Tasty Quick Meads?

Grancru · 02-17-2010, 07:45 PM

While all my carboys are being filled with some tasty nectors that will take a good while to finish I am looking for a tasty mead that will finish is a shorter time (if it exists).

Any recipies worth trying?

Gardenhead · 02-17-2010, 09:59 PM

The most popular one is Joe's Ancient Orange but I would also recommend making some Apfelwein using honey instead of table sugar.

**jezter6** · 02-17-2010, 10:45 PM

You have Joe's Ancient Orange, Malkore's Ancient Orange, HB_99's Lemonade Mead.

Think of it this way -- less gravity --- less time.

Beer ferments nice and quick, at 4-5%. When you start doing bigger beers, they need aged.

Try making hydromels (weaker meads) or sweet meads which can often hide some of that harshness of being a young mead.

Otherwise, you could look into some ciders/graff or other shorter fermenting drinks to build your pipeline.

badmajon · 02-18-2010, 04:01 AM

I'd say go with the ginger mead recipe I am using now:

http://www.homebrewtalk.com/f30/what-gets-ready-fast-155685/index2.html

vespa2t · 02-18-2010, 04:12 AM

JAOM with 1/2 the honey is a whole lot faster than original JAOM. Also, I like to add orange zest instead of the whole orange, that pith adds a hell of a lot of bitterness...

I also do another variation of JAOM with raspberries instead of orange. Its good and tasty in a month or so.

flyweed · 02-20-2010, 03:16 PM

JAOM quick grape mead is excellent....also, I just did a new Blood Orange Mead that I put together based on the original JAOM..this is quick too.

If you want to give cider a try...try the southern sweet cider recipe..it's very tasty and fairly quick to make as well

Dan

Fletch78 · 02-20-2010, 04:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gardenhead

The most popular one is Joe's Ancient Orange but I would also recommend making some Apfelwein using honey instead of table sugar.

100% in agreement with the Cyser. My JAO didn't turn out palatable to me, but my simple quick cyser is awesome, considering it's simplicity and no aging.

1 gallon:

1/2 gallon no-additive apple cider (vitamin c is ok, all that's legal in GA is pasteurized)
1.5 pounds wildflower honey
25 raisins
spring water
bread yeast

I used the jug the cider came in.

Proof the yeast according to instructions on package with the spring water. Pour honey into the cider and shake like crazy to combine and aerate. Pour a small splash of the must into the proofing yeast once it starts showing activity. Then shake up your spring water like crazy to aerate, it will hold more oxygen if it's cold when you do this. Add yeast and raisins, top up to the shoulder (not the neck, you need headroom) with spring water. Cap, shake up to combine. Loosen cap and keep out of light around 70 degrees (the warmer, the harsher it will be) for two weeks, gently swirling twice daily to keep the raisins moist and allow for some CO2 to escape.

I let it sit for a month, but that's mostly out of laziness, I think it would have been fine to rack after two weeks. I did add some boiled yeast (bread) after a few days per the folks at the 'other' mead website for nutrient.

I racked it into the leftover plastic jug of spring water, rinsed and sanitized the glass jug, poured back in, backsweetened with about a cup of honey and topped up with more spring water, capped tightly and put in the back of the fridge with several oak cubes for another two weeks. It is highly drinkable at that stage, but I'm letting most of it age in Grolsh bottles, less the few glasses I drank.

I actually added some gelatin for clarity but in hindsight it just made for more work, skip it.

So, that's very simple, and relatively quick, and quite drinkable. Nothing has blown up yet, either. I didn't stabilize it with anything, just cold crash. That may turn out to be a bad move, time will tell. I've got it in a safe place away from people and dogs.

LightningInABottle · 02-21-2010, 02:35 AM

Try the basic JAO recipe with these alterations;

1. Juice the oranges and do not put pith(peel) into fermentation container

2. Use 71b-1122 yeast. I recently did a 1 gallon tester and it was fermented dry in 2 weeks and crystal clear in 2 more weeks. It was very drinkable at the 2 weeks when I racked off the lees.

Fletch78 · 02-21-2010, 04:42 AM

Not to hijack, but I've been thinking of doing the same thing with JAO. Well, it wouldn't be JAO. It would be Fletch's Modern Orange using wine yeast to finish quickly and only using the zest and some juice, not the whole thing, certainly not any pith. And cloves be damned, they have no place in brewing. And there would be shaking, stirring, and racking. And it would be drinkable, unlike JAO. I wouldn't pour JAO out of a 40 to a dead homey. I wouldn't pour it out on a dead dog.

JAO has some internet credibility as being a great first-time mead, but a simple cyser is much easier and better. I don't know why JAO got it's reputation. It's nasty. It's worse than flat PBR spiked with McCorkmicks vodka. Take that scenario and add drakkar noir, and you have JAO.

People say "If you just age it, it's awesome!" and that may be well and true, but it's pitched as a simple no-age mead, drinkable from primary. That is patently false. It's a blue lipped lie.

Anyone reading this in the future, considering making Joe's Ancient Orange, don't do it.

Fletch78 · 02-21-2010, 04:45 AM

All that being said, I'm putting together Joe's Welch's right now, sans buckwheat.