bduane

Recipes 

She made 2 1gal batches, recipes below.

As I've never made mead before, we kind of just threw these together based on two of "Joe's" recipes. What do you think of these ingredient lists? My understanding is that they will ferment out very dry, so I'm thinking about back-sweetening these with some more fresh honey once they are done.

Thoughts?


Pyment [Est. OG: 1.081] (based on Joe's Quick Grape Mead)

• 1.5 lbs of local Michigan honey.
• 64 fl oz Welches 100% grape juice (no preservatives, based on nutritional information, this has 288 grams of sugar)
• Topped off to ~1 gallon with RO water.
• 1/2 tsp yeast nutrient
• 1 packet of dry "Red Star Pasteur Champagne Yeast"

Melomel? [Est. OG 1.052] (Based on Joe's Ancient Orange Mead)

• 1.5 lbs of local Michigan honey.
• 1 whole sliced orange (including rinds)
• Topped off to ~1 gallon with RO water.
• 1/2 tsp yeast nutrient
• 1 packet of dry "Red Star Pasteur Champagne Yeast"

JamesZeagleir

Recipes 

That's interesting I also helped my girlfriend make a mead, though it was a blueberry-strawberry mead.

Matrix4b

Recipes 

Yes, with champaign yeast it will definitely go very dry. I recomend in the future you use a different yeast. Champaign is the most agressive of the wine strains. If you backsweeten it then don't forget to stabalize it first. That is, add some potasium sorbate and let it sit for a few days. With a champaign yeast you may want to do two regiments of potasium sorbate. Then when it's not not fermenting add the honey water. Don't forget to put some campden tablets or some potasium sorbate or even boil the honey water for 2-3 minutes to kill the wild yeasts in the fresh honey. Most times it is not prefable to boil the honey but trust me, I have had a batch ferment after the addition of the honey water you backsweeten with and I was certian that fermentation had stopped.

Matrix

1776

Recipes 

Never heard (or seen) of people boiling their fruits in the must. Is this a good thing?

I've been told to get the most flavor out of your fruits or flavorings its best to add them after the initial fermentation.

fatbloke

Recipes 

Generally, its not "best practice" but that carries a caveat.

"white or green" fruit, its not a good idea, as you end up with a "cooked" flavour (unless that is what you're after). Whereas "blue, purple and black" fruit often benefit from heating.

The flavour will be different if its been fermented, so if you want a more fruity flavour, then its usually better to ferment a base brew dry, then stabilise, then rack onto or add the fruit.

__________________
"What the large print giveth, the small print taketh away". Tom Waits.

Oh, and here's some blog stuff!

Matrix4b

Recipes 

The other thing that happens when you cook/boil fruit is you get the pectin to firm up. It's how you get jam and jellies. So the pectin will be harder to get rid of. Usually, I puree my fruit and put it in the secondary fermentation. Sometimes I do put in some fruit juices on the primary but only if I intend to put it in the secondary too for a more complex flavor.

Matrix

JamesZeagleir

Recipes 

Yeah, you should put them in the fermentation over the boil if you don't want to buy a lot of berries. Also yeah putting fruit in the boil gives a different more "cooked" taste, the way I describe it is like a slightly smoked fruit based Clamatos Cesar if that makes sense? But I personally find that cooked fruit's worth doing with Wyeast Sweet Mead strain (but that's preference). That being said if you do put them in the boil running them through a strainer when you move it into secondary or bottle is not enough! I would highly recommended getting Volie' fabric. It's cheap and easy to get (it's less then 10$ a square meter). Siphon through the fabric into a bucket then do that again through the Volie' into what ever you want sediment free, it also gets all the super small clumps of fruit jelly that builds up over time inside the carboy which is pectin if I'm not mistaken.

This is what I did:

Well, in Ontario where I live fruit is really cheap right now (like $4 a kilo of strawberrys and like 6$ for blueberrys). After boiling my water for an hour, I just used nearly 20lbs of berries in the mash alone ( I used a squeeze press to get the juice). Then I just let it simmer for about 45 minutes. After which I added 3lbs of blossom honey and two table spoons of liquid strawberry and blueberry extract as well as about an extra pound or two of of both berries. Boiled it for 40 minutes at 110c and strained all the berries and put it in my carboy. I used Wyeast Sweet Mead. Although inside my carboy I had 9 peeled dragonfruits because I find it's something that always gives mead a delicious taste.

16 days later and my carboys still bubbling continually, although no need for a blow off tube. The color is a blood red, it literally looks a carboy full of blood. Looks really cool, and smells utterly delicious.

i'll post a picture of it in a couple of days when i rack into secondary.

bduane

Recipes 

So, it is all fermented out...

The orange mead finished at 0.992, the grape finished at 0.997, very dry.

When taking the reading, we tried a sample. I expected it to be very dry, but it also had a very medicinal taste almost numbing effect on the tongue. I was surprised that the orange mead had this characteristic considering it is only 7-8% ABV... is this normal? Will back-sweetening mask this, or only age?

We are going to rack them to a secondary jug and stabilize, add some honey/juice for sweetness, and wait a couple of days to ensure that it is stable.

She is very excited to serve one of these on thanksgiving, so hopefully we can turn it into something drinkable by then!

sonofgrok

Recipes 

I have boiled much of my fruit in the must. I haven't had any issues albeit I haven't done an epic number of meads.

__________________
"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will teach you to keep your mouth shut." ~Ernest Hemingway

fatbloke

Recipes 

Usually recommended to age first, as you often get some of the flavour characteristics coming back, but back sweetening early is a method of masking any "young mead" off flavours.

If its good enough to drink, then go for it, but it would be considerably better to aim for next year.

__________________
"What the large print giveth, the small print taketh away". Tom Waits.

Oh, and here's some blog stuff!