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Bluespark · 01-26-2013, 01:26 AM

I have some awesome chipotles, I've grown the jalapeños, smoked them over mesquite and dried them myself. I thought a cherry chipotle mead sounds awesome, and clover honey was on sale, sooo, this is the recipe I've come up with.

3 gallons
10.5 lb clover honey
Nutrient and energizer
1 cup black tea
3 chipotles
Lalvin 1122

Ferment till dry, nutrient additions and aeration for the first 7 days.

Rack onto 3 bottles organic sour cherry juice and 3 lb dried sweet cherries.

How does this sound?

Sybarite · 01-26-2013, 04:05 AM

Oh... That sounds good. But what I think doesn't matter since I am still waiting to rack my first batch of mead. :P

**fatbloke** · 01-26-2013, 10:27 AM

If it was mine I'd have thought of using more chipotle. Their flavour doesn't take much to be overcome. So increasing the amount would have a better chance of imparting some of their flavour.......

And I'd be putting them into secondary, not primary.

**TheBrewingMedic** · 01-26-2013, 01:12 PM

I agree with fatbloke about putting everything in secondary and increasing the chipolte, it does sound like a good flavor combination.

Id be a little concerned if you ferment dry then add sour cherry juice and only a small amount of dried cherries, even with the concentrated flavor of dried fruit it seems it could all be quite dry and tart, very little sweetness to balance the smokiness and heat of the chipoltes. Obviously this is just guessing and assumptions as I don't know how big the sour cherry juice containers are, I might reduce to 2 containers of the sour and double the dried sweet.

Bluespark · 01-26-2013, 02:48 PM

I was pondering this last night and agree %100. I think that having it a bit on the sweet side would be much better with the chillis.

How many would you recomend?

I also have smoked Thai chillis and habanero s, but I think I might be better off with a milder chilli, that way I can add more flavour without any extra heat.

I found a place to buy frozen sweet cherries, those might get added as well.

Thanks for the replies so far

Bluespark · 01-29-2013, 03:57 AM

So the base mead is bubbling nicely. I've been able to get a 5 lb bag of frozen black sweet cherries that taste awesome, and a local place in town sells sour morello cherries dried.

How many pounds should I use?

Any opinions on how many chipotles?

Brann_mac_Finnchad · 01-29-2013, 06:09 AM

The usual baseline for fruit is 2.5-3 pounds per gallon.
I would say maybe 2 peppers per gallon, and be prepared to take them out when the flavour is where you want. You can always add more if needed.

When I made my capsicumel, I used four serranos (1 gallon) for a light heat. Only one pepper worth of seeds though.

Bluespark · 02-06-2013, 08:50 PM

I've racked the basic mead onto 1.5 lb dried sour morello cherries ( about 4lb rehydrated with some hot water), 5lb pitted frozen thawed bing cherries and a litre of bing cherry juice, plus 2 chipotles per gallon and some pectin enzyme.

Very dark red, smells fantastic. I will top this up with organic sour cherry juice when I rack it off the fruit. Very excited for this one

**fermentinginpa** · 02-06-2013, 09:30 PM

That sounds awesome, can't wait to hear how it turned out.

Bluespark · 02-25-2013, 05:14 PM

Ended up using 8 chipotles for three gallons and I still can't taste them through the alcohol bite and fruit. I like things very hot though, which is not the intention for this one, so I will let it sit and taste in a few months. I will say the aroma is great and the color is spectacular. The brownish tint I noticed is dropping out with the yeast, leaving an extremely deep, rich blood red. Looks black in the carboy.