It's a hot summer afternoon. I'm sitting down on a hot afternoon, with a burger, and a cold beer. What I'm looking for is something to replace…

It’s a hot summer afternoon. I’m sitting down on a hot afternoon, with a burger, and a cold beer.

What I’m looking for is something to replace that cold beer with. I want it to be crisp and fresh, but also not sweet. I love tart and bitter flavours. Unfortunately, my options are either cold and sweet, cold and alcoholic or hot and non sweet.

So threadiverse, what alternatives am I missing?

Tereré is great, but it’s a bit of a pain to source in Australia. What else is there?

  • RBWells@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    2 days ago

    The best starter for ginger beer is “ginger bug”

    Start with 2 big spoonfuls each of (grated) ginger and sugar in 2 cups of water. Stir it twice daily and feed it once a day, alternating

    Day 1, spoonful of sugar

    Day 2, spoonful of sugar and spoonful of grated ginger.

    Here it gets active in a couple of days but better to keep feeding and stirring for a week. Use a cup of the liquid to ferment a gallon of ginger beer and save another cup tightly covered in a refrigerator to start your next batch, so it will go faster.

    You can make it with yeast but it doesn’t taste as good and is fussier.

      • RBWells@lemmy.world
        2·
        1 day ago

        Oh, a note - in the US I have to use organic ginger for ginger beer, all the rest of it must have been irradiated or had some hotshot anti-everything spray because only organic ferments.

        Not for any other ferment I make is this true, only ginger. Tepache, fruit kvass, sourdough, I use conventionally grown stuff. I’m not sure this holds true everywhere but if it doesn’t work, get organic ginger.