Hi guys, I'm brewing a Saison with Rye and Ginger, and I'm a little wary about my ginger quantity. Was planning to put dried ginger in the boil @5 min. I have 2oz. available (which is what the recipe I researched called for) but that seems a bit much to me. To get a noticeable but not overpowering ginger flavor, what is a good amount to use? My plan was to throw 1 oz. and hold back an oz. steeped in vodka to flavor to taste at bottling. Thoughts?
How about fresh ginger in the mash? That's worked for me in combination with some fresh ginger in the kettle at knock out. To more directly answer your question, the heat of the boil should 'soften' the ginger spice, so saving some for the secondary will give you a bit more bite. If that's what you want, great - if not add it all to the boil. Maybe you should just add all 2 oz. at whirlpool? And you shouldn't need the vodka (powdered ginger shouldn't have any bacterial issues), but get it in well prior to bottling so it gets infused - unless you're planning to mix it in bit by bit and taste test as you go.
I've never added ginger to a beer, but 2 ounces sounds like a LOT of ginger to me. Of course it depends a little on how big your batch is, but anyway my initial reaction is, go much lighter with your initial addition. By the way, if you decide to use fresh ginger, be a little careful. I made ginger ice cream a few months ago, and the recipe called for me to blanch the ginger. Apparently there's an enzyme in there that can interfere with milk proteins (I don't know exactly what it does, but something that might negatively affect the ice cream). I have no idea if the enzyme might have any negative effects on beer, but it's something to look into before you add fresh ginger. If you add fresh ginger to the boil, on the other hand, I'm sure the enzyme is destroyed very quickly.
I have only used fresh ginger before, in the beginning of my brewing. I attempted to make a ginger beer, actually I attempted it twice. The first did not have enough ginger flavor and the second was overpowering. My recollection was there was very little difference between the beers in the amount of ginger used. Moral of the story, be careful with ginger You might want to google for ginger beer recipes just to get an idea of amounts used.
I've added 1oz crystallized ginger at flameout as a whirlpool in a couple of rye IPAs and didn't think that was very overpowering. If I was looking for a noticeably detectable ginger flavor, and was using crystallized, I'd go either 1.5 or the full 2 oz as recommended.
I add 1.7 lbs of fresh ginger sliced into small pieces (not tiny) to 34 gallons of 6 % pale ale in the fermenter. After trub, thats about 31 gallons. The ginger character is definitely present, but not to the level where the spiciness reduces the palatability of the beer. This will not scale well to a 5 gallon system, much like dry hopping rates don't. My suggestion would be to start at about a quarter of that rate (1 oz per 5 gallons) toward the end of fermentation (similar to a dry hopping technique). Then I would take a sample in 1 day to determine if you would like to add more or not. Ginger flavor is extracted rapidly. Repeat until desired level of ginger character is reached. Edit: After trying both kettle and fermenter additions, the fermenter additions produce a stronger aroma, which I prefer.
I like the idea of a few quarter sized sliced of fresh ginger in the last few minutes of the boil. The side of a spoon is really handy for skinning the stuff.
Do you need to skin the "bark" for the boil? I make an Asian chicken soup that I just slice chunks of ginger into when making the stock and never worried about peeling, it seems to not add any off flavors. Could be different for beer, though.
I honestly don't know. I wouldn't risk it and it would only take a minute. I'm going to try to eat some of the bark next time I buy ginger though.
