cinnamon stick
10 cloves
500g light crystal malt (I assume he means light malt)[i]
1kg dextrose
Rehydrated wine yeast
Cheers,

Oliver

Regarding the original recipe Oliver posted above - what do people think of replacing all/some of the dextrose with raw sugar, as per the recipe on a can of Coopers Ginger Beer?

[Paleman]

Try a Ginger Ale here from Grumpys, Oliver.

Ive never tried it myself, but they claim its all natural. And if their beers are anything to go by, it should be top stuff.

http://www.grumpys.com.au/phpshop/?page ... a7cf0efae7

[shazzam]

Right on Paleman - that is the only one I have found after a few months of asking different websites - its either Grumpys, a family recipe or the old exploding bottle/ginger beer plant way.

[NTRabbit]

I've just started making this recipe, but with some minor alterations - 1kg of raw sugar and 500g of brown sugar instead of the 1kg ofdextrose, a tsp of lemon juice and a pinch of nutmeg, and instead of a wine yeast i have a leftover Coopers Ale yeast. I also only ended up with about 900-950g of fresh ginger, but thats no big deal.

Its going to come out strong, but hopefully its a ripper. Will let you know in oh, say 4 weeks?

[corks]

with regards to the recipe at the top of this thread...
could i substitute the malt and dextrose for brown sugar?