How to make fiery ginger beer

(it's hot stuff - don't say I didn't warn you!)

Ginger beer brings exciting memories for me. Carelessly-opened bottles of home made ginger beer erupting all over (and then dripping from) the ceiling. Bottles of supermarket bought “Old Jamaica Fiery Ginger beer” on the table at birthdays and special occasions.

Much later when I had my own children I started brewing my own based off an old newspaper clipping. After half a dozen iterations, this is the recipe:

• 420g ginger root, blended

• 2 teaspoon ground ginger

• juice of two lemons

• zest of two lemons

• 8 cloves

• 2 cups Demerara sugar (I recommend using a light sugar solely for aesthetic reasons)

• 2 teaspoons bread yeast

Quick warning - this is a tongue-tingling, throat-burning ginger beer. If you prefer yours somewhat milder, reduce the quantity of root ginger.

Add everything except the yeast to a large pot then fill with 4 litres boiling water. Boil the mixture for an hour. It’ll probably evaporate about a litre of liquid. At this point add sufficient cold water to match the total volume of your bottles - to fill five 1L bottles, you’ll need to add one litre of water.

Once liquid has cooled to a lukewarm temperature add the yeast. I like to scatter it over the surface of the liquid - if the conditions are right, the particles will first expand and then start falling to the bottom.

After the yeast has started multiplying the beer can be bottled. My favourite are 1L glass swing-top bottles. Place a funnel and a sieve in the mouth of a bottle and use a ladle to pour the beer in.

While the ginger beer is brewing the yeast consumes the sugar and produces alcohol and bubbles of carbon dioxide as by-products. If pressure is not released in some way the bottles may explode. Once bottled, gently open the tops of the bottles perhaps twice a day to prevent this from occurring. This is what I do, and I’ve never had a bottle explode yet.

Let the beer brew for a few days before drinking. Cooling in the fridge will slow the brewing and makes for a very refreshing drink on a hot summer’s day.

Cheers!

Notes:

• Open pressurised bottles slowly. Opening a swing-top bottle too quickly can cause the entire lid and wire hinge to blow off.

• Although the recipe calls for “420 grams ginger root”, I actually use two whole roots which usually have a combined weight of between 400 to 500 grams.

• Don’t add whole lemons! Lemon pith is very bitter and the resulting beer is undrinkable.

• Using dark sugar like muscovado will result in a rather dark and unpleasant looking liquid.