New to Brewing - Ginger Beer (and searching)

[Global33]

Hello all. Stumbled across this forum last night as I'm looking to start brewing. Thought I'd try something hopefully quite simple to start with such as ginger beer. Ordered some demi-johns, yeast and hydrometer last night and just picked up plenty of ginger, sugar and lemons from the supermarket. Anyone got any great recipes they want to share?

I'm struggling a little with the search here...I'm sure it's dead obvious and it's me being a klutz, but if I use the search at the top, I can't search just thread titles. If I go into a sub forum I can do this, but don't know what sub forum the information I'm looking for may be in!

 

[Graz]

Welcome!

If you click the little down arrow by the search box, then advanced search, then in the bit where it says search by keyword there's another drop down which the default is Search Entire Posts but you can change this to Search Titles Only.

I've seen a fair few Ginger Beer recipes on here so you shouldn't have too much trouble finding one.

 

[Global33]

Thanks @Graz. A million and one questions I want to ask, but I'm going to try and be good and do as much searching and reading as I can before I do so.

Quite excited for everything turning up tomorrow and being able to experiment making different drinks. Hopefully at some point I'll work my way up to making a decent ale from scratch. :)

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Welcome to the forum :

If you like wine here is a very quick, cheap and easy way to make your own - http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=49462
.

 

[Global33]

I had spotted the thread about WOW.

Bit gutted. Had hopped to start brewing today, but my plastic demi johns have just been delivered and they didn't have the airlocks. Got some wine yeast though. I'm quite tempted just make some in an old pop bottle anyway and see what happens.

 

[Global33]

Actually there is a quick question I want to ask...What the easiest method people have found for sterilising their kit and bottles? Don't have loads of space in my kitchen so need to keep it simple!

 

[Chippy_Tea]

Actually there is a quick question I want to ask...What the easiest method people have found for sterilising their kit and bottles? Don't have loads of space in my kitchen so need to keep it simple!

It doesn't come much simpler than this - I fill a washing up bowl with water and add two Milton steriliser tablets they are no rinse and only take 15 minutes to do their thing, i put everything i need to use in the bowl and pour a little steriliser into each bottle and screw the caps on i then shake them and again after 10 minutes to make sure the steriliser contacts all of the glass, i have been using this method for 3 years.


.

 

[Global33]

That's great...thank you.

 

[Chippy_Tea]

That's great...thank you.

I thought this was in the wine forum if making beer you may need to rinse as some brewers think not doing so can ruin your beer for wine it is not necessary.

 

[Personal91]

Hello all. Stumbled across this forum last night as I'm looking to start brewing. Thought I'd try something hopefully quite simple to start with such as ginger beer. Ordered some demi-johns, yeast and hydrometer last night and just picked up plenty of ginger, sugar and lemons from the supermarket. Anyone got any great recipes they want to share?

I'm struggling a little with the search here...I'm sure it's dead obvious and it's me being a klutz, but if I use the search at the top, I can't search just thread titles. If I go into a sub forum I can do this, but don't know what sub forum the information I'm looking for may be in!

Personally I would just get a regular size fermenting bucket so s to save having to buy another in the future

I will post how I do this when I get 5 mins

 

[phat]

... picked up plenty of ginger, sugar and lemons from the supermarket. Anyone got any great recipes they want to share?

I brewed my first ginger beer this weekend. I used 1kg malt extract with 500g ginger, juice and zest of a lemon and a lime and about 150g of honey. I also added 500g brown sugar. Boiled it for about 30 min in a couple of liters of water before straining it and topping up to roughly 12 liters with cold water in a fermenting vessel. Pitched it with sparkling wine yeast.

It tasted absolutely gorgeous! but we'll have to see what its like when all of that sugar and extract becomes alcohol (should turn out about 8% ish).

Happy brewing :)

 

[Global33]

Personally I would just get a regular size fermenting bucket so s to save having to buy another in the future

I will post how I do this when I get 5 mins

I will at some point. Whilst I'm just playing 5l are great. Less wasted ingredients if I get it wrong!

 

[Global33]

I brewed my first ginger beer this weekend. I used 1kg malt extract with 500g ginger, juice and zest of a lemon and a lime and about 150g of honey. I also added 500g brown sugar. Boiled it for about 30 min in a couple of liters of water before straining it and topping up to roughly 12 liters with cold water in a fermenting vessel. Pitched it with sparkling wine yeast.

It tasted absolutely gorgeous! but we'll have to see what its like when all of that sugar and extract becomes alcohol (should turn out about 8% ish).

Happy brewing :)

That sounds good! I'm wondering if I used to much sugar. My airlocks hadn't arrived, so I just made up 1.75l in a pop bottle. I used 200g of sugar, which is a lot more then that.

 

[phat]

If you didnt use any dme it'll work out about the same. I used a kilo of dme and 500g of sugar for 12.5 liters. So 200g for 1.75 liters works out just under that.... It'll be strong though :thumb:

 

[Global33]

Sorry, I'm still getting my head round this. What's DME?

Anyway, very exciting. Small bubbles this morning. There is also some sediment on the bottom and something floating on the top. What could these be?

 

[Gerryjo]

Sorry, I'm still getting my head round this. What's DME?

Anyway, very exciting. Small bubbles this morning. There is also some sediment on the bottom and something floating on the top. What could these be?

Hi and welcome to the forum.
DME is Dried Malt Extract.
LME is Liquid Malt Extract.
You'll get your head around the acronym's once you get round the forum a bit more.:thumb:
The bubbles are Co2 gas escaping with the foam on top is Krauzen.

 

[Touchstone]

Hi Phat how did it turn out?