McMead

As a joke I asked my friends to collect honey packets every time they go to McDonald's. Well as with most jokes my friends took me seriously. Now every time I see them They hand me honey packets. The big question is what flavors to add to it and what to call it. So far it is being called McMead. I figure I need about 500 honey packets and so far I have about 100. It's only been about 2 weeks. I think my local McDonald's most love me.

The packets say pure grade a honey. 1/2 oz. So lets hope its honey.

I LOVE the name. Good luck.

There's gotta be a way to flavor it with something from Mickey D's as well!

ChshreCat said:

There's gotta be a way to flavor it with something from Mickey D's as well!

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Mash some of those McDonaldland cookies maybe?

ChshreCat said:

There's gotta be a way to flavor it with something from Mickey D's as well!

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Secret sauce from a big mac...? All those little packets are going to be a pain to sanitize before opening.

strat_thru_marshall said:

Secret sauce from a big mac...? All those little packets are going to be a pain to sanitize before opening.

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The fat from the mayo component would seriously affect the head retention, should he decide to go sparkling and i'm sure clarity would be an issue. :fro:

They do have some things with fruit. There's a fruit salad that comes with the dressing stuff on the side. But you'd probably have to buy 100 of 'em.

Just make it a straight mead with nothing else. What have you got to lose? Except for the yeast, nutrient and water, it's a free batch!

thread of the day right here... i am eager to hear how it works out.

Use the jelly or jam or whatever they call it. The Big Mel would be a cool name for a melomel.

Tread82 said:

Use the jelly or jam or whatever they call it. The Big Mel would be a cool name for a melomel.

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Yeah! I have heard of using marmalade and/or jelly in brewing...I'd add some pectic enzyme, and still expect some haze, but as was pointed out...for essentially no $ input on ingredients, and a couple bucks for a few packets of dry yeast, you can make a batch of mead...what's to loose?!

Edit: I just thought of this....what about using the "maple syrup" as an addition? Now, I'm downright sure that this is corn syrup w/ maple flavoring, but perhaps with an addition into the secondary, you might get some maple flavor into the final mead?

I'd worry about some of their condiments having preservatives that may inhibit yeast growth.

ChshreCat said:

I'd worry about some of their condiments having preservatives that may inhibit yeast growth.

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You can always add to secondary.

Sweet and Sour McMead!!!!!!!!!

Tread82 said:

You can always add to secondary.

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I would not be concerned with the minimal amount (of preservative in any jelly that you might add to flavor the mead)...I made a pyment w/ 1gal of muscadine juice (in a 6 gallon total volume batch) that was packaged w/ sorbate. I started the fermentation and added the juice once things were in full swing (2-3 days into fermentation) and it just kept going fine...finished dry.

biochemedic said:

I would not be concerned with the minimal amount...I made a pyment w/ 1gal of muscadine juice (in a 6 gallon total volume batch) that was packaged w/ sorbate. I started the fermentation and added the juice once things were in full swing (2-3 days into fermentation) and it just kept going fine...finished dry.

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That sounds pretty cool. How did the muscadine pyment turn out? I'm wanting to do a dry mustang pyment before all the grapes raisin up.

strat_thru_marshall said:

Secret sauce from a big mac...? All those little packets are going to be a pain to sanitize before opening.

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Why ?

If the bleedin' Ancient Egyptians managed to get honey in some sort of container and bury it for something like 3000 years and the archaeological types find it's still edible, then a couple of bugs on the outside of the packs are nothing.......

regards

fatbloke

Also, what to flavour it with that gives a hint of the original source of the honey ???

Well it's either got to be something like pickles, from the burgers.......

Or more sensible would be an Acerglyn, mead made with Maple syrup, taken from the hotcakes/pancakes and sausage on the breakfast menu........

regards

fatbloke

I think it would be interesting to enter into a comp...

Ingredients: 2 gallons water, 368 packets McHoney

Use water from the fountain.

What about a hot apple pie?

Hot apple pie??? Now thats the stuff. Now just need the recipe....and 300 more honey packets.

coffee? substitute part of the water for it?

I was thinking that you could buy a hot apple pie, cook it to make sure it was sterilized and toss it in the fermenter. Also I was joking, but now that I think about it......

So how's it going now? Any more thoughts? Have you started it? I'm actually quite interested.

Maybe you could use some of the coca-cola powder they use? (if you know somebody on the inside!)

Still collecting honey packets. I worked at McDonalds years ago and I don't recall a coca-cola powder at all. Everything the one I worked at was in syrup form.

Ah, my bad. I've never worked there, just recalled stories of people who have talking about various powders etc.

I'm Lovin it! I cant wait to hear how this pans out!

What an ecological disaster. But since it's already packaged why not put it to use instead of the company tossing it at exp date. I wonder what it will turn out to taste like. Maybe you could write McDonalds and find out where they get the honey from. Then you could figure out what to add to it. Sounds like you got some time until the 500 mark.

1Brotherbill said:

What an ecological disaster.

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No Debbie Downers or Negative Nancy's! Ha! But you are right. "Paying" your way to free honey is an expensive way to acquire honey. Unhealthy too.

Say, OP, have you thought about your method of extracting the honey from all the packets efficiently? I can imagine your fingers would be extremely tired after squeezing out 500 packets. Could you use a set of rollers to extract the juice? A friend suggested cutting the packages in half, and tossing em in the pot with hot water and stir until all the honey left the packets, and then use a screen of some sort to remove the empty packets. You'll have to calculate efficiency and report your findings to us!

Remember we want pictures or McMead didnt happen!

Centrifugal Honey Extractor would work for this wouldn't it. Maybe even a salad spinner might work. Just slice the packs and toss them in and give them a spin. I bet that honey is pretty thin anyway so it probably flows with some ease. So kind of makes me wonder about the makeup of that honey now.

1Brotherbill said:

I bet that honey is pretty thin anyway so it probably flows with some ease.

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I had to taste it for myself. Its actually good honey and pours just as thick as any other honey i've tried. I also opened a packet and dipped it into my coffee until the tub was clean. (they come in little tubs with foil wrappers) This may be support for my original idea of opening all the packs and dumping the packs into hot water.

OP: How many packs do you have now?

Need an update on this idea.

would love to give a positive update...but... I can not.... My dog loves to chew everything.... You can guess where this is going. Somehow she got down into my brew room and destroyed my honey stash.

Nooooooooooooo!

Oh NOES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

How many packets did you lose?

Time to hijack the McDonalds supply truck (I kid, I kid...)

a little over 200 packets.....one very sticky dog....... one call to poison control to make sure the dog would be okay..... one not so happy SWMBO

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