Black Special

[Grebo]

I have just completed a second 2 gallon trial batch of what I am calling my Black Special, i'm now ready to scale up to 5 gallons

Ingredients:
1 x tin Black treacle
1 x (large) tin Golden Syrup
1 x jar honey (optional)
1 x Bottle lemon juice
Ground ginger
Water
500g Dark brown sugar (optional)

Method:
In a gallon pan, bring 4 litres water to a simmer
stir in treacle, syrup and honey
Add sugar (if using)
Add bottle of lemon juice
add a good dose of ground ginger
Keep stirring to make sure all dissolves well
Allow to cool and transfer to fermenting vessels and top up with water

Notes:
For primary fermenting vessels I have been using 1 gallon glass Demijohns, if I were to scale up to 5 gallons I would pour into plastic fermenting bin
The honey is an addition that can take the sharpness out of the final brew
Whilst the treacle and syrup are pure if inverted sugars I find some nice dark sugar helps it really go with a bang
Ginger powder gives a nice kick, leave out if you don't like the stuff
This brew will go like hell, i've used bakers yeast and it's gone like hell, probably even better with some proper brewing alcohol tolerant yeast
For bottling and water I tend to use the supermarket value still water bottles, the water goes into making the brew and the bottles then used for the brew.
DO NOT overprime the 2 litre PET bottles, funny as it is when they go sausage shaped and fall over, it's not so funny cleaning half fermented brew from the ceiling and walls before the wife gets home
Do find a comfy seat when you do finally work up the courage to try this as you won't be going far after a few!

[Spud395]

What sort of taste are we talking about here?

The recipe isnt something that says to me "I must rush to the supermarket for the gear to get this on"
Dont get me wrong I'm not knocking your recipe, just kind of wondering what it is you're making?

[Shadowknight]

You're a dentist?

I'm getting a lot of sweetness there?

[EliteEvil]

This sounds an awful lot like treacle ale.

[avtovaz]

erm, how big is a tin?

[EoinMag]

I'd be curious how large a bottle of lemon juice is too, how much is in there?

[hong]

Sounds interesting & pretty simple even for me! What kind of % are we looking at here, and is bakers yeast ok to use?

[Grebo]

Golden Syrup - 907g Tin (large size)
Black Treacle - 454g Tin
Lemon Juice - 250Ml bottle

The taste, particularly with added Ginger for spice is not far off the taste of Jagermeister in a beer form, yes it is a huge amount of sugar but much of it ferments out if left long enough, and it does go pretty damn quick! The Honey can take some of the bite out of it as the black treacle can make it seem rather tart.
Current indications are it will ferment out around 5-6% without too much effort, and as I had run out of proper brewing yeast I had just chucked in some baking yeast to the mix.

Bear in mind that so far the primary fermentation has been completed under airlock in Demijohns and the gallon pan of the wort split between 2 demijohns and topped up with water before pitching the yeast.

I may at some point as I say scale it up to a 5 gallon brew and kick it off in the fermenting bin before then bottling as I would with a normal ale brew. It's still very much an experimental brew but it's cheap, quick and easy!

All feedback welcome though

EDIT:
(Yes, now I have looked about about it does seem very similar to treacle ale, however no hops were harmed in the making of this brew so it really can't be classed as an ale, more a very sticky tasty alcoholic beverage)