Hey guys I must have forgotten to mention in the video. In order to keep your ginger bug alive you just continue to feed it the same proportion of sugar and ginger. Once it get’s too full or it won’t dissolve anymore sugar: just pour out about half of the liquid (leaving half behind) and adding some fresh water, and then go back to replenishing with the same amount of JUST ginger and sugar. Rinse and repeat to keep it alive forever! Also, once it’s active you can place it in the fridge and feed it once a week. Hope this helps! :)
In South Africa we like to make ginger beer but we add a few raisins in the bottles which sink to the bottom and once the raisins are raising you know its ready.
@@flensoest Generally, we try to keep things simple. Mililiters/Litres, Milimeters/Meters, Grams/Kilos. In building, Meters are generally, only used very large amounts. I've seen many building drawings where every measurement is in milimeters, even up to 50,000mm The point of metric is to keep it simple. Avoiding the fractions in imperial.
@@spacial2 i use the metric system so I get all that, I just don't get, or maybe not used to it in the making of alcohol, why they use grams when measuring water instead of, say decilitres. Oh well, thanks anyway :)
I've made a LOT of ginger beer. I highly recommend only using 2 Tbsp of ginger bug per gallon of water. Yes, that's right, 2 Tbsp. Anything more than this is unnecessary for carbonation, and will leave you with an overly-yeasty final product (IMO). As a result, you can also maintain a smaller volume of ginger bug. Additionally, it is possible to have a ginger bug that's too sugary. If I notice my ginger bug becoming sluggish, I'll often adjust with more/less sugar, based on how it smells/tastes. Give it a taste in the evening! If it's overly sweet and fermentation seems dead, just feed it with some ginger only for a day or two. When bottling, I find it helpful to bottle a single plastic water bottle, in addition to the other glass bottles. This "tester" bottle will make it easy to know when the batch is done. If it's rock hard, put them all in the fridge. No guess work! For me, this is 2-3 days with an active starter (and, yes, with only 2 Tbsp ginger bug / gallon of water). Finally, try squeezing in a lemon and/or lime, and tossing in the peels after the boil is done. I don't always do it, but it adds a depth of flavor that is often refreshing.
Thanks for that man, I had never really played around with the amount of ginger bug I used, good to know I only need a couple TBS., I've gotten a couple 6gal. carboys to work with now, so it's great knowing I don't need a quart of ginger bug to start.
Hi Ryan, I followed this recipe and I got almost zero carbonation. It tastes good, first bottle way to sugary, but second bottle really good. But got zero carbonation. What did i do wrong? can you help? Thank you
Hey all, user report here: I have been making this ginger beer weekly for about 6 months. I love it. I have gone through a few ginger bugs and have since created a 'super-bug'. With this bug my ginger beer is ready in less than 24hours! As Josh mentions, you need to feed your ginger bug daily whilst it is at room temp, and weekly once in the fridge. i found that the older the bug gets, the more culture it is producing (experiencing?), the faster the ginger beer is created. I started a new bug and fed daily for 3-4weeks at room temperature. Replace 70-80% of the water every 5 days (approximately). I used it for many bacthes of delicious ginger fizz during this period. First batches were taking 5 days, and now as mentioned it is making sizzling soda in less than 24 hours. I tend to keep my bottles close to a wall radiator which is on a low setting, or atop the fridge. Also for about 3.5L of liquid I add only 3-4 tablespoons of sugar and I'd say this is about the minimum necessary for a tasty batch. Other flavour options is to steep a herb into the tea once you have turned off the heat. Sometimes I like to use pine needles instead of lemon as a vitamin C boost and subtle flavour. Thanks so much to you Josh Weissman for this recipe. It is a great gift and I will forever share this video. P.S. He's not joking about explosions. Burp your bottles or else you'll be cleaning the walls and ceiling...
@@Coldestnig perhaps you can feed it more sugar or keep it a few degrees warmer. To see if it is alive, replace most of the water with fresh water and feed it again. Then wait to see if there are bubbles in a day or so
Discovered after failing the first time that much of the ginger grown in the United States is irradiated after harvest. Of course, this kills the yeast we're trying to cultivate. Made it the second time with organic ginger, and WHAM! :) Thanks, Joshua! Love your stuff!
Good thing you said that , i usually buy organic so now i know to buy organic ginger. Its annoying in the usa how we make buying organic harder and more expensive
@@Coni2009 It makes it inactive, so you can't grow your own ginger by buying ginger. They do the same thing with most veggies. They even spray our potatoes so you can't grow potatoes from bought potatoes
This formula is very good because he kept it simple. Im a retired baker and all the very best recipes are always the basic simple ones. I highly recommend this version over the convoluted ones. Keep it simple, you can't beat success.
Always love the simple, usually better! Am making kombucha, apple cider vinegar and now ginger beer! All these seem straightforward, just patience and good ingredients. Now, to find ginger-strawberry soda recipe.... 😉
I started the bug 3 days ago and opened it this morning and it was fizzy!! Such a cool feeling to see it all working. Like a delicious science experiment
@@MatheusFerreira-mu6lu use a plastic bottle instead, the ones used for carbonated drinks. You will know when your ginger beer is ready, the bottle will become rock hard.
Bro, I totally tried this and my wife loved it, she is from St. Thomas VI, so you gave me much brownie points. Also, I created a citrus bug by using grapefruit peals. I was attempting to make an orange and grapefruit soda. IT TOTALLY WORKED!!! you are the man bro! thanks for being you!!
Simple and direct. This is the best ginger beer recipe ever. I grew up on this stuff and I love playing around with it. IN the Caribbean we also add pineapple to the second ferment and you get a very lovely refreshing drink.
I want to make a pineapple "soda" with this and all I had was canned pineapple juice. Do you think that will work or would you recommend only using fresh juice? And is it okay to use the juice instead of water?
@@justpassingthrough. try it with the can pineapple, don't add the juice incase it has added vit c which might be too acid and kill the bugs. Add a bit of sugar to it too to give the bugs something to feed on. Add like half the amount of sugar to pineapple. Let me know what happens. Good luck.
There is a Mexican fermented pineapple drink called tepache made from the waste parts of the pineapple (skin and core) that is quite delicious. Lots of recipes on YT.🍍
Dude, flawless victory on this. I just changed the normal sugar to brown and it added more depth, but the first two batches with normal sugar were also amazing. Thanks for sharing! :D
Awesome recipe, and as usual super well explained and entertaining. I would suggest to freely adjust the amount of ginger to your taste. For me 10% of the water weight is good, it depends how gingery you like it. Also, if you have a juicer, I’d juice the ginger first, reserve the ginger juice to add at the end, together with the lemons, so you don’t loose any of the ginger flavors and aromas, and cook the pulp to extract the remaining flavor from it. In my opinion, using fresh ginger juice makes the final result a bit richter.
Quick Tip: I used a Chemex coffee glass jug for this and it makes feeding so easy - just dump the sugar and ginger in and swirl to dissolve each day - simple.
My father used to make this when I was a boy in England of about 9yo or 10. ....I am now 73. He got the recipe from his grandmother. If you read Joshua's remark below about how to keep it alive you will see it is the same principle as keeping a sourdough yeast starter alive. We have made this stuff for many, many, generations. Sourdough, Ginger beer, wine, cheese they are all ancient crafts based on fermentation and passed down from generation to generation in the civilized world..... and.... as with Josh, even in America. And as he says at 1:00, "Because you know me....This is what I do. This how I be......Which I think is pretty dope....." Isn't he just the coolest guy? Be sure to freeze it at 1:03 to get the full effect.
Oh I absolutely love that you appreciate these simple things. It brings me joy to see anyone valuing this . Mt grandparents generation knew how to be. Such recipes are blessings
If you have elderflowers growing around where you live (when they're in season obvs; here in the UK they're abundant when their time comes) you could try elderflower cordial or elderflower champagne, in case you've never done it before. (also, on a very serious note, you need your own food entry somewhere (bbc good food, food network and the lot); you are quite masterful at everything you dol
Made elderflower in the past using a mash, then adding yeast. You want to make sure to get a good champagne yeast in order to make elderflower champagne. The carbonation will be amazing and the bubbles finely beaded! Give it a try!
That's what I've just done! We're really obsessed with elderflower in Sweden in summer so you have to be quick before all of the good flowers are picked clean :) now we're working on ginger beer!
Third time's a charm! First batch didn't carbonate. I used the minimum amount of sugar you recommend. Good flavor just flat. Second batch I used the full amount of sugar and got a Pediococcus bloom. Did some research and found out it may be drinkable in three to six months. We'll see. Third time I used 1/2 cup of sugar and an older bug. I let the bug ferment for a about a week instead of three days. I let it ferment about fives days in the bottles. It got very fizzy! Success! It's fully carbonated and has great flavor. It reminds me of Verner's Ginger Ale, which I loved as kid growing up in Michigan. It's harder to find here in SW Missouri. So glad I learned how to make this! Thanks for sharing your recipe with us.
Yeah, Vernor’s was the best before it was bought out by Big Sodapop. It’s not made the same way today. I guess you’re too far out to get Vernor’s. We have it in Florida but that’s mainly because of all the Michiganders moving down here. Don’t bother looking for Vernor’s now though. You’ll be disappointed. Red Rock out of Atlanta is good. And surprisingly Aldi’s ginger beer is very good, but sweet. Much better than some designer brews that cost 3 times as much.
I used help make this with my mum when I was a kid 2 dozen bottles at a time, never had one explode (constantly burped them) but 24 bottles never lasted more than 2 days Lol. One of the best memories of my childhood.
You can also use plastic soda bottles. They are rated for over 6 Bar (100 psi), and if they do burst, no broken glass. Their caps are designed to vent when you loosen them, so less chance of a mess. For home brewed beer, I used soda water or sparkling water bottles because they have no flavor from their original contents, but for this, I suppose old ginger ale bottles would be ok, too.
@@tylersingleton7992 You probably inhale more chemicals with each breath than you would extract from the inside of a plastic bottle, particularly a used plastic bottle. The greatest rate of evaporation of volatile compounds from a plastic bottle occurs immediately after it is molded. In many cases the bottle is filled almost immediately. This means that the original contents will extract more than any subsequent contents. Again, this is all speculative. I think that, even using sophisticated chromatography, it would be hard to find any trace of chemicals originating from the bottle in your ginger beer. More likely source of contamination would be the detergent you used in cleaning the bottles.
Ginger Brewers - Most sources of bottles, the ones with the wire structure like Josh uses, usually want about $4 per, even in lots of 6 or 12. Grolsch beer comes in such bottles, same hardware, altho, it must be stainless steel, as after a year's use, not a blemish on them, and come with good ceramic caps with standard silicone gaskets. I can buy them 4 for $11 at my Beer Distributors, and, full of Grolsch beer, at that. It's a pretty tasty beer, so if Budweiser is your thing, you might want to give them to someone else to empty, but even if you pour the beer down the sink (don't you dare), at $2.25 rather than $4 or more, you're still saving money. As well, those bottles have already proven they are of a quality sufficient to do the job, they are of an attractive dark green glass, and they have slightly impressed sides, opposite each other (and with a raised glass Grolsch up and down the side), all of which make for a secure handling of something that might be cold and wet. I highly recommend you consider them, next time you are in need.
Josh, thank you for the guidelines! I halved the sugar and it came out perfectly in between ginger ale and ginger beer. I used mature ginger for the whole process as I read there's higher potential for yeast colonization. My next try I might use young ginger for the boil as the bite is quite strong. I love it but others may not as much. Again, thank you. This opened my eyes to natural carbonated beverages!
Ginger beer is the best, and after years of my wife driving my drunk ass around for 20 years, I now drink Ginger beer at social events, let others drink, and I still have a great time sober with a ginger beer in my hand, and I drive everyone home safely. Can’t wait to try this at home here in Italy during lockdown 2020.
We used to make this when I was a kid and back then- I'm old- fresh ginger was unheard of, so my mum used dried ginger 'powder'. Worked exactly the same :) and, yes, they do explode if you leave them to long !!
I have been wondering about that! Now when we all like to avoid shopping but I do have dried ginger peels at home. And dried ginger like in a regular spice jar. Hm. Maybe I'll just try equal amounts of dried ginger and sugar
That’s what cooking and making things like this so awesome, it’s the experimenting that makes fun and being able to say ‘HECK YES this is badass’ or ‘oh 💩 WTF did I do’ it’s all about the experience.
Ooof I'm doing this Update: it worked! Thanks man, I can't believe I made a carbonated drink SO easily. Used plastic soda bottles and they worked fine. I'll graduate to flip bottles when I find them near me and make other fruit drinks with the bug 😁
A note for anyone attempting this. I followed the instructions as given about opening the glass bottle every 24 hours. Day one (aproximately 10 hours after putting the liquid in the glass bottles, I popped the 'cork' to relieve pressure. I did not see any pressure release as was kind of indicated in the video, where it overflowed. It was kind of disappointing. Day 2, I opened the glass bottle and received a very satisfying 'pop' that I was hoping for. 9 hours later, one of the two bottles I filled exploded. Glass and liquid went all across the room. I happened to be around at the time, so I quickly 'popped' the other botte, which caused that bottle to also shatter, only less dramatically. I'm not sure if there should be more pressure releases through out the day, but that was my experience. I'm not typing this to dissuade anyone from making the ginger beer, only to suggest that it might be better to pop the glasses more than every 24 hours.
I followed instructions to the letter and this morning popped the top on some amazing Ginger Beer! Extremely delicious with a lovely light fizz. I had my doubts about adding the lemon, but it really is perfect. Thank you for a terrific experience!!!
Hey Joshua! I am not currently following your recipes, but thanks for your detailed instructions! I'm an ESL teacher and using them for my students and that saved a lot of work for me! Thank you so much!
This is still one of my all-time favourite recipes of yours. So easy and simple and so much cheaper than store-bought ginger beer. I leave mine to ferment for 2 weeks to ferment more of the sugar and get it more consistently carbonated.
I make a lot of homemade ginger. If you want to step up the spice, I’ve used as much as 1lb of ginger in a gallon of water. Boil it hard, and that both concentrates it, and also carmelizes the ginger a bit (for more spice.) and if you want to go REAL spicy, boil some peppercorns in there too!
When you take a chance on the first video that comes up and it ends up being everything you need to know. Thank you! My 9yo son and I watched this yesterday and started our ginger bug last night. We are very excited! Also, thank you for bleeping out the expletive when it exploded ;)
With nearly 2M subscribers, 47K likes I don't think you need my two cents but I will give it anyway. You are probably half my age and here I sit being taught by you. No not about ginger beer, that as well, but being such a great presenter. You know anyone can make anything sound complicated, the so called clever people do it all the time, but your way of presenting make me want to get up and go and do it NOW, not later, NOW! That takes a lot of talent! Well done! You taught me more than making a great beer!
I live in the midwest and started my sugar bug in the dead of winter - household temp approx. 68 deg. My sugar bug was SUPER fizzy on the 6th day. Incorporated it into the ginger beer and filled the bottles. Even with the little bit of sugar bug starter there is some carbonation visible on the top layer of the ginger beer. If you live in a cold place just keep going. Joshua is in Texas, so it might just go faster there due to the heat
Just a suggestion to avoid exploding glass bottles, I swapped to 2 liter soda bottles for home brews. You can feel the bottle when it is firmed up. Rarely dose a plastic bottle blow shrapnel when they blow, the side generally begins to bow out, and the caps seal several times. Thanks for all your great videos
This was the first time i have ever made anything like this, i got to say: this is the best drink that i have tasted ever i really enjoyed this drink and will continue to do so, not only myself but my wife, brother, sisters, and my son, to break it short the whole family really enjoy drinking it, we make a batch and enjoy each others company while drinking , your recipe is bar-none, thankyou brother . L 'chaim .
This is like a smoother, jazzier version of It's Alive with Brad. I like it. I've made my own ginger beer by making demerara-ginger syrup and mixing a bit of that with some soda water, but I'm gonna take it a step further with this and see how it turns out. I love Moscow mules and I'm always looking for ways to step up my home cocktail game, so thanks for this.
I love ginger beer, I tend to keep a bottle or two around in case I have a stomach bug ( since my best solution for the flu was Canada Dry) and it really soothes the stomach
followed this recipe exactly like you asked and it turned out BEAUTIFULLY WELL thank you soo much. you're one of the chefs who I trust. wouldn't follow a recipe that takes a week worth of expectations if I didn't beleive for sure u wouldn't put out a fake recipe. thank you soo much
So good man. What about a trouble shooting episode for fermenting? Yeast vs mold on top, gear, hard things to ferment vs the good ole boys. Also, cured meats maybe? Idk, I’m getting a beer..
Great info given in a concise way. I’ve been making ginger beer for 9 months or so and discovered that I no longer need to keep a ginger bug. Instead, I’ll use part of a soda from the last batch to inoculate the new one.
chris hogan ....I was away for 2 months and used some left in the fridge to make a successful brew. Be careful, the fermentation continues under refrigeration. I had a couple bottles pop their tops while I was away.
I added like 10x more ginger to the tea to get it to the proper amount for a nice “burn” - amazing! And mine was ready in only 2 days because my bug is super strong
Thank You! 1. I love Moscow mules 2. I love ginger 3. All the ginger beers I buy taste more like ginger syrup. I like the ginger spice not sugar so this is so perfect!
Do yourself a favor and never place those f*****ng flip cap bottles anywhere near a window or any other sort of glas. Once one bottle of my home made ginger beer exploded and the porcelain cap flew right into a glas door (the cap reached nearly light speed, since than my cats are traumatized). It was a safety door, first an interesting spider web unfolded, afterwards lots of shedding of cubic glas shards occurred, found some even months later. Most expensive ginger beer of all times. And yes, I opened the bottle once in a while. Must have been one highly aggressive ginger bug.. Sadly I am not allowed to brew ginger beer or root beer at home anymore and yes fermentation is cool. Try Japanese style pickled vegetables, fermented in rice bran, very adventurous too.
I also had a glass explosion with tons of shards of glass all over, even though I was burping twice a day. I decided to add some of those burping caps. Brewing is canceled until then.
You dont close airtight. U need oxygen but u also have to cover it. So using a cap or a lid and close it airtight would cause it to explode. So best way is to use a cloth to cover your beer.
@@evelgreytarot8401 I'm not saying it shouldn't be closed. It should never be tightly closed. That's what im saying. Depending on the container I'm using or a bottlenim using.
I started doing this when I was a 14 year kid.. Worked well... When I got older I started mixing it up in a 60 liter plastic drum. Plastic bottles are a good thing to prevent glass bottles exploding.. Now im an old man and can't move around as I could from injury So I buy it... Nothing like a good Ginger buz .
Thanks for this! My absolute favorite cocktail is a huckleberry moscow mule made with fresh huckleberries of course, and now I can make it with real home made ginger beer as well! I CAN'T WAIT!!!!
For the people asking whether or not you have to peel the ginger: If you're not using an organically sourced ginger it's better to peel to reduce the chance of contamination via pesticides and other no-no's. However, I used organic ginger for my ginger bug, I even peeled it, and it became noticeably fizzy after 3 days. My ginger beer is now bottled and awaiting the final fermentation results.
Just tried this. I tried a yeast one before and it didn't work out. I used 3/4 cup sugar for the mix. I made 2 liters with brown sugar and 2 liters with white. I did 3 days bottle ferment so far. I opened the white and man.. so good. I added a little ginger juice to the batches before bottled ferment too. I am letting the rest ferment another day or 2. I think I'll have to add some more white sugar to the brown sugar. Loving this endeavor. Thanks so much.
I started my ginger bug like 3 hours ago, and then opened youtube to see this piece recommended in my feed. What a coincidence 😆I intend to make ginger ale though 😉
@@bmelinda1258 , me neither. Once I pulled up at a local sports store, looked at a few things, shoes mostly. left my phone in the car outside the store. That night opened a browser on the computer, ads for sports shoes dominated. Did my phone track I was parked outside a sports store, or did they have cameras in store that tracked me or? Coincidence? Where's that tin foil hat!? lol
A few things I've picked up over the years doing this. Do it in PLASTIC bottles, you can feel when they are fully carbonated (can't squeeze the bottle anymore), and a much lower risk of bottle bombs. Just an empty 2L soda bottle will do it (rated for the pressure already). You have a piece of glass lodge an inch into your drywall because you forgot to burp it and you'll go to plastic and never look back trust me.... Also, you don't need to keep the ginger bug going. Just use the last bit of a previous batch as the starter for the next. One less thing to keep track of and the culture is more reliable in my experience.
I had a dozen in glass quart beer bottles in beer fridge. Middle of night, we heard muffled gunshots in garage. I got ready to confront whoever/whatever. Everything was as it should be, then 3 booms from inside of fridge I standing beside. I about jumped out of my skin 🤣 I cautiously peeked in and quickly shut the door. Tomorrow, tomorrow I will deal with the glass and sticky mess. I went with my plastic beer bottles since then. You can feel the pressure and if it blows, it is just a sticky mess. None have blown as I release high pressure as they still ferment (a lot slower rate than room temperature).
hi Joshua im a gastronomy student and i really enjoy watching your videos they are so relaxing and i learn a lot from them, sorry if i have mistakes on my english, greetings from mexico keep up the nice work dude!
I’m making this tonight because of this video. My grandmother used to make this for my mum and my mum told me the story of exploding GB bottles in the caravan one year. She liked that I was going to try my hand at this.
I finished making this after 12 days of fermentation! it's lovely and delicious af One thing... I got impatient and added dry active yeast about 12hours ago, and left it by my windowsill where I usually fermented them. One of my bottles exploded and shattered across the floor, because the yeast produced so much gas than my ginger bug did in a week. It's super fizzy and the other bottle I managed to salvage and keep about 3/4 of the content, tastes great. TLDR: don't be impatient, keep releasing gas every day and one it's ready keep it in the fridge.
Wanted to note on the skins vs no skins argument: it depends a lot on how you source your ginger. Some people have good luck with peeling their ginger first, others say to leave the skins on. In my experience it's much more important to use filtered or distilled water that has no chlorine or chlorinamide in it. Tap water's often a good way to either have it not work at all, or have it working for a day or two then die for no reason.
@@daisydcakes well, it could be your ginger or your water. If you boiled it the chlorine problems would be handled, but it could be a problem if your water is super hard or overly softened. You could just get some distilled water from the store, and not have to worry about it, but odds are good if your water is palatable and boiled (then cooled) that water isn't your problem. So maybe try a different source of ginger. Apparently some people have problems with irradiated (i.e. externally sterilized) produce at some stores, so just go someplace else I guess? Farm market if you can, otherwise just a different store.
Josh, you never stated that it’s the skin on the ginger that holds the wild yeast. I cut it all off and wasted days and ingredients to have to throw it away 😭
I actually ran frantically downstair to chop a new ginger with skins and throw them all in the jar together with the skinless ginger right after I typed that 😂😂
Finally. I've been searching for ginger beers in the store, but I can't seem to find it no matter where I go to. Now I can't wait for make my own. Thanks man!
I've made this using your recipe, and boy does it taste delicious. I love the addition of lemon, it sure adds flavour to the beer. This beer makes your body warm through the day. My friends seems to love it too. I serve this beer to them whenever they come over. Ao thanks for sharing man.
You say that you use ginger bug instead of brewers or champagne yeast so that it can ferment. Ginger bug is just a way of catching and feeding natural yeast in the air and allowing them to multiply enough that you can use them to ferment the sugars. That is what creates the alcohol and co2 for carbonating. The wild yeast will be the same species (though different strains) as the brewers' (ale) yeast or champagne yeast. The biggest difference is that the commercial yeast packets will be all the same single strain of yeast and you won't have any bacteria (or not enough to matter). Bacteria can cause the gusher bottles you mentioned as well as contributing sour flavors to the beverage (which may be desired - that is how sour beers are made)
Using the commercial yeasts will leave you with a much higher alcohol content, with wild yeasts and the short carbonation period the alcohol content of this would be negligible.
Not really, I have used natural yeasts to make wine and cider and they were as strong (12-14%) as any I made with yeast packets. It's the amount of fermentation time that's the key. You do get "off" flavours with natural yeasts.
That's why I make big batches of my ginger bug, 64oz at a time. You only need a couple shots of the ginger bug to make a whole liter of soda. So it stretches
It depends how you ferment it. If you do it this way probably not too long. A month or so. When you naturally ferment and don’t use an air lock you will absolutely get wild yeast and maybe some bacteria. However if you do it like home brewers do it with brewers yeast, an airlock, and proper sanitization you could have a very long shelf life. Just always keep it in a dark place or the fridge.
I forgot about a bottle I had brewed 6 months ago. I've taken it out of the fridge, opened it up. It was fizzy like a champagne. Have I kept it closed for a few more days, it would have exploded. I've drunk it and it was totally fine. So you should be able to store it in the fridge for a minimum of 4-5 months, just remember to burp them at least once a month. :)
I actually got mine started with my sourdough starter because it wasn't taking off with just ginger. Only used a tiny chunk barely bigger than a matchstick head, and it was very active the next day. I'm on my first time through and ending day 2 of the 2nd fermentation. I'm thinking it will turn out just fine! :) The ginger bug I inoculated with the sourdough starter tastes good.
@@stepowillhaben7753 Honey on it's own isn't an environment where the yeast can survive, but if diluted properly it's a great option for feeding yeast.
Do I have to feed the ginger bug consistently like a sourdough starter to keep it alive and active? Or is there a more economical way to make ginger beer every now and then?
I'm from Yorkshire (where this was invented) and we used to harvest ginger and pass round the bug from family to friends to neighbours for a while. In the end, we'd bottle it and split it. We added extra yeast and it ended up around 11 percent. It were lovely and very refreshing. I used to love the non alcohol stuff as a kid as that's what you get commercially.
What do you do with the remaining ginger bug? Like how do you maintain it... Because ginger is much more expensive than flour is for sourdough starter.
I checked a couple other source and it seems to be agreed upon that you can refrigerate and feed once a week (Similar to a sourdough starter). From a quick skim of a thread I found, freezing is possible but rather complex due to the problematic forming of crystals that literally spear your bugs to death. www.wildfermentationforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2186
@@JoshuaWeissman Somewhat yes, I suppose I should rephrase my question, I guess what I should be asking is does keeping the ginger bug have any advantages (aside from saving a few days of prep work) similar to sourdough starter the flavor becomes more developed as the starter ages. Because currently I don't have much money to throw at projects like these, so I'm just trying to weigh the pros and cons of just scraping the ginger bug and making a new batch every time I want to make ginger beer (which won't be very often).
I maintain my ginger bug at room temp with only brown sugar every few weeks or so. From what I've read, it is very forgiving once you get past the starting point (like in this video), and as long as you are feeding the yeast that's already in the bug, it should stay alive, and it seems to be true since mine has stayed alive for about 2 years now. It wouldn't hurt to add ginger every once in a while, though
When making beer cleaning is a big part of it, but noticed there was no mention of it with the bottles. They don't need to be scolded or disinfected right before use?
hey Joshua! Thanks for this recipe! Question: can I grate a bunch of ginger, keep it frozen in a zip-lock bag and feed my ginger bug from there? I usually keep my ginger frozen in the freezer like this anyway, would be convenient if I could feed it like that, so I won't have to worry that my ginger will go bad. Wondering if it might affect its fermenting properties...
Hey guys I must have forgotten to mention in the video. In order to keep your ginger bug alive you just continue to feed it the same proportion of sugar and ginger. Once it get’s too full or it won’t dissolve anymore sugar: just pour out about half of the liquid (leaving half behind) and adding some fresh water, and then go back to replenishing with the same amount of JUST ginger and sugar. Rinse and repeat to keep it alive forever! Also, once it’s active you can place it in the fridge and feed it once a week. Hope this helps! :)
Joshua Weissman you did mention it right at the beginning !! Loved the video
I was just about to ask that! You're a gentleman and a schollar!
Wow! AMAZING.... so.... quick question - Does it get a great buzz going you handsome devil?
Can i halve the proportion of the ginger bug recipe
how long does it take to ferment to adult levels?
In South Africa we like to make ginger beer but we add a few raisins in the bottles which sink to the bottom and once the raisins are raising you know its ready.
Is that with sugar as well?
Yes
@@Alieombaba
The raisin raisin😂
Wow i just learned why we add raisins thanks 😂
My ex husband did that too here in nz
just want to say i appericiate you using grams also ! makes everything much easier to follow
How long does the ginger bug keep? what is the best storage for later batches?
To the metric system! 🥂
Agreed, I just find it weird using it for liquids lol. What happened to deciliters.
@@flensoest Generally, we try to keep things simple.
Mililiters/Litres, Milimeters/Meters, Grams/Kilos.
In building, Meters are generally, only used very large amounts. I've seen many building drawings where every measurement is in milimeters, even up to 50,000mm
The point of metric is to keep it simple. Avoiding the fractions in imperial.
@@spacial2 i use the metric system so I get all that, I just don't get, or maybe not used to it in the making of alcohol, why they use grams when measuring water instead of, say decilitres. Oh well, thanks anyway :)
i have fond childhood memories of bottles of ginger beer exploding in our pantry when my mum & dad used to make it in the 70's
use a loose cork bottle
I've made a LOT of ginger beer. I highly recommend only using 2 Tbsp of ginger bug per gallon of water. Yes, that's right, 2 Tbsp. Anything more than this is unnecessary for carbonation, and will leave you with an overly-yeasty final product (IMO). As a result, you can also maintain a smaller volume of ginger bug.
Additionally, it is possible to have a ginger bug that's too sugary. If I notice my ginger bug becoming sluggish, I'll often adjust with more/less sugar, based on how it smells/tastes. Give it a taste in the evening! If it's overly sweet and fermentation seems dead, just feed it with some ginger only for a day or two.
When bottling, I find it helpful to bottle a single plastic water bottle, in addition to the other glass bottles. This "tester" bottle will make it easy to know when the batch is done. If it's rock hard, put them all in the fridge. No guess work! For me, this is 2-3 days with an active starter (and, yes, with only 2 Tbsp ginger bug / gallon of water).
Finally, try squeezing in a lemon and/or lime, and tossing in the peels after the boil is done. I don't always do it, but it adds a depth of flavor that is often refreshing.
Thanks for that man, I had never really played around with the amount of ginger bug I used, good to know I only need a couple TBS., I've gotten a couple 6gal. carboys to work with now, so it's great knowing I don't need a quart of ginger bug to start.
My ginger bug appears to be doing nothing any advice please
Ryan Nevius Do you make yours alcoholic? Could I put more sugar and ferment it longer to get a ginger beer that is alcoholic and a bit sweet?
Hi Ryan, I followed this recipe and I got almost zero carbonation. It tastes good, first bottle way to sugary, but second bottle really good. But got zero carbonation. What did i do wrong? can you help? Thank you
Pedro Miranda I didn’t have any carbonation either
Hey all, user report here:
I have been making this ginger beer weekly for about 6 months. I love it.
I have gone through a few ginger bugs and have since created a 'super-bug'. With this bug my ginger beer is ready in less than 24hours!
As Josh mentions, you need to feed your ginger bug daily whilst it is at room temp, and weekly once in the fridge. i found that the older the bug gets, the more culture it is producing (experiencing?), the faster the ginger beer is created.
I started a new bug and fed daily for 3-4weeks at room temperature. Replace 70-80% of the water every 5 days (approximately). I used it for many bacthes of delicious ginger fizz during this period. First batches were taking 5 days, and now as mentioned it is making sizzling soda in less than 24 hours.
I tend to keep my bottles close to a wall radiator which is on a low setting, or atop the fridge.
Also for about 3.5L of liquid I add only 3-4 tablespoons of sugar and I'd say this is about the minimum necessary for a tasty batch.
Other flavour options is to steep a herb into the tea once you have turned off the heat. Sometimes I like to use pine needles instead of lemon as a vitamin C boost and subtle flavour.
Thanks so much to you Josh Weissman for this recipe. It is a great gift and I will forever share this video.
P.S.
He's not joking about explosions. Burp your bottles or else you'll be cleaning the walls and ceiling...
My 8-day ginger bug has fewer bubbles, any advice
@@Coldestnig perhaps you can feed it more sugar or keep it a few degrees warmer.
To see if it is alive, replace most of the water with fresh water and feed it again. Then wait to see if there are bubbles in a day or so
When you say replace 70-80% of the water every 5 days.. Are you also removing the built up pieces of ginger?
@@andreagriffith6634 Yeah most of them. They can be used in a stir fry too
Hey, how alcoholic would you say this recipe is?
Discovered after failing the first time that much of the ginger grown in the United States is irradiated after harvest. Of course, this kills the yeast we're trying to cultivate. Made it the second time with organic ginger, and WHAM! :) Thanks, Joshua! Love your stuff!
Woazu
What good does this irradiation of the ginger serve? Seems excessive.
@@Coni2009 : I'm sure it's some sort of "safety" measure. Must protect ourselves, you know. *scoff*
Good thing you said that , i usually buy organic so now i know to buy organic ginger. Its annoying in the usa how we make buying organic harder and more expensive
@@Coni2009 It makes it inactive, so you can't grow your own ginger by buying ginger. They do the same thing with most veggies. They even spray our potatoes so you can't grow potatoes from bought potatoes
Tip, put a couple of sultanas or raisins in the bug to seed it with some yeast to get it started.
This formula is very good because he kept it simple.
Im a retired baker and all the very best recipes are always the basic simple ones.
I highly recommend this version over the convoluted ones.
Keep it simple, you can't beat success.
Always love the simple, usually better! Am making kombucha, apple cider vinegar and now ginger beer! All these seem straightforward, just patience and good ingredients. Now, to find ginger-strawberry soda recipe.... 😉
Can I make you a question? Can I use this liquid like the sourdough on my bread instead of using the sourdough or comercial yeast?
Gerard Jones Do you by any chance know the percentage of the alcohol in it?
@@mshari623 after 3-4 days it is still less than 2% alcohol by volume.
@@GonzaloD1812 no.
I started the bug 3 days ago and opened it this morning and it was fizzy!! Such a cool feeling to see it all working. Like a delicious science experiment
Mine got fizzy the second day
My bottle exploded :(
your bug exploded? you need to put the lid on lose so the CO2 can escape.
How do you know when it's fizzy?
@@harshbagadia8610 you'll see it fizzle on its own like a shaken soda. or try hitting the jar on the table, it should fizzle.
@@MatheusFerreira-mu6lu use a plastic bottle instead, the ones used for carbonated drinks. You will know when your ginger beer is ready, the bottle will become rock hard.
Bro, I totally tried this and my wife loved it, she is from St. Thomas VI, so you gave me much brownie points. Also, I created a citrus bug by using grapefruit peals. I was attempting to make an orange and grapefruit soda. IT TOTALLY WORKED!!! you are the man bro! thanks for being you!!
I'm super interested in your citrus bug. Recipe for orange soda?
@@ChristiDea OMG!! ME 2!
Oh yeah! Me too! Pls tell us
This sounds excellent! Thanks for the suggestion!
What's the recipe??? Super interested
Simple and direct. This is the best ginger beer recipe ever. I grew up on this stuff and I love playing around with it. IN the Caribbean we also add pineapple to the second ferment and you get a very lovely refreshing drink.
I want to make a pineapple "soda" with this and all I had was canned pineapple juice. Do you think that will work or would you recommend only using fresh juice? And is it okay to use the juice instead of water?
@@justpassingthrough. try it with the can pineapple, don't add the juice incase it has added vit c which might be too acid and kill the bugs. Add a bit of sugar to it too to give the bugs something to feed on. Add like half the amount of sugar to pineapple. Let me know what happens. Good luck.
There is a Mexican fermented pineapple drink called tepache made from the waste parts of the pineapple (skin and core) that is quite delicious. Lots of recipes on YT.🍍
Dude, flawless victory on this.
I just changed the normal sugar to brown and it added more depth, but the first two batches with normal sugar were also amazing. Thanks for sharing! :D
I was gonna try brown sugar, as well, hoping the molasses would deepen the flavor. Good to know I'm on the right track!
Does your tastes fizzy like the soda from a can?
Does it contain alcohol?
@@Wolf-xu1fj Probably, but such a little amount that it would be impossible to get drunk off of. think of it like kombucha
Brown sugar for the bug? The beer "tea?" Or both?
Awesome recipe, and as usual super well explained and entertaining. I would suggest to freely adjust the amount of ginger to your taste. For me 10% of the water weight is good, it depends how gingery you like it. Also, if you have a juicer, I’d juice the ginger first, reserve the ginger juice to add at the end, together with the lemons, so you don’t loose any of the ginger flavors and aromas, and cook the pulp to extract the remaining flavor from it. In my opinion, using fresh ginger juice makes the final result a bit richter.
gingerbrewing level: 99.
Quick Tip: I used a Chemex coffee glass jug for this and it makes feeding so easy - just dump the sugar and ginger in and swirl to dissolve each day - simple.
Amazing video. So direct. No bla bla and MEASUREMENTS.. and METRIC ONES!! 🎉❤❤❤ No wasted time! Thank you so much!!
My father used to make this when I was a boy in England of about 9yo or 10. ....I am now 73. He got the recipe from his grandmother. If you read Joshua's remark below about how to keep it alive you will see it is the same principle as keeping a sourdough yeast starter alive. We have made this stuff for many, many, generations. Sourdough, Ginger beer, wine, cheese they are all ancient crafts based on fermentation and passed down from generation to generation in the civilized world..... and.... as with Josh, even in America. And as he says at 1:00, "Because you know me....This is what I do. This how I be......Which I think is pretty dope....." Isn't he just the coolest guy? Be sure to freeze it at 1:03 to get the full effect.
I love how you included Josh and America in the civilized world! 🤣❤️❤️❤️
@@lindaedwards3377 I was feeling generous.
He's definitely the coolest guy!
Oh I absolutely love that you appreciate these simple things. It brings me joy to see anyone valuing this . Mt grandparents generation knew how to be. Such recipes are blessings
Does it contain alcohol?
If you have elderflowers growing around where you live (when they're in season obvs; here in the UK they're abundant when their time comes) you could try elderflower cordial or elderflower champagne, in case you've never done it before. (also, on a very serious note, you need your own food entry somewhere (bbc good food, food network and the lot); you are quite masterful at everything you dol
Ah, that's a great suggestion! I love that. Thank you for your kind words. I would love to do something like that. :)
Made elderflower in the past using a mash, then adding yeast. You want to make sure to get a good champagne yeast in order to make elderflower champagne. The carbonation will be amazing and the bubbles finely beaded! Give it a try!
All sorts of flavourings are possible but there is only one way of producing the alcohol, yeast and sugar.
@@NurText Would you have a elderflower champagne recipe please?
That's what I've just done! We're really obsessed with elderflower in Sweden in summer so you have to be quick before all of the good flowers are picked clean :) now we're working on ginger beer!
Third time's a charm! First batch didn't carbonate. I used the minimum amount of sugar you recommend. Good flavor just flat. Second batch I used the full amount of sugar and got a Pediococcus bloom. Did some research and found out it may be drinkable in three to six months. We'll see. Third time I used 1/2 cup of sugar and an older bug. I let the bug ferment for a about a week instead of three days. I let it ferment about fives days in the bottles. It got very fizzy! Success! It's fully carbonated and has great flavor. It reminds me of Verner's Ginger Ale, which I loved as kid growing up in Michigan. It's harder to find here in SW Missouri. So glad I learned how to make this! Thanks for sharing your recipe with us.
Yeah, Vernor’s was the best before it was bought out by Big Sodapop. It’s not made the same way today. I guess you’re too far out to get Vernor’s. We have it in Florida but that’s mainly because of all the Michiganders moving down here. Don’t bother looking for Vernor’s now though. You’ll be disappointed. Red Rock out of Atlanta is good. And surprisingly Aldi’s ginger beer is very good, but sweet. Much better than some designer brews that cost 3 times as much.
@@DanaSpencerFLA reed's ginger beer fresh thyme or trader joe's is real good
I used help make this with my mum when I was a kid 2 dozen bottles at a time, never had one explode (constantly burped them) but 24 bottles never lasted more than 2 days Lol.
One of the best memories of my childhood.
How much abv % ? Ginger beer
I just made an easy bread using the ginger bug as yeast, and it turned out amazing, highly recommended!
I know this comment is old but I’m super curious about how you did this!
Wow how did you make it? Did you use dry east?
Whaaaaa?! That sounds amazing.
Should be called gingerbread😅
You can also use plastic soda bottles. They are rated for over 6 Bar (100 psi), and if they do burst, no broken glass. Their caps are designed to vent when you loosen them, so less chance of a mess.
For home brewed beer, I used soda water or sparkling water bottles because they have no flavor from their original contents, but for this, I suppose old ginger ale bottles would be ok, too.
maybe you can help? when i daily add sugar and ginger to bug should i mix it well? (till sugar dissolves). or should i just put it in without mixing?
chemicals leach in plastic containers though.
@@tylersingleton7992
You probably inhale more chemicals with each breath than you would extract from the inside of a plastic bottle, particularly a used plastic bottle. The greatest rate of evaporation of volatile compounds from a plastic bottle occurs immediately after it is molded. In many cases the bottle is filled almost immediately. This means that the original contents will extract more than any subsequent contents.
Again, this is all speculative. I think that, even using sophisticated chromatography, it would be hard to find any trace of chemicals originating from the bottle in your ginger beer. More likely source of contamination would be the detergent you used in cleaning the bottles.
Ginger Brewers - Most sources of bottles, the ones with the wire structure like Josh uses, usually want about $4 per, even in lots of 6 or 12. Grolsch beer comes in such bottles, same hardware, altho, it must be stainless steel, as after a year's use, not a blemish on them, and come with good ceramic caps with standard silicone gaskets.
I can buy them 4 for $11 at my Beer Distributors, and, full of Grolsch beer, at that. It's a pretty tasty beer, so if Budweiser is your thing, you might want to give them to someone else to empty, but even if you pour the beer down the sink (don't you dare), at $2.25 rather than $4 or more, you're still saving money.
As well, those bottles have already proven they are of a quality sufficient to do the job, they are of an attractive dark green glass, and they have slightly impressed sides, opposite each other (and with a raised glass Grolsch up and down the side), all of which make for a secure handling of something that might be cold and wet. I highly recommend you consider them, next time you are in need.
great tip thanks
Ohh..great tip, though I think he's using bottles that are about a liter in size. I had bought ones that are about a liter in size at ikea for $3 each
Josh, thank you for the guidelines! I halved the sugar and it came out perfectly in between ginger ale and ginger beer. I used mature ginger for the whole process as I read there's higher potential for yeast colonization.
My next try I might use young ginger for the boil as the bite is quite strong. I love it but others may not as much.
Again, thank you. This opened my eyes to natural carbonated beverages!
Ginger beer is the best, and after years of my wife driving my drunk ass around for 20 years, I now drink Ginger beer at social events, let others drink, and I still have a great time sober with a ginger beer in my hand, and I drive everyone home safely. Can’t wait to try this at home here in Italy during lockdown 2020.
Simon Naylor you still alive
Kona Abhi Arrrgggghhhh......
@@simonnaylor3536 lol.. may the ginger bugs be ur side and keep u safe..
Good on you mate for making changes
So happy for you, keep going!
We used to make this when I was a kid and back then- I'm old- fresh ginger was unheard of, so my mum used dried ginger 'powder'. Worked exactly the same :) and, yes, they do explode if you leave them to long !!
I have been wondering about that! Now when we all like to avoid shopping but I do have dried ginger peels at home. And dried ginger like in a regular spice jar. Hm. Maybe I'll just try equal amounts of dried ginger and sugar
@@umeleijon9279 did you try it?
@@umeleijon9279 did you try it?
That’s what cooking and making things like this so awesome, it’s the experimenting that makes fun and being able to say ‘HECK YES this is badass’ or ‘oh 💩 WTF did I do’ it’s all about the experience.
Ooof I'm doing this
Update: it worked! Thanks man, I can't believe I made a carbonated drink SO easily. Used plastic soda bottles and they worked fine. I'll graduate to flip bottles when I find them near me and make other fruit drinks with the bug 😁
If you’re in the US, Dollar Tree has them.
A note for anyone attempting this. I followed the instructions as given about opening the glass bottle every 24 hours. Day one (aproximately 10 hours after putting the liquid in the glass bottles, I popped the 'cork' to relieve pressure. I did not see any pressure release as was kind of indicated in the video, where it overflowed. It was kind of disappointing. Day 2, I opened the glass bottle and received a very satisfying 'pop' that I was hoping for. 9 hours later, one of the two bottles I filled exploded. Glass and liquid went all across the room. I happened to be around at the time, so I quickly 'popped' the other botte, which caused that bottle to also shatter, only less dramatically. I'm not sure if there should be more pressure releases through out the day, but that was my experience. I'm not typing this to dissuade anyone from making the ginger beer, only to suggest that it might be better to pop the glasses more than every 24 hours.
This can happen especially if you’re using regular flip top bottles and not fermentation specific bottles.
Thanks for the insight!
oooh thank you for this, i will be burping them throughout the day from now on, i just bottled the liquid up yesterday, no pop yet so thank you again!
Did a couple of recipes already, everyone loves it.
Here in Brazil there's not even any ginger ale, so it's really unique.
no sul tem-se a gengibirra! =D
Ok this will be my first fermentation project, I love all things ginger
I followed instructions to the letter and this morning popped the top on some amazing Ginger Beer! Extremely delicious with a lovely light fizz. I had my doubts about adding the lemon, but it really is perfect. Thank you for a terrific experience!!!
What is your recipe please?
Hey Joshua! I am not currently following your recipes, but thanks for your detailed instructions! I'm an ESL teacher and using them for my students and that saved a lot of work for me! Thank you so much!
ESL. lol
"I'm a commie indoctrinator"
@@GoneGalt15 go back to your bunker, the real world doesn't need people like you.
@@GoneGalt15Congratz. That made zero sense.
This is still one of my all-time favourite recipes of yours. So easy and simple and so much cheaper than store-bought ginger beer. I leave mine to ferment for 2 weeks to ferment more of the sugar and get it more consistently carbonated.
Does the ginger beer contain alcohol?
@@Wolf-xu1fj no
@@Wolf-xu1fj it can if you ferment it...
@@Gabriel-nd7ehwhat do you mean by fermenting it ? Caus I’m in the process of making some but I would like to avoid having alcohol in it :)
@@Gabriel-nd7eharen’t we already fermenting it by following this recipe ?
I make a lot of homemade ginger. If you want to step up the spice, I’ve used as much as 1lb of ginger in a gallon of water. Boil it hard, and that both concentrates it, and also carmelizes the ginger a bit (for more spice.) and if you want to go REAL spicy, boil some peppercorns in there too!
Oh, my! I'd like to try a sip of that before making a batch. LOL
My guy
Might as well chuck in some curry powder
@@funtimes9196 in a clove and cinnamon drink, maybe!
@AndrewDMth does it make a difference the sugar you use, including for flavour? Thanks
I just made this for the first time and it was killer good! I only used the juice of one lemon and it was perfection! Blessings!
When you take a chance on the first video that comes up and it ends up being everything you need to know. Thank you! My 9yo son and I watched this yesterday and started our ginger bug last night. We are very excited! Also, thank you for bleeping out the expletive when it exploded ;)
With nearly 2M subscribers, 47K likes I don't think you need my two cents but I will give it anyway. You are probably half my age and here I sit being taught by you. No not about ginger beer, that as well, but being such a great presenter. You know anyone can make anything sound complicated, the so called clever people do it all the time, but your way of presenting make me want to get up and go and do it NOW, not later, NOW! That takes a lot of talent! Well done! You taught me more than making a great beer!
I live in the midwest and started my sugar bug in the dead of winter - household temp approx. 68 deg. My sugar bug was SUPER fizzy on the 6th day. Incorporated it into the ginger beer and filled the bottles. Even with the little bit of sugar bug starter there is some carbonation visible on the top layer of the ginger beer. If you live in a cold place just keep going. Joshua is in Texas, so it might just go faster there due to the heat
Just a suggestion to avoid exploding glass bottles, I swapped to 2 liter soda bottles for home brews. You can feel the bottle when it is firmed up. Rarely dose a plastic bottle blow shrapnel when they blow, the side generally begins to bow out, and the caps seal several times. Thanks for all your great videos
@@SunriseLAW And a lot cheaper/easier to get. I would just make sure it's the HARD RIGID plastic types and lids "for good measures".
BPA, & BPB are pretty bad for you though, i'll take exploding bottles over chemical leach any day
@@rickytorres9089Great idea! I don't drink soda so can you please tell me which ones are the more rigid plastic?
I love love Josh 💗 everything I need to know he covers everything from the bedroom to the kitchen he's the man.
This was the first time i have ever made anything like this, i got to say: this is the best drink that i have tasted ever i really enjoyed this drink and will continue to do so, not only myself but my wife, brother, sisters, and my son, to break it short the whole family really enjoy drinking it, we make a batch and enjoy each others company while drinking , your recipe is bar-none, thankyou brother . L 'chaim .
Hi,seems like your bottle didn't explode..what did you cover it with?
This is like a smoother, jazzier version of It's Alive with Brad. I like it.
I've made my own ginger beer by making demerara-ginger syrup and mixing a bit of that with some soda water, but I'm gonna take it a step further with this and see how it turns out. I love Moscow mules and I'm always looking for ways to step up my home cocktail game, so thanks for this.
Colin A Brad cracks me up.
Colin A do you by any chance know the percentage of alcohol in it?
Is there alcohol in this?
@@mshari623 Depends on how long you keep the ginger beer fermenting. See this video: ua-cam.com/video/Y4BENv0Y9DY/v-deo.html
@@balrog240 Yes, there is, but the amounts are small. ua-cam.com/video/Y4BENv0Y9DY/v-deo.html
I love ginger beer, I tend to keep a bottle or two around in case I have a stomach bug ( since my best solution for the flu was Canada Dry) and it really soothes the stomach
followed this recipe exactly like you asked and it turned out BEAUTIFULLY WELL thank you soo much. you're one of the chefs who I trust. wouldn't follow a recipe that takes a week worth of expectations if I didn't beleive for sure u wouldn't put out a fake recipe. thank you soo much
So good man. What about a trouble shooting episode for fermenting? Yeast vs mold on top, gear, hard things to ferment vs the good ole boys. Also, cured meats maybe?
Idk, I’m getting a beer..
Great info given in a concise way. I’ve been making ginger beer for 9 months or so and discovered that I no longer need to keep a ginger bug. Instead, I’ll use part of a soda from the last batch to inoculate the new one.
How long do your bottles sit around before you make a new batch?
chris hogan ....I was away for 2 months and used some left in the fridge to make a successful brew. Be careful, the fermentation continues under refrigeration. I had a couple bottles pop their tops while I was away.
Google YEAST and learn sonny.
Hi, how long is the beer valid for drinking after refrigoration? Could't find that info
That's very interesting.. like we do with Kombucha then..
What quantity do you need from the previous soda please?
Thanks again!!! ❤❤❤
So awesome! I use ginger regularly in cooking, and as a tea. It’s great to have another way to use it.
I added like 10x more ginger to the tea to get it to the proper amount for a nice “burn” - amazing! And mine was ready in only 2 days because my bug is super strong
Thank you for using the metric system, it's very much appreciated
easiest to understand after at least ten ginger beer recipes. thank you!!
Thank You! 1. I love Moscow mules 2. I love ginger 3. All the ginger beers I buy taste more like ginger syrup. I like the ginger spice not sugar so this is so perfect!
Do yourself a favor and never place those f*****ng flip cap bottles anywhere near a window or any other sort of glas. Once one bottle of my home made ginger beer exploded and the porcelain cap flew right into a glas door (the cap reached nearly light speed, since than my cats are traumatized). It was a safety door, first an interesting spider web unfolded, afterwards lots of shedding of cubic glas shards occurred, found some even months later. Most expensive ginger beer of all times. And yes, I opened the bottle once in a while. Must have been one highly aggressive ginger bug.. Sadly I am not allowed to brew ginger beer or root beer at home anymore and yes fermentation is cool. Try Japanese style pickled vegetables, fermented in rice bran, very adventurous too.
Fräulein Trude maybe you used low quality bottles?
Fräulein Trude 😂😂😂I have tears streaming down my face reading this. Thanks for the laughs and advice🤣😅 I hope your cats get better someday soon😺
YIKES !! Poor kitties!
I also had a glass explosion with tons of shards of glass all over, even though I was burping twice a day. I decided to add some of those burping caps. Brewing is canceled until then.
Omg 😯
So easy!! I will be getting started next weekend! Thank you joshua :) you are amazing for these video’s don’t you ever stop please
It’s 40C here in Australia so the brewing took no time at all...
...Also one bottle exploded haha whoops.
dad use to make it all the time and we lost a bottle in plain sight till it exploded kitchen smelt like ginger for days
You dont close airtight. U need oxygen but u also have to cover it. So using a cap or a lid and close it airtight would cause it to explode. So best way is to use a cloth to cover your beer.
@@rotondwa94 No, if you don't close it properly you'll lose all the carbonation, same as if you left soda out without a cap. You just need to burp it.
@@evelgreytarot8401 I'm not saying it shouldn't be closed. It should never be tightly closed. That's what im saying. Depending on the container I'm using or a bottlenim using.
@@evelgreytarot8401 I always use a cloth or a plastic and poke small holes on top.
I started doing this when I was a 14 year kid..
Worked well...
When I got older I started mixing it up in a 60 liter plastic drum.
Plastic bottles are a good thing to prevent glass bottles exploding..
Now im an old man and can't move around as I could from injury
So I buy it...
Nothing like a good Ginger buz .
Thanks for this! My absolute favorite cocktail is a huckleberry moscow mule made with fresh huckleberries of course, and now I can make it with real home made ginger beer as well! I CAN'T WAIT!!!!
For the people asking whether or not you have to peel the ginger: If you're not using an organically sourced ginger it's better to peel to reduce the chance of contamination via pesticides and other no-no's. However, I used organic ginger for my ginger bug, I even peeled it, and it became noticeably fizzy after 3 days. My ginger beer is now bottled and awaiting the final fermentation results.
How was it?
maybe you can help? when i daily add sugar and ginger to bug should i mix it well? (till sugar dissolves). or should i just put it in without mixing?
2:39 That pot will never fall apart. She’s a stately old lady, wearing her scars with pride. Lol
Just tried this. I tried a yeast one before and it didn't work out. I used 3/4 cup sugar for the mix. I made 2 liters with brown sugar and 2 liters with white. I did 3 days bottle ferment so far. I opened the white and man.. so good. I added a little ginger juice to the batches before bottled ferment too. I am letting the rest ferment another day or 2. I think I'll have to add some more white sugar to the brown sugar. Loving this endeavor. Thanks so much.
I started my ginger bug like 3 hours ago, and then opened youtube to see this piece recommended in my feed. What a coincidence 😆I intend to make ginger ale though 😉
They are listening
Alexa is your friend?.....
stee vo i don’t have one 😆
@@bmelinda1258 , me neither. Once I pulled up at a local sports store, looked at a few things, shoes mostly. left my phone in the car outside the store.
That night opened a browser on the computer, ads for sports shoes dominated.
Did my phone track I was parked outside a sports store, or did they have cameras in store that tracked me or? Coincidence?
Where's that tin foil hat!? lol
stee vo i was also looking up ginger bug in the browser....google is spying on us
A few things I've picked up over the years doing this. Do it in PLASTIC bottles, you can feel when they are fully carbonated (can't squeeze the bottle anymore), and a much lower risk of bottle bombs. Just an empty 2L soda bottle will do it (rated for the pressure already). You have a piece of glass lodge an inch into your drywall because you forgot to burp it and you'll go to plastic and never look back trust me....
Also, you don't need to keep the ginger bug going. Just use the last bit of a previous batch as the starter for the next. One less thing to keep track of and the culture is more reliable in my experience.
I had a dozen in glass quart beer bottles in beer fridge. Middle of night, we heard muffled gunshots in garage. I got ready to confront whoever/whatever. Everything was as it should be, then 3 booms from inside of fridge I standing beside. I about jumped out of my skin 🤣 I cautiously peeked in and quickly shut the door. Tomorrow, tomorrow I will deal with the glass and sticky mess.
I went with my plastic beer bottles since then. You can feel the pressure and if it blows, it is just a sticky mess. None have blown as I release high pressure as they still ferment (a lot slower rate than room temperature).
hi Joshua im a gastronomy student and i really enjoy watching your videos they are so relaxing and i learn a lot from them, sorry if i have mistakes on my english, greetings from mexico keep up the nice work dude!
Pretty solid English, buddy!
I’m making this tonight because of this video. My grandmother used to make this for my mum and my mum told me the story of exploding GB bottles in the caravan one year. She liked that I was going to try my hand at this.
I finished making this after 12 days of fermentation! it's lovely and delicious af
One thing... I got impatient and added dry active yeast about 12hours ago, and left it by my windowsill where I usually fermented them. One of my bottles exploded and shattered across the floor, because the yeast produced so much gas than my ginger bug did in a week.
It's super fizzy and the other bottle I managed to salvage and keep about 3/4 of the content, tastes great.
TLDR: don't be impatient, keep releasing gas every day and one it's ready keep it in the fridge.
How much is the alcohol percentage?
If you want more ginger bite, put ginger juice in when the boiled mixture had cooled. Heat breaks down gingerol.
as in, fresh juiced ginger?
damn i miss joshua's fermented recipes!
amen
"You know me. This is what I do, this is how I be"
Oh, I know. Which is what I love, which is why I'm here.
Going to try this tomorrow!
Great videos. Rapidly becoming my fav foodie channel. Freshest music selections that I also begin to follow. Keep it coming Joshua ✌️
Wanted to note on the skins vs no skins argument: it depends a lot on how you source your ginger. Some people have good luck with peeling their ginger first, others say to leave the skins on. In my experience it's much more important to use filtered or distilled water that has no chlorine or chlorinamide in it. Tap water's often a good way to either have it not work at all, or have it working for a day or two then die for no reason.
Hello I used boiled water to filter the water... it’s been 4 days now and it’s very gluely and no fizz... any tips ?
@@daisydcakes well, it could be your ginger or your water.
If you boiled it the chlorine problems would be handled, but it could be a problem if your water is super hard or overly softened. You could just get some distilled water from the store, and not have to worry about it, but odds are good if your water is palatable and boiled (then cooled) that water isn't your problem.
So maybe try a different source of ginger. Apparently some people have problems with irradiated (i.e. externally sterilized) produce at some stores, so just go someplace else I guess? Farm market if you can, otherwise just a different store.
Josh, you never stated that it’s the skin on the ginger that holds the wild yeast. I cut it all off and wasted days and ingredients to have to throw it away 😭
OH SHIT.
I actually ran frantically downstair to chop a new ginger with skins and throw them all in the jar together with the skinless ginger right after I typed that 😂😂
Nicken0o0 You got to be kidding me, I just bottled these fucking beers :) I literally wanna kill myself right know
@@Robless23 GO CHOP SOME SKINLESS GINGER RIGHT NOWWW
On day 3 it started getting some bubbles. On day four it stopped. And now I see it needs to have skin... Oh well, let's try to save it
Finally. I've been searching for ginger beers in the store, but I can't seem to find it no matter where I go to. Now I can't wait for make my own. Thanks man!
Getting ready to start my first batch. I LOVE ginger beer, so being able to make it at home is going to be awesome. Can't wait.
I don't understand who you said, but I understood the recipe. Thanks a lot guy! ❤
I've made this using your recipe, and boy does it taste delicious. I love the addition of lemon, it sure adds flavour to the beer. This beer makes your body warm through the day. My friends seems to love it too. I serve this beer to them whenever they come over. Ao thanks for sharing man.
Does it taste very fizzy? Mine turns out less fizzy. I don't know why. Maybe because I've burped it twice a day for 3 days? Help :")
@@natashaferichia you only need to burp it once a day
Does yours taste super fizzy like the soda from a can?
@@natashaferichia super. Sometimes my fermentation bottle explode when I forgot to burp them every couple of days
I wonder if at this stage (i think day 4 or 5). Can i still save my unfizzy ginger beer by locking it for 2 days and burp it after 2 days or so 🥲
Wanted to pop in and say, I really miss this content. Great work though chef, much respect
In Russia we preparing "KVAS", a similar drink, made of bread, malt and yeast.
О. Ильин i think you mean weast
@@b42thomas yeast?
@@adolthitler No it is yist
No, it is ist.
@@b42thomas , i mean yeast.))
I really needed a good video after that UA-cam rewind.....thx
You say that you use ginger bug instead of brewers or champagne yeast so that it can ferment. Ginger bug is just a way of catching and feeding natural yeast in the air and allowing them to multiply enough that you can use them to ferment the sugars. That is what creates the alcohol and co2 for carbonating. The wild yeast will be the same species (though different strains) as the brewers' (ale) yeast or champagne yeast. The biggest difference is that the commercial yeast packets will be all the same single strain of yeast and you won't have any bacteria (or not enough to matter). Bacteria can cause the gusher bottles you mentioned as well as contributing sour flavors to the beverage (which may be desired - that is how sour beers are made)
Using the commercial yeasts will leave you with a much higher alcohol content, with wild yeasts and the short carbonation period the alcohol content of this would be negligible.
Not really, I have used natural yeasts to make wine and cider and they were as strong (12-14%) as any I made with yeast packets. It's the amount of fermentation time that's the key. You do get "off" flavours with natural yeasts.
Wild yeasts are likely to give you more of the four and five carbon alcohols which will give you a fucking hangover.
Wild yeast=hangover!
For sure you don't want to "jack" ( freeze) any of these to increase the alcohol... too many methyls!
Just tried this & it's awesomely delicious! Thanks for sharing.
spoiler: the 3 ingredients are: (1) water, (2) sugar, (3) ginger and (3) lemon.
That's 4
😂
What bothers me is it would take 6-9 days to make just to be gone in a matter of minutes.
Welcome to the wonderful world of brewing
That's why I make big batches of my ginger bug, 64oz at a time. You only need a couple shots of the ginger bug to make a whole liter of soda. So it stretches
you can cheat the system coughadd tinybitofyeastcough
"This is what I do, this is how I be." Bruuuh that spoke to me
I was super annoyed at another white dude trying to "borrow" our vernacular to make himself cooler. Just so over it...
@@marsthatdamnrebel What?
I use the ginger bug with juices. Apple, apple and craberry, they are all marvelous!!!
Thumbs up for metrics
all we need now are ° Celsius aka temperature metrics...
America is going metric... inch by inch.
@@gerardjones7881 lmao
Owkey, I feel like I missed something. After using your bug, do you add the same amount of water as you took out?
yeah can you use it indefinitely like kombucha?
After ginger beer it’s finished for how long can I keep it in the fridge before it goes bad? Thank you?
It depends how you ferment it. If you do it this way probably not too long. A month or so. When you naturally ferment and don’t use an air lock you will absolutely get wild yeast and maybe some bacteria. However if you do it like home brewers do it with brewers yeast, an airlock, and proper sanitization you could have a very long shelf life. Just always keep it in a dark place or the fridge.
I forgot about a bottle I had brewed 6 months ago. I've taken it out of the fridge, opened it up. It was fizzy like a champagne. Have I kept it closed for a few more days, it would have exploded. I've drunk it and it was totally fine.
So you should be able to store it in the fridge for a minimum of 4-5 months, just remember to burp them at least once a month. :)
@@jiujitsu1129 This. Wild yeast ones can get an unpleasant sulfur flavor after a while.
I make 3 liters and my father drink it almos. Everything I must say it’s very refreshing and tasty
next is ginger beer made with sourdough starter
No.
@@stizan24 WHAT!???! HOW DARE YOU
maybe the other way around?
You can make very good ginger beer with the sweet whey drawn off yogurt culture. Although the ginger bug adds more intense ginger flavor.
I actually got mine started with my sourdough starter because it wasn't taking off with just ginger. Only used a tiny chunk barely bigger than a matchstick head, and it was very active the next day. I'm on my first time through and ending day 2 of the 2nd fermentation. I'm thinking it will turn out just fine! :) The ginger bug I inoculated with the sourdough starter tastes good.
Would it be possible to use something else other than sugar? Like honey, or beet sugar or palm sugar?
it needs to be fermentable sugar. honey is a bad idea as it is anti-microbial.
@@stepowillhaben7753... honey is absolutely fermentable. Google Mead. Antimicrobial generally means bacteria.
@@stepowillhaben7753 Honey on it's own isn't an environment where the yeast can survive, but if diluted properly it's a great option for feeding yeast.
Do I have to feed the ginger bug consistently like a sourdough starter to keep it alive and active? Or is there a more economical way to make ginger beer every now and then?
I keep mine in the fridge and feed it once a week, except I forget to do so.
I'm from Yorkshire (where this was invented) and we used to harvest ginger and pass round the bug from family to friends to neighbours for a while. In the end, we'd bottle it and split it. We added extra yeast and it ended up around 11 percent. It were lovely and very refreshing. I used to love the non alcohol stuff as a kid as that's what you get commercially.
Excuse me sir I am a proud Barbarian.
Also I demand a JW logo hoodie with “This is how I be” on it.
What do you do with the remaining ginger bug? Like how do you maintain it... Because ginger is much more expensive than flour is for sourdough starter.
I checked a couple other source and it seems to be agreed upon that you can refrigerate and feed once a week (Similar to a sourdough starter). From a quick skim of a thread I found, freezing is possible but rather complex due to the problematic forming of crystals that literally spear your bugs to death.
www.wildfermentationforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=2186
Replace the water and add suger and ginger like normal to keep your bug alive for next batch of beer
ShadowVipers just answered this for you and pinned to the top for others. Hope that helps! :)
@@JoshuaWeissman Somewhat yes, I suppose I should rephrase my question, I guess what I should be asking is does keeping the ginger bug have any advantages (aside from saving a few days of prep work) similar to sourdough starter the flavor becomes more developed as the starter ages. Because currently I don't have much money to throw at projects like these, so I'm just trying to weigh the pros and cons of just scraping the ginger bug and making a new batch every time I want to make ginger beer (which won't be very often).
I maintain my ginger bug at room temp with only brown sugar every few weeks or so. From what I've read, it is very forgiving once you get past the starting point (like in this video), and as long as you are feeding the yeast that's already in the bug, it should stay alive, and it seems to be true since mine has stayed alive for about 2 years now. It wouldn't hurt to add ginger every once in a while, though
When making beer cleaning is a big part of it, but noticed there was no mention of it with the bottles. They don't need to be scolded or disinfected right before use?
Yes
Defenetly good for my family on winter❤
hey Joshua! Thanks for this recipe! Question: can I grate a bunch of ginger, keep it frozen in a zip-lock bag and feed my ginger bug from there? I usually keep my ginger frozen in the freezer like this anyway, would be convenient if I could feed it like that, so I won't have to worry that my ginger will go bad. Wondering if it might affect its fermenting properties...
What to do with remaining ginger bug ? Should We feed sugar and ginger every 24hours ?
Check his pinned comment
put it in the refrigerator, and you just need to feed it each week
i'm here because i can't buy alchohol during the covid19 lockdown
19 !!!! I'm still indoors from Covid17
Have you tried honey or other sweeteners might work.
Me too. From South Africa 😁
Starting a 20 litre brew tomorrow. Lots of sugar and yeast with some added raisins. Hoping to get a brew of +-15%. Lekker!
@@jbisschj7992 have you start brewing
@@joslothee2800 Yes, last night 😁 , added some more sugar this afternoon. Hoping for the best.
I used to take bottles of half water, half apple juice to work. After a few days, they'd have fermented too. Good stuff.
I would love to see some more uses of ginger bug! I will be attempting making my own soon ☺️