We have had an epiphany. And it’s called homemade ginger ale. You have to try this.
We’ve made a version of this before using homemade ginger syrup, but this is a whole different ball game. This recipe from Crumpets and Cakes has you combine grated ginger, sugar, lemon juice, water, and a pinch of baker’s yeast in a 2-liter bottle. That little bit of yeast is all that’s needed to get this concoction nicely fizzy. After a few days, it’s ready to be sipped.
And oh what a sip it is! The flavors of the ginger and citrus are bright and refreshing, but also pleasantly soft. We’ve had some ginger beers that are so spicy they make our eyes water, but this soda just has a nice prickle of gingery heat toward the end. The carbonation also gives the beverage just the right touch of sparkle. So good.
One word of caution: open your bottle over the sink in case of carbonation explosion! Ours bubbled and sputtered for several minutes before finally calming down (see image above). Next time, we’ll try a touch less yeast and see if that helps.
Next time, we’ll also try this with less sugar. It wasn’t overly sugary, but we personally prefer a less-sweet beverage. We might also try a sugar substitute like stevia, but since the yeast needs some kind of sugar to do it’s carbonation job, we’re not sure how a substitute would work.
This method also has a lot of potential for other soda flavors. We really had no idea it was this easy to make sodas at home. What if we juiced some summer fruit and used that in place of the ginger? Or skipped the ginger and made sparkling lemonade or limeade? We’re so excited to try!
In the meantime, definitely head over to Crumpets and Cakes and give this ginger ale a try:
• Homemade Ginger Ale - Two Ways from Crumpets and Cakes
Do you make soda at home? Any advice?
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(Images: Emma Christensen)
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This looks awesome. Yum!
That's ginger beer, that is. :-)
What sort of sterilization would I have to do on the glassware if I wanted to try this? I don't qant to poison anyone :).
I recently posted my own recipe for a darker, spicier homebrewed ginger ale --- like ginger beer, really, though it's made with yeast, not ginger beer plant. I used 1/8th tsp of yeast, and I suspect I could get away with less.
fi_burke, I sterilized my bottles with vodka (as noted in the linked recipe).
Note: David B. Fankhauser, Ph.D. strongly warns against the use of glass bottles for this kind of homebrew, and I agree --- at least for dilettantes like me. This stuff builds up pressure fast, and glass bottles may explode. Plastic bottles have a little give, so --- bonus! --- you can squeeze 'em to see when they're ready to chill and enjoy.
Oops, the links to Dr. F should be this.
Mmm. This sounds like a great way to use up leftover ginger. I do like my ginger ale super spicy though. Might need to experiment with a few recipes.
I recently made homemade ginger pop but made a natural starter without yeast: http://www.apronstrings.ca/2010/05/homemade-ginger-pop/
So cool!
There was an episode of Food Jammers about this...they started out with this method and tried lots of combos like fresh fruit juices and herbs, but used glass bottles so everything exploded. Not sure if that was just for dramatic effect or what, but they eventually switched to using a CO2 tank instead of trying plastic. The basic idea, though, was that it could be done with flavors other than ginger, and with less sugar in some flavors as well.
Personally I'd love to figure out how to do it with some combination of fruit juice and stevia, as that's what I usually mix seltzer with. Unfortunately it doesn't look like any of the recipes are online and it's not airing again until late September! But here's the episode link:
http://www.cookingchanneltv.com/food-jammers/go-for-soda/index.html
@Elsa, thanks for that link! I might have to try this.
I favorited this DIY Soda video forever ago and still haven't come around to giving it a try. I really want to do this ginger ale too!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQldb1497Yw&playnext=1&videos=_mDUxa83K_A
My only problem is the complete lack of plastic soda sized bottles.
I would love to try this, and am thinking it would work well with some wine making equipment (which i have), instead of the soda bottles (which i don't have). I'm just worried that too much of my fizzies will dissipate if i use fermentation traps. Anyone tried this method?
For those of us who strain our own yogurt, whey is also a terrific starter to lacto-ferment ginger beer. Beyond the probiotic benefit, the whey also adds a slight tang that freshens up the ginger beer.
I use ginger beer plant or water kefir grains for a proper old fashioned ginger ale.
I'm not a fan of the yeasty flavor and aroma from yeast fermented soda recipes and all the carbonation flares up at the front end leaving you with a relatively flat soda when you're actually drinking it. The GBP and WKG allow the flavor of the soda to shine through with the "ferment-y" flavor way in the background. And it stays very nicely fizzy all the way to the very last sip. Plus it never explodes glass bottles and is also probiotic.
@fi_burke you'll want to use a Tbsp of non-chlorinated cleanser (Oxi-clean) and hot water to clean your bottles. Soaps, chlorine and the like will leave off-putting flavors &/or affect your yeast.
I've made ginger beer with both bread yeast an champagne yeast and I gotta say I'd hunt down the latter as the flavor is cleaner and the carbonation is better.
@JungMann I'm so trying that!
Man, I could go for a Dark and Stormy about now...
Is baker's yeast the same thing as Fleishman's?
@inblackink-yes, Fleishman's is baker's yeast (the kind that raises bread) as opposed to nutritional yeast (used for flavour).
And, I'm making a batch right now as it turns out.
I tried this with a friend when we were nine.
It turned out as moonshine instead of ginger ale.
I can't wait to have a try at this, too!
@llf - thank you!
Thanks everyone for the tips! I am definitey trying this!
So I have a bottle of ginger ale that is in day one of fermentation and I have a rather dumb question...
Is the alcohol in the finished product negligible? Am I going to get buzzed? Is it okay for kids to try?
Thoughts?
Goldfixe - I believe the alcohol is very negligible. The Fankhauser article (linked to in Elsa's comment above) says that the ABV is about 0.4% and most beers are around 5.0%. You'd have to drink quite a lot of ginger ale to get at all buzzed! Personally, I didn't feel anything after drinking a normal-sized glass.
Goldfixe - I ferment my ginger beer anywhere from 2 - 4 weeks and have never gotten tipsy from it. At least not until I add the dark rum.
I've made this and then combined it with a scoop of homemade pineapple sorbet for refreshing pineapple ginger floats!
[update: I notice that people clicking through my link above are getting a 404 page, so here's an updated link to my ginger beer recipe. Sorry for the inconvenience!]
I've recently given up diet pop but miss ginger ale so very much. I've made a few different versions but this way intrigues me. Could be the best yet!