Kick in the @$$ ginger flavour

I'm trying to design a recipe to replicate the ginger beers you encounter in the Jamaica; only I'm looking to make an alcoholic one. These 'beers' (really sodas) tend to be cloudy, and have a real ginger kick to them - i.e. it burns a little while it goes down.

I've been reading through the many ginger beer recipes on the forum, and have not yet seen anyone who has claimed to achieve this. A few have said theirs was 'too strong'; but I don't know if that's an overpowering kick-in-the-pants, or if they were going for a subtle ginger flavour and overshot.

So my question: can anyone recommend an addition schedule/quantities to get the strong ginger kick I want? I suspect I need both flavour and aroma-like additions (30min, 15min, 5min?), but am unsure of amounts/timings/etc.

Any advice is appreciated.

Bryan

Ive made ginger amber ale before, layered ginger additions throughout the boil (60, 30, 15, and 0 +dh i believe). I got a really nice ginger flavor from this, but didnt really get any ginger heat. Im definitely interested in if you can achieve this, im a huge ginger beer fan!
One thing that i found is really important is to chop the ginger in large chunks. I grated it the first time i tried it, and the ginger flavor was definitely lacking.

That's odd - I'd have predicted that finer = more flavour extraction = stronger ginger flavour!

Maybe the heat/flavour in ginger is really volatile? Perhaps a large dosing near the end of the boil would work?

Hopefully someone knows the answer...

B

I added a little ginger to an amber beer, and it only took a tiny bit to completely overwhelm any other beer flavors. Like less than a tsp after flameout. I love ginger ale, but really disliked this.

And I wouldn't boil it. No reason. Just add it after flameout.

Yellow,

Was the ginger too strong, or was it a clash with the hops/etc?

Bryan

I make ginger tea and ginger candy from the ginger i use in the tea. I basically chop up a ginger root and boil it in a couple of cups of water. The resulting extract i then dilute with water and add honey/lemon to calm down the ginger fire taste. You might be able to make an extract like that and then add it in a secondary fermenter. Maybe split the batch into small aliquots and do an experiment to see how much you need.

So after posting this, I may have found an answer...of sorts. In this thread a guy used 40oz! Sounds like a lot, but in reading further its apparent that the later the ginger addition the stronger the heat. No one seems to have balanced it yet to get heat without it being overpowering, but I'm thinking about:
2oz @ 60, 30, & 15min
4oz @ 2min
4oz "dry hopped"

I've got a week to work this out, but at least I've got a starting point...staring to think I should scale back to 3gal though...

EDIT: 5oBrewing posted while I wrote this. That is not a bad idea...

Bryan

I made a ginger ale recently but it was a real ginger ale, not a ginger spiced beer. For a 1 gallon batch I used just the juice of 1 lemon, 2 lbs of grated ginger and 1 lb sugar.

Boiled all that together for 30 mins and the into the fermenter with fresh bakers yeast. Result - a dry and fiery ginger ale at about 6% abv. Very nice stuff.

Warthaug said:

Yellow,

Was the ginger too strong, or was it a clash with the hops/etc?

Bryan

Click to expand...

The problem with using only 1 tsp is that the ginger isn't strong enough to taste like ginger ale; instead, you just have a beer that has a really strange ginger flavor getting in the way of your beer. Even at 1 tsp, it overpowers everything. There's a Sam Adams beer that uses ginger that will give you a very good idea of what 1 tsp at flameout tastes like.

But honestly, I drink homemade ginger soda quite often, so I do love ginger. (FYI: boil some chopped ginger with sugar, truvia, and lactic acid, then store in a refrigerated jar. Serve with sparkling water.)

I can see how you'd need 2+ lbs to get the ginger heat.

BadMrFrosty said:

I made a ginger ale recently but it was a real ginger ale, not a ginger spiced beer. For a 1 gallon batch I used just the juice of 1 lemon, 2 lbs of grated ginger and 1 lb sugar.

Boiled all that together for 30 mins and the into the fermenter with fresh bakers yeast. Result - a dry and fiery ginger ale at about 6% abv. Very nice stuff.

Click to expand...

WOW - 2 lbs for 1 gallon! Did you bottle or force carb? I'm too lazy to bottle, but wondering if my kegerator's standard 10-12 psi would be enough for a ginger ale.

I use 2lbs of thin sliced fresh ginger root in a 5 gallon batch for my Ginger Amber Ale.

It gives the beer a great, strong ginger flavor. Ambers are fairly bland to begin with, so it's a good base beer to build from.

You're going to get a lot more astringency and heat from using powdered dry ginger than from fresh.

SpeedYellow said:

WOW - 2 lbs for 1 gallon! Did you bottle or force carb? I'm too lazy to bottle, but wondering if my kegerator's standard 10-12 psi would be enough for a ginger ale.

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I (mini) kegged but naturally carbonated, don't see why you couldn't force carb though. Forgot to mention, I also ferment on the ginger mass for extra gingery goodness.

I used 3 oz (in a 5 gallon batch) of peeled, sliced ginger root in an American style pale ale. It went in @15, then I added a little lemon zest at flameout. The grain bill was 2-row, a little wheat, and a little 40L. I think there was mostly cascade, amarillo, and citra, with a focus on the citra and amarillo. To be honest, most of the hops were pretty muted by the ginger. The aroma and flavor were both very gingery, and I had several compliments from both casual beer drinkers and professional brewers on it. There is definitely some ginger heat to the beer, but it's still quite drinkable. I think it came in at 5.9% abv.
I would say that you want a late addition, otherwise you won't capture those fragrant and spicy qualities of ginger. A long boil time on your ginger is going to give you subdued flavor and aroma, but bitterness, just like hops. 15 minutes felt like be happy middle ground for me. I'll be making my ginger pale ale the same way next time, but with all citra.

Good luck!