So, you want to make ginger beer at home?
The good news, is that its easy, cheap and fun.
Sadly, it takes a bit of dedication and patience to start a plant.
There is not much to breeding a ginger beer organism from scratch, though its a lot easier to just get a sample of the yeast culture forma Friend already doing it if you can.
What you need for a ginger beer plant starter culture:
Ingredients:
- 6 good quality raisins or sultanas.
- 2 teaspoons of sugar
- 20ml of water
- One clean 700ml, wide mouthed glass jar with lid. (An italian passata tomato sauce jar is ideal)
- One spare glass jar (optional)
- 50 ml Vinegar
Method:
Cleanliness and the integrity of the yeast source is VERY important at this stage.
THe objective of this exercise is too culture a dominant strain of wild champagne yeast, derived from grape skins. There are a lot of wild yeasts in the environment, which wont produce such a pleasant flavour, and good hygiene should minimise the chance of raising the wrong organisms.
- Take your glass jar, and either fill it with boiling water, or stick it in the oven
- Do the same with the lid.
- The jar may crack under temperature, so be careful.
- Let stand for at least 5 minutes, then tip out the hot water.
- Pour vinegar in the jar, put on the lid, and shake.
- Tip out vinegar, and rinse jar with boiling water again.
- Put 2 teaspoons of sugar in the jar, dissolve sugar with some boiling water, let stand till like warm.
- Drop in 6 raisins or sultanas.
- Close the lid loosely
- Wait 5 days.
By this stage, the yeast in the grapes should have begun feeding on the sugar in the weakly sweet solution the raisins have been bathed in, and when opening the lid, the mix should smell “yeasty”
Finally, top up the jar 400ml of cool, sterile water that has been boiled recently.
To give your newly born ginger beer plant its first ever feed, tip in a tablespoon of dry powdered ginger, and a tablespoon of sugar to start the ginger beer making process.
You will need to feed your new pet this special diet of sugar and ginger for at least 5 days before harvesting to make your brew.
Over time, the amount of sediment and organism in the jar will build up quickly, indicating your new pet is growing up big and strong.