Fermented Soda?

[DigitalBlacksmith]

I am a casual brewer, I make a decent creme soda and I stay away from "all grain". So pretty simple guy.
I have been toying around with the idea of a fermented soda for a few months now and with summer around the corner I was wanting some experienced help here.
What yeast and sugars could be used? I was thinking a Champaign yeast with cane sugars and some lactose for feel. The idea is that this would be a base batch that someone could flavor like old style soda fountains.

Any thoughts?

 

[sinkaidas]

interesting.

bump..

 

[DigitalBlacksmith]

So I am certain this has to have been done before, perhaps it goes by a name or something? Of course I will need some yeast nutrients and some other items but I would love some resources.
The end product should be a clean citrus with highlights of vanilla and fruit. I would be up for using hops for dry hopping such as citrus hops or something light in order to get a fruity or flowery feel.

 

[DigitalBlacksmith]

Ok even if you havent done this or heard of it. What suggestions do you advanced brewers have out there for compensating for the lack of grain? I imagine I will use the same ingredients as a mead. Suggestinons for a yeast strain?

 

[Raenon]

You'd probably want to look at some of the recipes for both hard root beer (sometimes referred to as "Root beer beer/ale" (as if one ignores the first occurrence of beer simply because it often refers to a soft drink without malt...) and especially to "Skeeter Pee" (as it's essentially a hard lemonade, and the need for nutrients and solutions is well documented)
Ginger ale is often also fermented, though it's usually kept at fairly low levels, either just enough for carbonation (around 0.25% ABV) or perhaps 1-2%
It really depends on how much alcohol you'd like, and if you'd like to keep it sweet by adding unfermentable sugars, or stopping fermentation by either campden tablets or refrigeration, or let it go completely dry, which still gives you the option to backsweeten with unfermentables or artificial sweeteners.

I would recommend against using much in the way of hops for anything that you want to highlight vanilla and fruit, but if you're using other spices (like a root beer of ginger ale as I mentioned), hops can help balance them out creatively.

I did make an unfermented root beer that I really like with about a pound of light DME in my sugars, along with a pound of honey, pound of dark brown sugar, and 2 pounds of table sugar. I unfortunately boiled far too much nutmeg in it, and that's really my only complaint. Malt can play well

 

[DigitalBlacksmith]

Thanks for the reply Raenon! That is what I was looking for.
I plan on doing some small batches to start, maybe have several growlers going with different contents. will suck to force carbonate, maybe I will just use the growler and some priming sugar, it is just hard to get to that 40-50PSI for soda without using my keg.
I want to keep the base as plain as possible so that it will rely on flavors afterwards. basically a Smirnoff/zima. Like bitters for a mixed drink but having that malty quality so I dont feel like I am drinking vodka and sprite

Any Reccomendations for yeasts? High attenuation is probably a necessity here.

 

[GilaMinumBeer]

Any Reccomendations for yeasts? High attenuation is probably a necessity here.

I would look into methods for homemade soda. Natural soda are fermented just enough to attain carbonation. Seems whatever yeast is used for that could be furthered along for a full on fermentation.

 

[airving]

I don't think you're trying to do this, but just in case: remember, trying to aggressively sweeten anything fermented (eg alcoholic soda at standard soda sweetness) your yeast will try to consume all that sugar. Best case that's more alcohol and no sweetness, worst case = bottle bombs. You can stabilize (kill the yeast) a la wine making and back sweeten, but then you'd be forced to keg for carbonation. You could add lactose or other unfermentable sugars, but I think that would alter the flavor profile significantly.

We're you trying to make a very mildly flavored base to be flavored and sweetened immediately prior to consumption?

Having said all that, I picked up a book from amazon about making soda ( homemade soda..., Andrew Schloss) and I'm interested in alcoholifying some of those.

 

[DigitalBlacksmith]

Related posts for reference:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/wine-cooler-malt-beverage-3116/
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f12/smirnoff-ice-recipe-57117/
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f25/skeeter-pee-195681/

 

[DigitalBlacksmith]

I don't think you're trying to do this, but just in case: remember, trying to aggressively sweeten anything fermented (eg alcoholic soda at standard soda sweetness) your yeast will try to consume all that sugar. Best case that's more alcohol and no sweetness, worst case = bottle bombs. You can stabilize (kill the yeast) a la wine making and back sweeten, but then you'd be forced to keg for carbonation. You could add lactose or other unfermentable sugars, but I think that would alter the flavor profile significantly.

We're you trying to make a very mildly flavored base to be flavored and sweetened immediately prior to consumption?

Having said all that, I picked up a book from amazon about making soda ( homemade soda..., Andrew Schloss) and I'm interested in alcoholifying some of those.

Correct, I have a kegging system and am pretty adept at making soda. The idea is to kill the yeast after the proper alchohol levels are achieved, then back sweeten.
As I read more and more I am looking at DME, kill the yeast, then back sweeten with cane sugar, lactose, and citric acid, force carbonate and voiola I should have something resembling smirnoff ice but better

 

[Raenon]

Alright, I had a great big long post that got lost in transmission (expired token? BAH!)

At risk of not showing my work, I'll try to sum up my message:
Force carbonation is simple and effective, and can be done in 1-2L plastic bottles with just a carbonator cap. Bottle conditioning is effective, but requires you to either ferment it dry, or use non-fermentable sugars or artificial sweetener. Not saying that it's bad for your recipes, just that it has specific limits unless you pasteurize mid process (or chill... which means you can't transport warm or the yeast may well wake up and eat up all the sugars, belching too much CO2)
That to me introduces another step that I'd forget or screw up somehow (including an extra trip to a pot of boiling water, and another opportunity for my dog to trip me!)
If you've already got a kegging setup, either tap it there, or force carbonate plastic bottles.

If you do intend to bottle condition, don't use growlers for it. It might work, but when it goes wrong you bust a nice growler and lose the contents, sometimes explosively. Use those for their intended purpose- transporting some already carbonated beverage to another location
Instead, use 1L swingtops. They're cheaper than growlers, still have impressive capacity, and they're designed to hold pressure.
Or go even cheaper, and just use standard 12 oz and 22oz bombers.


Finally, I recommend starting with either hard root beer or ginger ale. Traditional recipes that already use malt (in some cases, at least), and you have a damn fine chance or producing a great beverage. Whether you use a recipe with a little hops or none, you'll have an idea for what the flavor of just straight fermented malt will mean for other beverages down the line.
I'm sure Smirnoff didn't get theirs right the first time, and they're probably cheating by adding distilled alcohol to soda pop as it is (this would still be called malt beverage in the US, even if no malt, or even grain, was used to make the alcohol...)

Hmm, tempting myself to get into hard soda as well...