Traditional Ginger Beer

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •500ml glass jam jar for the plant
• •Square of muslin and a rubber band
• •Fine sieve
• •Large jug or bowl, at least 4 litre capacity
• •Funnel
• •Six 500ml swing-top bottles

Instructions

1. 1

   Start the plant

   Find a clean glass jar that holds about 500ml. A jam jar is perfect. Pour in 280ml of warm water. It should feel like a comfortable bath, no hotter, because water that's too hot will kill the yeast before it's had a chance to do anything useful. Stir in the 2 teaspoons of ground ginger, 2 teaspoons of sugar, and the yeast. Cover the top with a square of muslin or a clean tea towel, held on with a rubber band. Not a lid. The plant needs to breathe. Set it somewhere out of direct sunlight, a cool corner of the kitchen counter where you'll see it and remember it.

   It will start to bubble and smell yeasty within a day, sometimes faster. If nothing is happening after 48 hours, your yeast was tired. Start again with a fresh sachet.
2. 2

   Feed it every morning

   For the next six days, feed the plant every morning with one teaspoon of ground ginger and one teaspoon of sugar. Give it a gentle stir with a clean spoon and put the cloth back on. That's the whole job. By day three or four you'll see a soft foam on top of the liquid and smell the sharp, yeasty, gingery perfume that tells you the plant is properly alive and working for you. It becomes a small daily ritual, the sort of thing you do before the kettle has boiled.

   Never seal the jar with a metal lid. The plant is making gas, and pressure in a sealed jar is a problem you do not want to come home to.
3. 3

   Strain the plant

   On the seventh or eighth day, when the plant is actively foaming and smells sharp and strong, it's time. Line a fine sieve with a double layer of muslin and set it over a large jug. Pour the plant through slowly, letting all the liquid drain. The wet sediment left in the cloth is the yeast and ginger that have done the work. You can split it in two and start fresh plants with each half (that's how this tradition has travelled for a hundred years), or just discard it. The liquid in the jug is what you want.

4. 4

   Dissolve the sugar

   In a large heatproof bowl or a clean pan, pour the 1 litre of just-boiled water over the 500g of caster sugar. Stir until every grain has dissolved. The water will go completely glassy and clear, almost slippery. Add the 2.25 litres of cold water and the juice of the two lemons. Stir it through.

5. 5

   Combine and check the temperature

   The mixture needs to be at blood temperature before the plant liquid goes in. Dip a clean finger. It should feel neither hot nor cold, as though you're touching nothing at all. Too hot and you'll kill the yeast and nothing will happen in the bottles. If in doubt, wait a bit longer. When it feels right, pour in the strained plant liquid and stir it through gently.

6. 6

   Bottle it

   Using a funnel, decant the ginger beer into swing-top bottles, leaving a good inch of headspace at the top of each one. Seal the flip-tops closed. Write the date on each bottle with a piece of tape, because you will absolutely not remember otherwise. I've made that mistake more times than I'd like to admit.

   Swing-top bottles designed for home brewing are the only sensible choice. Reused squash bottles and old wine bottles are not built for pressure. This matters.
7. 7

   Second ferment, then chill

   Leave the sealed bottles in a cool, dark place for two to four days. This is when the ginger beer builds its fizz. Check each bottle once a day by easing the flip-top open just enough to hear a soft hiss, then closing it again. A gentle hiss on day two is good. A sharp, violent hiss means it's going faster than you expected and needs to move to the fridge immediately. Once the bottles are properly carbonated, refrigerate them all. The cold slows the ferment down to almost nothing and holds the drink where you want it. Serve over ice with a slice of lemon, outside if the weather is doing its job.

   Always open a bottle for the first time over the sink, pointed away from your face. A lively ginger beer will teach you a lesson you'll remember for years.

Chef Tips

• •Use ground ginger for the plant itself, not fresh. I know fresh ginger feels like the instinctive choice, and you can add a bit of grated fresh ginger to the finishing syrup if you want more heat, but the plant is traditionally fed on ground ginger and it ferments more reliably that way. Trust the tradition on this one.
• •The bottles matter more than the ingredients. Swing-top bottles built for home brewing are the only sensible option. Old squash bottles and reused wine bottles are not designed to hold pressure and can fail in ways you do not want to be near. Buy proper bottles once and use them forever.
• •Taste the mixture just before bottling. It should be sweet, sharp with lemon, and hot with ginger, a little sweeter than you'd want the finished drink, because the yeast will eat some of the sugar in the second ferment. If it tastes perfectly sweet now, it'll be thin by the time it's fizzy.
• •A slice of lemon in the glass isn't decoration. It lifts the whole thing. And if you have any good mint in the garden, a sprig of that goes on top and suddenly you're drinking something you'd pay a lot for in a nice pub.

Advance Preparation

• •The ginger beer plant needs seven days of daily feeding before it's ready to strain. Start on a Saturday and it'll be ready by the following Saturday.
• •After bottling, the second ferment takes two to four days at room temperature. Build this into your timing if you're making it for a specific occasion.
• •Once refrigerated, the ginger beer keeps for up to two weeks, though it's at its best in the first seven days when the fizz is lively and the ginger hasn't started to soften.
• •The plant sediment left in the muslin can be split and used to start two new plants. This is how the tradition gets passed along. If you've made a plant you like, you can keep it going almost indefinitely by feeding half and brewing with the other half.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 500g)