| #1. Ginger Beer Concept |
| Published: 2025-04-15 [Tue] 05:43, by |
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Continuing from a discussion on giko: My plan is to test drive a simple fermented ginger beverage with the following ingredients/materials: 1. Grated ginger 2. Brewer's yeast 3. Water 4. 1-2 chili peppers, to taste 5. Sugar (which type?) 6. 2L plastic bottle So far I have heard that it is important to slowly release the gas in the bottle, and carefully monitor the pressure. What I imagine is an earthy, simple drink. Something to be enjoyed after a day's work, or savored with some deep-fried foods. Any suggestions? |
| #2. |
| Published: 2025-04-17 [Thu] 04:29, by |
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I do about 100g of ginger, 100g of sugar per liter. Kind of sugar doesn't matter. ==> 5.8% ABV fermented dry. Easiest way to let gas out: poke a needle through the end of a balloon so co2 gas can get in, but oxygen / bugs / etc don't get in. You can also very loosely place the lid on top of the bottle but if it's on too tight, the co2 buildup will make the bottle explode. |
| #3. |
| Published: 2025-04-17 [Thu] 13:44, by |
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>>2 I see! And how did you find the carbonation? I'll try to go to the store to buy the ingredients today. I'll periodically update here as the project moves along |
| #4. |
| Published: 2025-04-19 [Sat] 04:36, by |
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>>3 > How did you find the carbonation? Dry wine (completely fermented) should not be carbonated at all. I ferment dry, add like 4g of sugar per liter and cap the lid and wait another 2-3 weeks if I want it carbonated. This is the most surefire way to have something properly fermented and carbonated without extra specialist ingredients or equipment. You can also just wait a day after fermentation starts, find a way to kill the yeast and put a cap on it, if you want your ginger ale on the sweeter side. Some people throw it in the fridge but you risk drinking live, active yeast (= all day diarrhea) Or buy a sodastream machine -- bonus points for supporting our greatest ally and the only democracy in the middle east if you take this route. Look into how people carbonate beer. They buy big expensive machines and lots of tools to optimize the process. It may be easier to make concentrated ginger ale (eg 8% alcohol and tons of ginger) and mix with soda water if you want something cheap and boozy but still DIY. |
| #5. |
| Published: 2025-04-19 [Sat] 15:02, by |
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>>4 Lots of info to consider. What does the term "dry" mean to you? I have heard it in the context of beer, like Asahi "super dry". Also, I prefer light carbonation, just enough to whet the appetite and refresh you. Not heavy carbonation you would find in a lot of commercial soda. I think I will take the soda water route just to speed up my first go at this, though. I'll call it "Pohon Beer". Maybe I can even add jalapenos - plenty of them in the building to go around! |
| #6. |
| Published: 2025-04-19 [Sat] 16:40, by |
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>>5 Dry = all the sugars have been fermented by the yeast to Co2 gas and ethanol, basically. And they produce a lot more co2 than you'd expect! The contrast to dry, in the context of wine, is sweet: which makes the meaning of "dry" more clear. There are a number of ways to determine whether dryness has been accomplished, fermentation has ended. The easiest way is with a hydrometer -- when the specific gravity drops below 0 (eg that of water), most likely all the sugar (which is more dense than water) is gone and has been replaced by ethanol (which is lighter than water). Especially when the standard gravity is below 0 and remains constant for several days, that's a sign the yeast have finished consuming alcohol, and are now cleaning up after themselves before they go dormant and the hooch clears up. Co2 can still be released from the liquid after fermentation has ended so it's not a 100% sign that fermentation is still ongoing if Co2 is being released. For me, where ambient temps are 25-32*C, it takes about a week for 5% ABV to ferment with bread yeast (~85g sugar/liter) and then about another week for things to settle out. Higher ABV takes longer to ferment and longer for yeast to clean up after themselves. And you lose flavor. A cheaper way to see that fermentation has completed: when your airlock goes inactive (either stops bubbling if it's a proper one, or the balloon goes limp and deflates completely, if you go the balloon route) screw a lid on. Check every few hours for the next day to see if pressure is building up: squeeze the bottle to see if it's gotten firmer and unscrew the lid to "burp" out any Co2 (you don't want a bomb going off) When you test the bottle and no more Co2 is being released in significant ways, after 2 or 3 days of checking, you can move onto the next step. This is the time when you want to add 5g/liter of sugar and possibly a dash more yeast before sealing the bottle and letting it sit -- I think 10g/liter could be feasible, especially in a plastic soda bottle for a heavy carbonation. But you're going to have to wait at least another week or two for the yeast to clean up after themselves and go dormant, making the drink safe to drink, even though it's only the bit of Co2 you're looking for. Using clear plastic bottles is a great way to check "finishing" because the drink will become very clear when it's ready to drink. When in doubt, wait more -- it only improves the product! All you can really do is trial and error if you don't want to research about the finer details of carbonation or invest in more equipment. I think 5g/yeast per liter once fermentation is probably a safe starting point. Otherwise, double the ginger and ABV, then cut with soda water when it ferments dry. Takes maybe 2-3 weeks for a drink to be drinkable after starting fermentation, but more time only helps in making things smoother and more subtle. Whether you add more sugar at the end to produce carbonation the old fashioned way or you plan to mix your dry fermented ginger ale with soda water, make sure to pour slowly from your fermenter -- near the end you'll see the nasty "lees" (dead yeast and crap), you don't want any of that in your final product because it tastes foul and can give you a tummy ache. I'm only an amateur brewer & distiller but I hope this knowledge can help you. Feel free to update this thread with the results of your experiments. Try to keep logs: date fermentation starts, recipe, ambient temperature, date fermentation seems to end, etc etc. Brewing is an art and a science: either way, notes help. |
| #7. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 01:40, by |
| Out shopping for my ingredients! |
| #8. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 04:45, by |
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The fermentation process has started, I presume. Added 4g of yeast to 1L of water, in addition to 100g sugar, and an eyeballed amount of ginger (~125g). Fingers crossed here, friends |
| #9. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 04:47, by |
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Will update on temperatures and progress soon, and reply to the info post above. |
| #10. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 04:54, by |
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My worry at this time is that I added too much of the grated ginger, which had some sugar already added to it. Evidently this caused the volume of ingredients to be higher, and I wonder if the amount of yeast I added is sufficient. Forums say that even something as small as half a packet is very strong. Is this sensible? |
| #11. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 05:17, by |
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>>10 you only need like 1g of yeast honestly, yeast will double every 90 minutes so adding 10x as much yeast only means you end up saving like 5 hours in a 2 week process. But if you're concerned and there's no evidence of fermentation happening tomorrow, adding a dash more yeast won't hurt I would not worry about sugar in the grated ginger, it's probably incidental and 100g of sugar per liter is already something easy for bread yeasts to handle What you should worry about more in the fermentation process is that the bottle can stay moderately warm. Slower temps, like below 15*C / 60*F will make fermentation happen a lot slower; too slow and the yeast go to sleep |
| #12. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 05:26, by |
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>>11 Since summer is on the horizon, it's heating up in my apartment right now. The room is very muggy right now, but maybe putting it in the same room as the gas stove is worth trying? |
| #13. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 05:39, by |
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Here's an image, a very rough ambient temp estimate is in the desc https://imgur.com/a/OCoYbJ9 |
| #14. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 07:21, by |
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After 2.5 hours, I'm starting to notice the top of the mixture getting bubbly and slightly... foamy? |
| #15. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 07:40, by |
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Already starting to notice bubbles rising to the top visibly. Now I worry it might blow up when I'm asleep... we will see! |
| #16. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 08:03, by |
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>>13 Try to fill the bottle so there's only maybe .5 inches or 1-2 cm of air above the liquid. Too much oxygen in the bottle will result in off flavors -- you want as little oxygen as possible to be exposed to your drink. Oxygen is what causes drinks to foul up and once yeast get to work, they don't like it. What an airlock does, aside from letting CO2 gas out, is also keep a layer of Co2 above your hooch to protect it from oxygen. And if you're too poor to buy a balloon, just SET the lid on top without twisting. Or squeeze the bottle, screw on the lid, then unscrew until the bottle can expand again. Burping the gas every few hours is not the smart way to go about it. Short of buying real airlocks and a real fermenter online, these are what you should do if you don't want the bottle to explode and make a disgusting mess everywhere -- which will happen! At least with plastic, you only have to worry about the lid shooting off as pressure builds. If you were fermenting in a glass bottle you could have a lot of fun hunting down glass shards. not to mention the sticky mess... Fermentation is pretty simple. Clean bottle, some yeast and water, the right amount of sugar and whatever else, and an airlock. You'll get the hang of it. In the future I would recommend boiling the ginger with sugar together to kill off any microorganisms and waiting for it to cool before pouring it in your bottle and topping it off with clean water. Your test run should make something drinkable in 1-2 weeks even if it's not perfect. Once your ginger wine has finished fermenting, you can also speed up the aging process by putting it in the fridge for a few days, as cold as you can go without freezing. That forces the yeast and crap down to the bottom more. This is a process called cold crashing. Time is best but cold can help. |
| #17. |
| Published: 2025-04-20 [Sun] 11:21, by |
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>>16 Will be going to bed now. Leaving the lid on as loosely as possible for the next 18 hours, at least. Oxygen exposure is unfortunately inevitable, as my schedule prevents me from getting a balloon until tomorrow. |
| #18. |
| Published: 2025-04-21 [Mon] 18:23, by |
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Video from 4 days ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uL3PDXAczwI > Homemade GINGER BEER with a KICK - 7% ABV! [10:41] > This is the easiest way to make flavorful, and BOOZY alcoholic ginger > beer at home. No special brewing equipment needed but I'll share some > extra tips and gear that might help you out! |
| #19. |
| Published: 2025-04-23 [Wed] 00:34, by |
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>>18 Excellent, watched. I notice the guy test ran a "bug" (interesting phrasing) and fermented that further. Reminds me, some tutorials I read added the step of putting the yeast in 55°C water... does this speed up the activation? I once made amazake (sweet fermented rice beverage), and at 55°C it was done in 12 hours. Very low alcohol due to such a short fermentation time and the usage of koji rather than yeast... or not? As of right now, the bubbles have slowed. Only sporadic bubbles are seen on the top, and a yeast cake has formed on the bottom of the bottle. Could it really be finished so soon? My question at this stage is, when do I pop it in the fridge? |
| #20. |
| Published: 2025-04-23 [Wed] 14:17, by |
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Have been testing the pressure in the bottle for the last 12 hours or so, fermentation seems to have stopped. Going to wait a few more days before the refrigeration phase to be on the safe side |
| #21. |
| Published: 2025-04-24 [Thu] 03:07, by |
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I may have been jumping the gun. After 12 more hours, still very minor bubbles are seen on the top. I closed the bottle tightly 6-7 hours ago and a small amount of CO2 was just released. Waiting a few more days is a safe bet. |