Poltorak is a type of polish mead, so called 'royal mead', which is supposedly one part water, two parts of honey. A typical polish commercial Poltorak has about 16% alcohol and is insanely sweet. I've been trying to work out how it is actually done and can't seem to make sense of it.
If a poltorak mead would be started by adding all the honey at once, it would have an OG of ~1.305 which is clearly unworkable for yeast. If only a quarter of the honey was added at the start, there is about 20% potential alcohol and a proper fermentation could take place. Yeast-death-by-alcohol could also happen, but lets suppose that more honey will be added just in time for the yeast not to die.
Now if we ferment this mead with a good yeast until it is around 17 percent in strength, we still have the other half of the volume to add, which will be pure honey in this case. Adding that honey would take the gravity to around 1.200 and drop the alcohol level to 8.5%. Now that seems again way too thick for fermentation.
Maybe adding the rest of the honey in two halves could work then? SG would rise to 1.13 and alcohol level to 11.3%. This might be workable for the yeast but still the SG would be only around 1.090 when the yeast will hit 17% again. Add the last quarter of honey and the gravity would be around 1.16 and alcohol percentage around 12.75%. When alcohol hits 16-17% the FG would be around 1.13.
All things considered it looks like adding the honey in even smaller parts in a very controlled fashion, maybe for drops after initial fermentation, just might be able to push the strength high enough so that the strength will be 16% after the final honey drop.
Questions to the more experienced mead makers:
How would you manage aerating, degassing and nutrients in this case?
Would it make sense to do an even lighter initial fermentation in order to be able to drop strength below 10% and get more growth to the yeast colony?
How would you plan the additional honey feeding?
Does anyone know how the Poles actually do it? Cheat distilled mead?
I think I'm going to try this.
If a poltorak mead would be started by adding all the honey at once, it would have an OG of ~1.305 which is clearly unworkable for yeast. If only a quarter of the honey was added at the start, there is about 20% potential alcohol and a proper fermentation could take place. Yeast-death-by-alcohol could also happen, but lets suppose that more honey will be added just in time for the yeast not to die.
Now if we ferment this mead with a good yeast until it is around 17 percent in strength, we still have the other half of the volume to add, which will be pure honey in this case. Adding that honey would take the gravity to around 1.200 and drop the alcohol level to 8.5%. Now that seems again way too thick for fermentation.
Maybe adding the rest of the honey in two halves could work then? SG would rise to 1.13 and alcohol level to 11.3%. This might be workable for the yeast but still the SG would be only around 1.090 when the yeast will hit 17% again. Add the last quarter of honey and the gravity would be around 1.16 and alcohol percentage around 12.75%. When alcohol hits 16-17% the FG would be around 1.13.
All things considered it looks like adding the honey in even smaller parts in a very controlled fashion, maybe for drops after initial fermentation, just might be able to push the strength high enough so that the strength will be 16% after the final honey drop.
Questions to the more experienced mead makers:
How would you manage aerating, degassing and nutrients in this case?
Would it make sense to do an even lighter initial fermentation in order to be able to drop strength below 10% and get more growth to the yeast colony?
How would you plan the additional honey feeding?
Does anyone know how the Poles actually do it? Cheat distilled mead?
I think I'm going to try this.
