Sunday, February 26, 2012

Brew, brew, brew

Our experimentations in brewing continue! This week we've been drinking blackberry ginger soda. I saw a post on a brewing board that making fruit soda doesn't really need a recipe and I felt empowered.

The recipe sorta went like this: take frozen blackberries from freezer. Simmer in a pot with some water. Add some grated ginger and lemon juice. Dissolve 1/2 cup sugar. Cool. Strain into carboy and add cool water to make a gallon. Pitch yeast. Shake. Bottle. Wait 2-3 days. Drink!

The soda is really purple. It makes your teeth purple. Bill thinks it's too dry, but I think it's perfect. And yup - we totally drink it from awesome golden harvest drinking jars we got at Goodwill. I am not ashamed of my love of drinking from canning jars, even if it makes me a redneck.

Tonight we reracked our Altbier. It's been fermenting for 3 weeks and has some time to go still.


But now it's in a carboy rather than a plastic bucket - so we can look at it. AND...and...way better airlock. In the background you can see the previous airlock. That one is Very Uneventful. It bubbles boringly. The new one has much more exciting bubbling action.

Finally, Bill is brewing (?) mead. First step is to heat honey and water. Then, I guess he cools it and pitches the yeast and it sits in a carboy fermenting for, like, a year? I dunno. Mead does not interest me. Bill likes the sweet stuff (like me! (booo)) much more than I do.


2 comments:

  1. I was just thinking of that homemade sode we had at dinner with you after the Rhinebeck festival- What was that, Pineapple-Ginger? It was so good!

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  2. That soda is totally why I started making our own! I think it was "spicy pineapple." We thought the spice might be from ginger. It was pink, I think. Now that I've made two sodas with ginger, though, I am less convinced. We're using fresh ginger which is delightful and warm, but not spicy.

    I fully intend to experiment until I've figured it out, though. Cherry vanilla is up next, but after that I'm gonna try a pineapple ginger to see if it's close.

    That was totally the best soda ever. And a really lovely dinner with cool peeps!

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