Hello,
I usually do beer, wines, and ports. Here is my first venture into Melomel. I'm currently brewing this so I will update it as I go and move it to the Recipe DB when I am done.
Ingredients
-------------
15.4 lbs (7 kg) of local farm honey
3lbs + 7lbs of farm fresh Saskatoons
Yeast Nutrients
Dry Yeast
Extra Equipment
------------------
Flask and Stir Plate
Grain Bag
Glass Marbles
Heat belt
Prep
-------------
Freeze your berries!
Yeast Starter (well, sort of)
-----------------------------
Normally I would have used a liquid yeast and created a yeast starter. This time I was using a dry yeast. I added 1L of warm water, yeast nutrients, and dry yeast to my flask and aerated it for 15 mins on my stir plate.
Instructions (so far)
----------------------
1. Warm your honey, I did not boil my honey at all. I wanted to keep as much of the flower profile included in the honey as possible. Plus I read to much on the big debate regarding the need to boil honey and just went simple.
2. Clean and Sanitize!
3. Add honey and warm water to reach target volumn to primary bucket and mix well. Vigorously stir the mixture to aerate the must and mix the honey.
4. Measure the OG. Oops I skipped this step. Occasionally I get a little lazy. In this case I just forgot about it.
5. Add the glass marbles and 3lbs Saskatoons to your grain bag. The marbles will help sink the grain bag. I did not have enough marbles to counter the boyency of the bag. One of my spoons does fit in my primary bucket with the lid on so I am using that to hold the fruit below the surface.
6. Move to a elevated position and use the heat belt if necessary (December 28th, 2015).
Future Steps
-------------
I usually do beer, wines, and ports. Here is my first venture into Melomel. I'm currently brewing this so I will update it as I go and move it to the Recipe DB when I am done.
Ingredients
-------------
15.4 lbs (7 kg) of local farm honey
3lbs + 7lbs of farm fresh Saskatoons
Yeast Nutrients
Dry Yeast
Extra Equipment
------------------
Flask and Stir Plate
Grain Bag
Glass Marbles
Heat belt
Prep
-------------
Freeze your berries!
Yeast Starter (well, sort of)
-----------------------------
Normally I would have used a liquid yeast and created a yeast starter. This time I was using a dry yeast. I added 1L of warm water, yeast nutrients, and dry yeast to my flask and aerated it for 15 mins on my stir plate.
Instructions (so far)
----------------------
1. Warm your honey, I did not boil my honey at all. I wanted to keep as much of the flower profile included in the honey as possible. Plus I read to much on the big debate regarding the need to boil honey and just went simple.
2. Clean and Sanitize!
3. Add honey and warm water to reach target volumn to primary bucket and mix well. Vigorously stir the mixture to aerate the must and mix the honey.
4. Measure the OG. Oops I skipped this step. Occasionally I get a little lazy. In this case I just forgot about it.
5. Add the glass marbles and 3lbs Saskatoons to your grain bag. The marbles will help sink the grain bag. I did not have enough marbles to counter the boyency of the bag. One of my spoons does fit in my primary bucket with the lid on so I am using that to hold the fruit below the surface.
6. Move to a elevated position and use the heat belt if necessary (December 28th, 2015).
Future Steps
-------------
- I expect the primary fermentation to take up to 14 days. It is bubbling quite well right now.
- After primary fermentation I intend to add the remaining 7lbs of Saskatoons. I will need to remove the old ones and clean the bag. I will transfer the must to new bucket at this point and expect to see some renewed fermentation due to the berries. My must is already turning a reddish colour so I expect this to deepen.
- After another 14-28 days (maybe less, based on activity and colour) I will transfer to a carboy for clearing. I expect two or three rounds in a carboy. Between 14-28 days between racking, maybe longer.
- I should net around 30 bottles for this. I recommend clear bottles - you want to show off the colour!
We are adding fruit because it's cheap, otherwise use juice. Generally speaking fruit's skin needs to be cut for alcohol to extract flavors faster. It simply will take longer for alcohol inside your mead to path through the defensive layers of the fruit (it's skin). 
