Making Ginger Beer

ginger beer started bubbling on a heating pad on the kitchen counter..it has a muslin/washable coffee filter rubberbanded over the top to keep insects and kitties out; began March 27th

Nourishing and cheap to produce in my own home. Those are two things I like best when it comes to food in my kitchen, inexpensive and nourishing. With growing children and a man in survival mode from cancer treatment and a mama that is, uh, holding on to middle age to care for all of them and for herself at the same time, I love these old folk remedies, tonics, etc. I have ventured into making kombucha tea and kefir and have found a nice website (linked for you right back there in this sentence on "kombucha" and "kefir") with not only what you need to get started, again very affordably so, but with information and links as to why you need to consume these things as well as videos ( I love it when you show me, not just tell me, right?!) on how to make these concoctions. I have watched several of these videos and I would agree with how she is doing things here and like how she shows you how really easy this is to produce these things. But for now, I seem to be interested in making Ginger Beer. What is ginger beer? See this link for a general history of ginger brew. This morning, I was wondering, just what is the alcohol content since I do plan to serve to my young children....upon reading, uh-oh...well, it can possibly be as high as 11% which is as high as beer or wine. That can happen the longer you ferment it. The longer the ferment time, the more alcohol you will get. Opppss....well, we shall see just how much fermentation I am able to get with my brew...I will try it out on my husband and I first for sure. I did serve my children kombucha tea in small amounts on hot summer days and do not recall being concerned with alcohol content then....hummmm...I guess that we did not drink more than 8oz or 16oz per adult per day and maybe 4 to 6 oz. or less for the children and at the time, T was too tiny anyway to drink it or drink more than a taste anyway. Overall, the good bacteria consumption is key, the alcohol is likely low, see this article here under "A Little Goes A Long Way", and that is the goal for us all, to get the good things in our gut and stop supplementing with very expensive probiotic supplements. To keep my family of five in regular probiotic supplements can be around $30 per month whereas with kombucha tea, kefir water, ginger beer...it is a fraction of it and I daresay, much more natural and therefore more "alive" and truly useful to the body. We are at home anyway and can use the capsule or powdered supplements when away from home. I will report my findings on making of this new brew, new to our family anyway. Today is day 8 of making the "bug" to start the actual batch to ferment a drinkable brew. I am keeping the warm temperature steady by placing my jar on a heating pad on low temp right on the kitchen counter. This is not difficult ya'll and it is not dangerous. I read recently that when making your own fermented anything at home, ginger beer, kefir, vegetables, etc., if it is ruined and toxic, you will not only not be able to eat/drink it but the smell with toss you backwards. Carefully prepared and, using good directions, see this advice as well at the above linked how to videos, these fermented foods/drinks have been traditionally used, read this, and thought to be vitally nourishing for the body. As a sidebar, did you happen to notice in the photos of the native people in shelters following the tsunami in Japan, they were eating fermented vegetables. Normal everyday food for them that is beneficial. I noticed it! By the way, if you are reading this and you have found a good source for buying flip top, rated for fermentation, quart size bottles...please advise!

Happy home brew ya'll! Go ahead, try it!