Brew in a Bottle NonAlcoholic Ginger Beer

by **Dominator** » Thu Jul 25, 2013 8:26 pm

I have been playing around with some ideas for making non alcoholic ginger beer. I think the recipe still needs some tweaking but it is not too bad considering how cheap and easy it is to make, and you should have most of the ingredients already.

I just use old 1.25 or 2L soft drink bottles.

The recipe so far is:
Per liter
1 cup of sugar
Two desert spoons of powdered ginger
1/4-1/2 teaspoon of citric acid
Pinch of yeast. (I used 1/4 of a teaspoon in a 2L bottle and it was more than enough)

Method
Wash and sanitize your bottle and funnel. I just sanitize with hot water from the tap. Pour your sugar, ginger and citric acid into your bottle, fill about 1/3 with hot water from the tap, put the lid on and give it a good shake to dissolve the sugar. Fill with cold water up to about 2" below the top, you want the mixture in the bottle to be around 28-30oC. Sprinkle your yeast in and put the lid on loose, squeeze the bottle to get the air out, then shut the lid tight.

Sit it on the bench some where warm and give it a shake every now and then. Keep a close eye on it and when the bottle is firm, crack the cap to let the pressure out, depending on the ambient temp and how much yeast you added you may or may not have to do this.

After 24-48 strain the mixture through a muslin or cotton cloth. Put the liquid back in the bottle and top up with water until it is about an inch or a little less below the top. Sit it back on the bench and let it carbonate. After about 12h the bottle should be firm again. Chuck it in the fridge and when it is cold, it is ready to drink.

Obviously you can adjust the amounts of sugar, ginger and citric acid to suit your taste.

I am just trying a second generation and will update this when I have confirmed it will work and have tasted it. You can do a second gen by keeping what is left in the muslin cloth and adding half to your next batch with half the usual amount of ginger. ie. for a 2L bottle you would add half of the stuff from the old batch and 2 spoons of new ginger.

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by **7evan** » Thu Jul 25, 2013 9:34 pm

Non-alcoholic? ??????? :think:

WHY?????

by **Dominator** » Fri Jul 26, 2013 5:24 am

evanmac710 wrote:Non-alcoholic? ??????? :think:

WHY?????

Because it's easy, takes 2 days not 2-3 weeks and I can brew small amounts so I don't have to store 25L of it. If I want it alcoholic I can mix it with rum.

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by **Sam.** » Fri Jul 26, 2013 7:59 am

Dominator wrote:
evanmac710 wrote:Non-alcoholic? ??????? :think:

WHY?????

Because it's easy, takes 2 days not 2-3 weeks and I can brew small amounts so I don't have to store 25L of it. If I want it alcoholic I can mix it with rum.

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I like the efficiency!

I always use the coopers ginger can with a brew booster and some extra fresh ginger and it tastes great!

Never tried the non-alcoholic version....

by **MacStill** » Fri Jul 26, 2013 8:33 am

Dominator wrote:
evanmac710 wrote:Non-alcoholic? ??????? :think:

WHY?????

Because it's easy, takes 2 days not 2-3 weeks and I can brew small amounts so I don't have to store 25L of it. If I want it alcoholic I can mix it with rum.

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:text-+1:

and you can use it as a mixer for a lot of the booze we make too :D

by **Bucky** » Thu Aug 01, 2013 9:35 am

Ive just done a little batch of this and i love it. sipping on some now actually. will add a little more citric acid next time though :handgestures-thumbupleft:

by **Dominator** » Thu Aug 01, 2013 4:05 pm

Glad you like it. I am going to get some ale yeast next time I am at the HBS and see if it makes any difference in taste. If you reuse half of what you strain out of the bottle and add half the usual amount of ginger, kinda like a second generation, it tastes even better.

by **Bucky** » Thu Aug 01, 2013 4:19 pm

Thats what i have going now except i have used all fresh ginger finely grated. only thing is it wasnt very fizzy. that being said it only sat on the bench for an hour before i threw it in the fridge.

by **Dominator** » Thu Aug 01, 2013 4:38 pm

Bucky wrote:Thats what i have going now except i have used all fresh ginger finely grated. only thing is it wasnt very fizzy. that being said it only sat on the bench for an hour before i threw it in the fridge.

Yeah it needs at least 6-12 hours to develop some fizz, I just wait until the bottle is firm.

by **1 2many** » Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:08 pm

This looks cool Dom i don't mind a ginger beer and i will give this little experiment ago

Cheers :handgestures-thumbupleft: