My First Mead

I made my first mead last saturday. I mixed the ingredients and stirred the honey into the must. after a few hours some of the honey (about 1/2) settled on the bottom. Will the yeast still work its way through it?

Yes, they will; having honey on the bottom of the fermenter is not an issue.

How much honey to water did you use?

Had a good amount of honey at the bottom of the carboy for my batch of hard lemonade (it's soooo haaaard!) when it started... Partially due to a brain fart on my end, it being late when I mixed it up (around midnight, roughly) and such... Still, within about a week of fermentation kicking off, all that honey was gone. Now I'm just letting it finish fermenting before I do some more things with it and then bottle that up...

For my other mead batches, I've not seen honey settle to the bottom... I've been using about 4#/gallon of must...

Give it enough time and the yeast should find it and gobble it up... Unless the batch goes to an ABV level that's beyond the yeast's tolerance before then...

Post up what your recipe is...

I used about 7lbs for 2 gallons of water. I found a recipe that called for 3.5lbs for 1 gallon and doubled it.

Recipe for Orange Clove Mead (I got this on this site if I remember correctly)

2 gallons spring water
7lbs Clover Honey
50 Raisins
2 Whole Cloves
2 Cinnamon Sticks
2 Whole Oranges Cut in 4ths with peals on
Pinch of Nutmeg
Pinch of Allspice

WLP720 Sweet Mead -Wine Yeast

What yeast did you use?

With that much honey, you'll be above 16% ABV, if you picked a yeast that can go that high. Otherwise it will finish sweet.

I used WLP720 Sweet Mead - Wine Yeast and I added yeast nutrient to the must.

It's going to finish sweet then, since that yeast caps out at 15% according to the White Labs site... The FG should be in the 1.015 area, making is a "medium" dryness level mead... That is, assuming your OG was 1.126... What was the OG?

If that was your goal, then you have nothing to worry about...

Personally, I prefer using Lalvin yeast for my mead.

How much nutrient did you give it, and what nutrient did you give it? Are you doing any degassing and aeration or just the old "set it and forget it" method?

Golddiggie said:

It's going to finish sweet then, since that yeast caps out at 15% according to the White Labs site... The FG should be in the 1.015 area, making is a "medium" dryness level mead... That is, assuming your OG was 1.126... What was the OG?

If that was your goal, then you have nothing to worry about...

Personally, I prefer using Lalvin yeast for my mead.

How much nutrient did you give it, and what nutrient did you give it? Are you doing any degassing and aeration or just the old "set it and forget it" method?

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I don't know the name right ow of the yeast nutrient but i was planning on the set it and forget it method...what is degassing?

Degassing is basically you agitate the must before removing the bung/airlock (or blow-off tube) and aerating it. It releases some of the CO2 in the must so that you can replace it with oxygen. You do that until 1/3 of the must's sugars have been consumed and then you don't do it anymore.

You did take an OG reading, right??

Golddiggie said:

Degassing is basically you agitate the must before removing the bung/airlock (or blow-off tube) and aerating it. It releases some of the CO2 in the must so that you can replace it with oxygen. You do that until 1/3 of the must's sugars have been consumed and then you don't do it anymore.

You did take an OG reading, right??

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Yes the OG was 1.122

I have left it sit while the honey on the bottom is now gone so I am not going to agitate at this point.

I'd stir that honey up. It will mix in the honey, get nutrients to the yeast, and degas the must.

The honey is all gone now. It has been eaten up and I can't see it on e bottom any more. Would you still stir the must?

The honey is all gone now. It has been eaten up and I can't see it on e bottom any more. Would you still stir the must?

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I stir the first 7/8 days. This seems like a new thing (degassing mead during fermentation), so it is hard to pin down what should be done. I think many great meadmakers are degassing all the way until fermentation ends; while others are not doing it at all, and a bunch are splitting the difference like me for now.

ONLY degass/aerate until you hit the 1/3 break... This is the point where 1/3 of the sugars of the must have been consumed by the yeast. How long that takes depends on how well you fed the yeast and how soon it started going to town on the sugars. Most often, you'll hit that point within the first week. But, you'll have times when it takes more, or less, time. Usually we degass and aerate at the 1/3 break and give the yeast one last dose of nutrient before tucking it away to finish fermenting. Checking on it every week or three.

I have batches I started on November 24, 2010 that are still slowly creeping towards a FG. I also have a couple of batches started at/around the same time, and they have hit a FG.

Once fermentation finishes, you can start racking to get the mead to clear. Depending on how long your fermentation takes, you might want to rack a couple of times before then... Usually about once every month, or so... I would recommend looking at what people on got mead do for processes with their batches. See how different types of mead, or different recipes, respond to the processes. If you post up questions there, very high chance they'll be answered pretty fast... At least that's been my experience to date...

I went ahead and degassed and aerated the must. I also added a small amount of yeast nutrient.

The recipe that I am using says not to rack the must off because of the other ingredients like the oranges and the spices. Will there be a problem if I keep the mead in the primary for the duration of the 8 - 12 months before it is ready. The directions in the recipe said the best way to tell it is done is when the oranges fall to the bottom.

I'd be concerned about the fruit being in there for too long. Unless you peeled the oranges, removing the seeds too, you could run into issues. Spices aren't really an issue as much.

The fruit will fall to the bottom when they're ready to be racked off of... Doesn't mean the mead is done though. Where did you find the recipe??

The only way to tell if the mead is actually complete, is to take SG readings that don't change with at least a week, or three, between them. Mead can start fermenting fast, then slow to a snails pace for the final points. Like my traditional batches slowing down once they got close to 1.030... My blackberry melomel did hit FG faster though. Around 1.002...

Here is the website that I got the recipe from, it is about half way down the page

http://www.stormthecastle.com/mead/mead-recipes.htm

19 days in and here is what it looks like. I took a gravity reading yesterday and it read at 1.002 which seems insanely low so I am going to take it again tonight.

Does this seem odd to anyone the original gravity was 1.121 and the yeast I used was White Labs Sweet Mead Yeast? The only thing that might have gone wrong is we hit a heat wave during the first week of fermentation and the temp in the primary hit 77. Most of the time it was down around 68 degrees.

The mead tasted very much like alcohol and the color is a clear yellow/orange.

I uploaded a photo of the mead currently with this post.

Going from an OG of 1.121 to 1.002 puts it at 15.9% ABV... An average strength mead.

Let it age to get rid of some of that alcohol taste/flavor... At almost 16%, I would let it age (in bulk form) for at least 6 months before checking on it again... The longer you can age it in the batch/bulk form the better it will be, and faster it will get there. I would hold off on any back sweetening until it's aged and you're ready to bottle it...

When you say in bulk form, do you mean with the oranges and everything in it, or should i rack it off the once they drop to the bottom.

Also can you give me a link that explains back sweetening

Thanks for the input

Bulk as in single container, not bottled into several/many...

Look at this post... There are more on that site that goes into details of the process... From what I've recalled, you want to take minute steps when going through it... You also don't want to do it too early, since when you let it age, you'll gain some sweetness back from the batch mellowing...

I would let it go another 3-6 months (at least) in the carboy (rack off of the extra stuff, get just the mead alone) before even thinking about back sweetening it any... Wouldn't be a bad idea to go even longer in fact. I know of people that leave their mead in the carboy for a full year before bottling it up...

I am ready to bottle soon and from what I have read mead is not carbonated unless you are making a sparkling mead, is that correct?

I read that I should just rack it to another container and leave it for another week to make sure fermentation is completely done (although it has been 7 months now) and then bottle.

Is that correct? This is my first mead.

So you guys with experience suggesting to backsweeten ONLY after some bulk aging? I was under impression with some recipes (JQGM) that its done as soon as its done fermenting, racked off the yeast and stabilized. Thats the way I been doing anyways.

dregus said:

I am ready to bottle soon and from what I have read mead is not carbonated unless you are making a sparkling mead, is that correct?

I read that I should just rack it to another container and leave it for another week to make sure fermentation is completely done (although it has been 7 months now) and then bottle.

Is that correct? This is my first mead.

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Yes, mead can be still or sparkling depending on what you want. Sparkling is less typical than still, but there is nothing wrong w carbing it.

If you're going to carb it, definitely rack it to make sure fermentation doesn't pick up again (I've read of ferments starting after months of inactivity because of racking), because bottle bombs are a serious consideration w a sparkling mead w an FG of 1.002. However, if you're not carbing, you could just bottle it without racking; worst that will happen is the ferment starts up and the mead gets a little carbed in the bottles. Others would disagree with this latter approach, but I've never had an issue and wouldn't worry about the little bit of fermentation that is possible.

paraordnance said:

So you guys with experience suggesting to backsweeten ONLY after some bulk aging? I was under impression with some recipes (JQGM) that its done as soon as its done fermenting, racked off the yeast and stabilized. Thats the way I been doing anyways.

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You want to wait until it's aged some because as it ages the alcohol heat dies down and a sense of sweetness returns. Thus, if you backsweeten while it's still hot, it may seem like the right amount of sweetness, but after it's mellowed and aged, the added sugar may be cloying.