Ginger beer

[CrealCritter]

I decided I'm going to finish the batch off as a best attempt at Blueberry Ginger Cream Ale. I went ahead and made up my flavoring and bottle primer for into a quart jar.

The ginger yeast needs additional sugars to eat to produce co2 in the bottles (natural carbonation). I decided to use brown sugar since it's really nothing more than white sugar and molasses. Molasses should add a little minerals to the finished drink also. Cream of tarter Is for head retention.

Blueberry flavored bottle primer recipe

2 cups blueberries washed
1 quart spring water (non chlorinated)
1/4 cup light brown sugar (packed)
1/4 cup white sugar
3/4 teaspoon cream of tarter

Heat water in pan until boil, turn off heat. Add blueberries, sugars and cream of tarter. Stir until sugars are dissolved. Turn heat back on high until boil. Mash blueberries, reduce heat and slow boil for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally. Strain liquid into sterile glass measuring cup until 3 cups of liquid is reached. Disregard remainder (blueberries & excess liquid). Filter the 3 cups of liquid into a sterile quart mason jar, screw on lid and place in refrigerator.

Ingredients

Boiling

No rinse sanitizer. Everything that touches the bottling primer after its boiled must be clean and sanitized to reduce risk of secondary infection to the ale. This includes your hands.

Sterile blueberry flavored cream ale bottling primer ready for Friday. It tastes good too

 

[sumi]

That sounds and looks great! You're making me want to get into the kitchen and start brewing something now.

 

[CrealCritter]

That sounds and looks great! You're making me want to get into the kitchen and start brewing something now.

You should

 

[CrealCritter]

Day 6 - die down continues. Running out of sugars to eat and alcohol contents are rising. Ginger yeast has a very low alcohol tolerance 4% - 4.5%.

 

[CrealCritter]

Day 7 - it's bottling day

Lots of condensation and big bubbles

 

[CrealCritter]

Bottling.

After sterilizing all my gear and syphoning just the good stuff from the top. I was left with a bunch of trub in the bottom of the carboy. I took a final gravity reading with my hydrometer and calculated the alcohol content of 4.1% I couldn't believe it so I measured again, yep sure 4.1% egads.

Trub

About 3 gallons of ale syphoned in to the bottling bucket.

Then poured myself a test taste glass, gave it a good snifaroo. Smells delicious, good amount of ginger and just a little lemon. I took a big mouth full and sloshed it around in my mouth. It wasn't overly sweet and kind of reminded me of some kind of spiked lemonade drink. I swallowed and my ears started to heat up, closely followed by a sinus clearing. Phew Its tangy hot going down, not like hot pepper hot but most definitely tangy hot! So I finished the rest of the glass and it was quite enjoyable actually.

Next I added my 3 cups of blueberry flavored bottling primer to the ale and gently stirred it in. And poured myself a taste test of it. Now we're talking... This is more like a soda should be, some what sweet and tangy and a little less hot.

Then I proceeded to bottle, I yielded about 22 and 1/2 pints. I'll let these sit until the plastic pet bottles get hard, indicating that they are carbonated. Then stick them in the refrigerator. To slow the carbonation down.

Right now I'm drinking what's left from the 1/2 pint from the bottom of the bucket. Its not carbonated but tastes pretty good. We'll see how it does over time. I'm pretty confident it will mellow some over time.

 

[CrealCritter]

My daughter said it tastes like "gari" or pickled ginger that they serve when eating sushi in between dishes. IDK... I've never eaten sushi. She took 8 bottles so she must like it.

But something really strange has happened... My hands and fingers don't hurt. It's been years since I haven't had pain in my fingers and hands. My daughter googled health benefits for ginger and said reading off some webpage

Ginger may reduce muscle pain and soreness. The anti-Inflammatory effects can help with arthritis.

Had I known this, I would have brewed this stuff up years ago.

 

[sumi]

A delicious homemade drink that makes you feel better? You're onto a winner!

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Ginger IS good for inflammation. I wasn't sure the benefits would survive the brewing process - but apparently it does. That's great!

 

[CrealCritter]

Ginger IS good for inflammation. I wasn't sure the benefits would survive the brewing process - but apparently it does. That's great!

My goal was to make a healthy alternative to store bought sodas. The effects didn't last long though, woke up to hurting hands again this morning. I just couldn't believe that my hands weren't hurting after drinking this stuff. I'm going to do a little testing on myself just to make sure it was this drink and it wasn't something else. However, if it is this drink then I stumbled on to something that works good for me.