Does anyone have a good recipe for ginger beer? Preferably non-alcoholic or low alcoholic, as I need a surrogate beer for my no-alcohol days. I'm also curious about the process,

How is it possible to ferment anything without it becoming alcoholic?
How is it sweetened without the sugar fermenting out?
About how much ginger root would be used for 5 gallons?

Thanx for any help



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No alcohol days, whater those? Seriously though, I thought you were making Ginger Beer to go in your Dark and Stormies.

Kirby wrote:No alcohol days, whater those? Seriously though, I thought you were making Ginger Beer to go in your Dark and Stormies.

Haha. Sometimes that would be the intention. But I also think my body might enjoy a little break. Younger Australians like me have a fairly hazardous binge drinking culture; even some Irish travellers I met were quite startled. Its fun but coupled with the fact I have hundreds of bottles of beer in all my cupboards means there's a bit of a danger of continuous excess. It can easily end up as a homebrew session with friends on the weekend, going out on Tuesday and Thursday nights, and then 1 or 2 beers on other days. I don't mind saying I'm cutting back on alcohol, I want to survive my twenties!!

"Survive my twenties"?!! What's left after that?

Anyway, to answer your original question, I saw this on a cooking show a week or so back and thought it looked pretty good:

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/ginger-ale-recipe/index.html

Let us know if that's the sort of thing you're looking for.

Also, if you have kegging as an option, there's a pretty good recipe for Root Beer in Charlie's "The Homebrewer's Companion." I can type it up if you like.

Unfortunately I don't think my friends will let me hold up their kegging system with something of low alcohol content, but that link was very helpfull to work out the ratios/amounts of ginger needed. I was also thinking of sarsparilla, which as far as I can tell is very similar to make, except you use licorice and sarsparilla root in addition to ginger, and use treacle (or if possible molasses) instead of white sugar. I just bought a new little one gallon fermenter, so I might try something in that first, before a larger batch. Again, cheers for the link, makes it look like a fairly easy project.

J.

It really looks like a school-kid project. I'm thinking I'll try it out this week myself! (for the kids you know, of course, not me, no, the kids...)

Hi,

I found one good recipe of old ginger beer.Here it is "Old English Ginger Beer Recipe".

Loaf sugar, 2-1/4 pounds; cream of tartar, 1-1/2 ounces; gingerroot, 1-1/2 ounces; 2 lemons; fresh brewer's yeast, 2 tablespoonfuls; water, 3 gals.

Directions: Bruise the ginger, and put into a large earthenware pan, with the sugar and cream of tartar; peel the lemons, squeeze out the juice, strain it, and add, with the peel, to the other ingredients; then pour over the water boiling hot. When it has stood until it is only just warm, add the yeast, stir the contents of the pan, cover with a cloth, and let it remain near the fire for 12 hours. Then skim off the yeast and pour the liquor off into another vessel, taking care not to shake it, so as to leave the sediment; bottle it immediately, cork it tightly; in 3 or 4 days it will be fit for use.

That looks like a completely different method to what I ended up doing: I'll probably try it though. I'm going to try the first batch later tonight. For one gal I ended up useing 2oz brown sugar, 2oz crystal grain, 4oz ginger and a shot of lemmon juice. Not quite conventional. Infact its a pink colour, not smokey.