Leap Year Mead 2

BuffaloSabresBrewer · 02-08-2008, 04:47 AM

Just trying to organize this a little better so we can get a better idea what people want to do. The ideas that have been proposed so far have been a citrus, a vanilla, or a previous recipe. So this is what I put in the poll but please feel free to make a suggestion and Ill add that to the poll.
I think were trying to keep this fairly simple. Please feel free to post recipes.
I just thought if the participants voted it would be easier.

Recipe Here:

Quote:

Here is my vote for a recipe. Please feel free to correct the math, because this is theoretical, and based on a 1 gallon batch size (Makes things easy)

3# of Honey (Best Local Variety you can get)
Yeast Nutrient (Follow your directions)
Water
1 Gram RED STAR Pasteur Champagne Yeast. (Whole pack for a 5 gallon batch)

Rack onto 2 vanilla beans (Split and scraped) for the entirety of secondary ferment.

This should give us a Beginning gravity of about 1.130 and the Pasteur will ferment it Dry.
By not cooking the crap out of the vanilla, it will maintain more of it's delicate flavor, and by adding it at the secondary stage, it will add a crisp clean vanilla taste, and not overpower our drink.

I suppose that the timing of primary ferment needs to be worked out, but we have plenty of time, and secondary ferment could go many moons.

With this we get what we all have talked about, #1. Simplicity, #2 Short shopping list, #3 Dry, #4 Modestly High ABV, #5 Not overly flavored.

**Nurmey** · 02-08-2008, 04:57 AM

Thank you BSB! Just what we needed to get this thing decided. Times a wasting and I need to buy supplies.

Should we put a closing date for final recipe?

BuffaloSabresBrewer · 02-08-2008, 05:00 AM

Not quite sure well need a bit of time to get ingredients. Some will have ore trouble finding ingredients than others.
So those brewers should speak up and help us decide. Ill be stopping around a few places to see what my honey options are.

BuffaloSabresBrewer · 02-08-2008, 05:04 AM

I have a 6.5 gallon carboy that Ill be using and I plan on filling it as high as I can. One option we have is to brew our mead and add other flavors after fermentation has slowed. I dont know if I want to do this but if someone doesnt want to do what the group does they can break up their batch and leave half as planned for longer aging and add other flavors to the other half of the batch. Just a thought.

**BigKahuna** · 02-08-2008, 06:05 AM

If we call the 15th "The Day" for the recipe, that would give us 2 weekends to visit the store.
If we allow for a "Base Recipe" I'd love the hear about the "Splits".

**BigKahuna** · 02-08-2008, 06:27 AM

If we do the vanilla, and add it at the beginning of secondary, do you think that 1 or 2 beans is enough? If you scraped the bean like Emeil and Alton Brown tell us to do, then add all of the stuff to the secondary, it should flavor up the whole thing pretty good, and I don't think we are looking for over powering vanilla either.
Specifically looking at the Tonga Vanilla from beanilla.com...They are advertising on this page.

BuffaloSabresBrewer · 02-08-2008, 02:24 PM

Lets make the deadlines as follows
Style 11th
Recipe 13th
Any changes to the recipe that people might like to make (including different yeast strands) by the 15th
All specific instructions and ingredients that will be needed posted on the 15th. That will give us plenty of time to buy ingredients and debate over specific details.

Tusch · 02-08-2008, 02:33 PM

I like the idea of doing a vanilla mead. I have no idea what that will end up tasting like, as a newb, but I love the idea. So the plan is to get a recipe settled on by the 15th and then brew on the 29th? I might have to do 1 or 2 one gallon batches, because my one big carboy is currently in use. But hey, if I can get 10 bottles of something tasty, I'd love to see what its like in 4 years.

And it seems that the higher gravity meads are usually chosen for long aging periods, will this be taken into consideration? Perhaps something with as high of an abv as 18 or 20?

archmaker · 02-08-2008, 02:53 PM

I am game for this, and seeing how this is only my second Mead and I have not had a chance to taste any of my first (JAOM) I will follow the lead of the group. I am not going to vote as I do not know enough abut Mead at this point to make a decision.

Let us newby's know and I will start getting it together. Look forward to making a special Mead.

Thanks guys!

BuffaloSabresBrewer · 02-08-2008, 08:37 PM

Ya I guess I wrongly assumed this would be a higher ABV mead. I assumed because this was a leap year mead this would be aged longer. But I vote for a higher ABV mead also.