GingerBeer

about

Adapted from a recipe I found online, scaled down. To retain the ginger burn and intensity I like to keep it as close to raw as possible. Generally I will boil the water and then add the ingredients. This helps 'sterilize' them (not really) but keeps the ginger and lemon mainly raw.

• IG: 1.076
• FG: 1.048
• ABV: 3.5%

procedure

• 2 gal water
• 1/2 lb ginger
• 2 cups brown, 5 cups white sugar
• 1 lemon
• 1/4 tsp cream of tartar
• 1/2 pack champagne yeast

1. boil water for 10 min to sterilize
2. remove from heat and add ingredients
3. cool and pitch yeast
4. ferment one week
5. rack into bottles and condition for a week

The combination of high final specific gravity and champagne yeast (high alcohol tolerance) makes this a particularly violent brew. I've never had a bottle explode but if they sit around it is difficult to open them. Generally one needs to slowly bleed off the excess pressure before removing the cap. Failure to do so looks like this:

alterations

A better recipe would use inverted sugar which is easier for the yeast to digest. Alternatively the sugar could be inverted as part of the recipe. Here is the alternative procedure:

1. boil water and lemon juice with table sugar for 30-45 minutes (this will invert the sugar)
2. remove from heat and add remaining ingredients, allow to cool
3. continue with recipe above

-- ChristopherPepe - 17 Feb 2009