Pro-Soup Propaganda

Brewing Ginger Beer!

On Wednesday I started brewing my first batch of ginger beer! It was finally ready to start brewing after I had gone through two rounds of feeding the ginger beer plant to strengthen it after not being fed for a week and a half of shipping from Great Britain.

This is what the ginger beer plant looked like in the bottom of the jar it's been living in, feeding for the past couple of weeks. The SCOBY looks like large chunks of tapioca.

I started with my big two liter jar of water and added 1/4 cup of lemon juice to it, followed by 16 tablespoons of organic sugar. Ginger beer plant likes sugar!

I boiled my chunk of ginger for a few minutes to clean the outside a bit. I then tossed the whole chunk in my Vitamix, which I was using for the first time. It pureed that ginger like it ain't no thang! It smelled awesome.

I poured my ginger slurry through cheesecloth to strain the juice out. It was pretty gingery smelling! I could have done less ginger for a less bitey brew, but why would I want to do that? ;o)

I then poured the ginger juice in my jar and added a little over a tablespoon of ginger beer plant. It's now been sitting for a few days and either tomorrow or Monday I will pour the ginger beer into Mason jars for it to start carbonating. Four or five days later I should have fizzy, alcoholic ginger beer! Crossing fingers it actually works!