[Tastebridge] suggestions for alcoholic ginger beer experiments

Fri Mar 8 10:16:53 UTC 2013

Early on I used bread yeast, because it was cheap and available, but I have
stopped doing that. Bread yeast is not nice really.

I used http://www.homebrewwest.ie/super-wine-yeast-compound-60grm-1087-p.aspas
a general purpose yeast for most ferments since then. For beers
however
I am starting to use commercial beer and ale yeast and make starters.

I have some sourdoughs going that I may be brave enough to use with a beer
at some stage (one of them does contain beer yeast). I might create a
ginger plant starter while I am on holidays (my new sourdough containing
totally wild yeast is starting to come together but it is at the funky
stage now).

On Thu, Mar 7, 2013 at 1:09 AM, Frantisek Apfelbeck <algoldor at yahoo.com>wrote:

> Thanks Richard!
> I have an important business meeting today, I will get back to you email
> later and ask more questions. One thing which I wonder already is, what
> type of yeast did you used during your experiments?
>
> Sincerely from Jeju,
>
> FAA
>
> Frantisek Algoldor Apfelbeck
>
> biotechnologist&kvasir and hacker
>
>
> http://www.frantisekapfelbeck.org
>
>
> "There is no way to peace, peace is the way." Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
>
>   ------------------------------
> *From:* Richard Conroy <richard.conroy at gmail.com>
> *To:* Frantisek Apfelbeck <algoldor at yahoo.com>
> *Cc:* tastebridge tastebridge <tastebridge at lists.noisebridge.net>
> *Sent:* Wednesday, March 6, 2013 9:24 PM
>
> *Subject:* Re: [Tastebridge] suggestions for alcoholic ginger beer
> experiments
>
> Hi Frantisek,
>    I have done quite a lot of alcoholic ferments using ginger, and started
> out much the same as the way you did. I have since moved on to making my
> ginger beer with malt extract/all grain, and hopping it just like any other
> beer.
>
> Also using honey rather than refined sugar is another trick that I really
> like, I use it for honey ginger wines where I want to have a higher alcohol
> strength beverage (~8-10% ABV). Ginger + Honey + Red soft fruits & berries
> (especially plums) = AWESOME.
>
> Standard advice with alcoholic ferments is to ferment until complete and
> resweeten/prime when the yeast is done. The higher the strength, the longer
> you will need to leave it age and develop flavour, but they also preserve
> longer. You will need a hydrometer/refractometer. If you bottle too early
> you can get some interesting bottle bombs.
>
> Many of the components of ginger, including its fieryness are in my
> experience very volatile, and blow out your airlock when you do alcoholic
> ferments.
>
> I am thinking of trying to introduce more of it at batch priming time
> instead (but I dont do batch priming currently). The theory is that you add
> your priming sugar into a solution, and siphon your ferment onto it. Leave
> until it fully mixes and then bottle with that. Your priming solution can
> contain more than just water, and you can use it to introduce flavour kicks
> or volatile aromas lost during fermentation. Haven't tested this yet.
>
> I have haphazardly taken down odd notes and photos here:
> https://www.facebook.com/The.Sum.of.all.Beers
>
> Been meaning to store this in somewhere more ordered, but life is a bit
> too busy at the moment.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 8:14 AM, Frantisek Apfelbeck <algoldor at yahoo.com>wrote:
>
> Hi Michael,
> Many thanks for tips! I will get back to your email most likely tomorrow.
> Just for now I've relocated to South Korea, specifically to the island
> called Jeju. Beautiful location but I have not found a brewing shop here
> yet so I have to be minimalistic.
>
> Anyway talk to you more tomorrow and once more thanks for your tips.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Frantisek Algoldor Apfelbeck
>
> biotechnologist&kvasir and hacker
>
>
> http://www.frantisekapfelbeck.org
>
>
> "There is no way to peace, peace is the way." Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
>
>   ------------------------------
> *From:* Michael Lyons <cprmichael at yahoo.com>
> *To:* Frantisek Apfelbeck <algoldor at yahoo.com>
> *Sent:* Tuesday, March 5, 2013 3:46 PM
> *Subject:* Re: [Tastebridge] suggestions for alcoholic ginger beer
> experiments
>
> Thanks for asking. I've have quite a bit of experience brewing though
> hardly consider myself to be an expert. I applaud you for brewing an
> alcoholic drink that is not beer. Personally, I stopped brewing beer a few
> years ago when the price of ingredients doubled and it became cost
> prohibitive for me.
>
> First of all, there are many reasons to not use baking yeast, and many
> types of yeast to choose from which have different qualities  you can take
> advantage of. One of these qualities is the alcohol concentration at which
> the yeast attenuates ie. stops functioning. Another quality  is how well
> the dead yeast flocculate and settle out of the liquid.
>
> Another substance you might want to consider is Yeast Nutrient, which is
> inexpensive. I have used it when I have brewed hard cider, which doesn't
> have the natural nutrients that beer wort does.
> The quantity of yeast you use is not particularly relevant since the
> yeasties multiply and theoretically one yeast cell could (eventually)
> ferment any amount of beverage. Asking at brew shop is a good idea.
> Also keep in mind that yeast are reusable, so you can save some of the
> used yeast in a suitable, airlocked bottle. A really fun thing to do is
> to have a fresh batch ready for ferment when you siphon off the finished
> brew off the old yeast. Dump the fresh batch on top of the old yeast and it
> will take off full bore in an couple of hours.
>
> As for adjusting the sweetness, I suggest using a non-fermenting
> sweetener, like stevia or lactose. I remember having a problem with a cider
> I made that would not stop fermenting. I had let it ferment until the yeast
> stopped, but it ended up tasting incredibly dry. When I added more sugar to
> get the right  sweetness, the yeast would re-activate and within a week or
> two the sugar would be gone and the cider would be too dry again.
>
> If you are using brown sugar for flavor, remember that it is white sugar
> mixed with molasses, and you might as well use white sugar and add molasses
> for flavor.
>
> Speaking of flavorings, it is often best to add them after the
> fermentation. When I tried making a cherry cider, all of my great cherry
> flavor I'd added before fermenting went up in the bubbles my yeast gave
> off while it was working on the sugar during fermentation.
>
> As for water, remember that Anchor brewery and I think speakeasy too, use
> straight SF tap water. Fine product from Hetch Hetchy. Great taste and fine
> to brew with. Chlorine & flouride and inconsequential no need to filter,
> sanitize or mess with the water from the tap; "they" already do that.
>
> As for fermentation vessels, most people I know use either 5 gallon food
> grade plastic buckets with lids or glass carboys.  Fermentation locks are
> necessary to keep out bacteria and  errant yeast, especially during the
> later stages of the fermentation when the yeast is not throwing off so much
> CO2. Many of us rig up a blow off tube for the first part of the
> fermentation because ordinary locks can get clogged with vigorously
> bubbling yeast and blow out..
> Fyi, we have all this gear at Noisebridge.
>
> I have no idea what temperature 25C is, but the nice thing about living
> where we do is that yeast like it too. 60-70F. I would be leery of using a
> submersible pump, since the brew is not circulating  and you're likely to
> get part of the batch too hot. Traditionally we keep blankets around the
>  brewing vessel and they make electrically heated wraps for fermentation
> containers.
>
> Well that's my two cents. Good luck and let me know if you have any more
> questions or would like any other help.
>
> -michaeLyons
>
>   ------------------------------
> *From:* Frantisek Apfelbeck <algoldor at yahoo.com>
> *To:* "foodhackingbase at lists.hackerspaces.org" <
> foodhackingbase at lists.hackerspaces.org>; tastebridge tastebridge <
> tastebridge at lists.noisebridge.net>; 091 Foods <091-food at googlegroups.com>
> *Sent:* Monday, March 4, 2013 5:06 PM
> *Subject:* [Tastebridge] suggestions for alcoholic ginger beer experiments
>
> Hi to all and to alcoholic brewers especially,
> I just started a new experiment aiming to brew nice alcoholic ginger beer
> and I have some questions below. My first batch will be most likely too
> sweet,  but it is the max end of the screening which I want to do (on the
> sweet side), the details for the first experiment are below. I would like
> to ask for recommendations for the next experiments, I put some ideas below
> at the end. It is possible that I may be able to sell the final product, of
> course I plan to share the technology, recopies etc.
>
> The final volume of the brew = 5 l; Specifications:
>
> 0.1% (w/v; 5 g) of bakers dried instant yeast (primed/activated in warm
> water with bit of light brown sugar for +-30 min)
> 20% (w/v; 1000 g) of light brown sugar (dissolved in hot water)
> 4%(w/v; 200 g) of ginger (fresh, cleaned by brush and blended in mixer,
> added to the brew at the beginning of fermentation)
> 95% of used water is commercial purified water (I shake it a bit to get
> some oxygen in it)
> fermentation vessel is 5 l plastic container, narrow mouth, closed by lid,
> no air lock at the momment
> the brew is fermenting at +-25C in my "aquarium heater" based incubator
>
> It started to go on within few hours and it is fermenting really strongly,
> anaerobic fermentation as mentioned. I tasted it yesterday (two days after
> starting) and it is quite sweet still and bit alcoholic. I am thinking
> about starting another brews under same conditions changing just the sugar
> concentration to 15% and 10%(w/v). What do you think about that? Below are
> more ideas, please do remember that I do not have too much experience with
> alcoholic fermentations. Also I ferment in the same environment all my
> probiotics but I am using the clean newly bought plastic vessels for the
> alcoholic ginger beer.
>
> THE NEXT EXPERIMENTS - Ideas and suggestions
> - decreasing the level of sugar concentrations to 10 and 15% (w/v; 500 and
> 750 g respectively)
> - changing the type of sugar for completely white sugar (which may be an
> issue concerning the nutrition for the yeast) resulting in more clear
> gingery flavour
> -  changing the type of sugar for dark rich brown sugar resulting in more
> heavy complex flavour because of molasses
> - changing the amount of yeast added to a lower concentration
> to decrease the possibly off flavour
> - increasing the concentration of ginger and maybe processing it with
> heat, which would result in more "spicy flavour" due to the transformation
> of gingerol to more pungent zingerone
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gingerol
> - more ideas?
>
> I should mention that I do not have access to any specific yeast now, I'm
> bit low on cash, otherwise what strains would you recommend? I heard nice
> thinks about California Ale yeast but I'm not sure if it would be suitable.
> Maybe some more "cider" style yeast would be better?
>
> Many thanks for any ideas, I will be in touch within next few days with
> few news :-)
>
> Sincerely,
>
> FAA
>
> PS I have made another batch of kimchi yesterday from Chinese cabbage,
> miso, fish souse, ginger and garlic so I'm really looking forward for the
> results.
>
> Frantisek Algoldor Apfelbeck
>
> biotechnologist&kvasir and hacker
>
>
> http://www.frantisekapfelbeck.org
>
>
> "There is no way to peace, peace is the way." Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi
>
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> --
> http://richardconroy.blogspot.com | http://twitter.com/RichardConroy
>
>
>

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