Inspiring Meads

I got into mead because of my own adventurous nature, and happened to have a giant success on my first batch.

But I'm curious why other people take note of mead. If you don't mind, please let me know your best mead stories, those that inspired you to stick to mead's.... and don't be hesitant to share recipes

My first mead was horrible. It got an infection somewhere along the way so I let it go figuring it might still taste ok after alot of aging. Well after 10 months it was still horrible.

Thats not very inspiring is it lol.

about ready to give it another go I think.

I was bored one new years day, so I drove an hour to Fredrick MD and got all the stuff for a 1gallon batch.... it was awesome!

Although I'm a confirmed meadmaker, I have to admit to preferring my dry red wines over mead. However I continue making gallons of mead because of the smiles and appreciation I receive when I share it with others. There are so many varieties of mead and the combination of ingredients is endless, and experimenting with those combinations keeps it interesting.

I'd been curious about it because of it's association with Vikings. Kind of childish, but hey!

A couple years ago I was in Boulder, CO and toured the Redstone Meadery... when I started brewing my own beer 4 months later, it seemed natural to make a mead as well. It helps that the friend who introduced me to brewing also makes mead (he's been bulk aging one for 7 years now... I wonder how good it is!).

I had been brewing beer for a while and decided to try making wine and mead for a different experience. I found the flexibility inherent in mead recipes to be what drew me in. In addition I like honey and find the whole process of beekeeping and honey making by the bees to be fascinating.

My meads have so far been pretty good but none are outstanding yet. My first mead was a spiced mead that had too much cloves. The second was Joe's Grape Mead that was too grapey. The third was a simple cyser using fresh pressed cider.
The cyser was the best so far but the others continue to improve with age. Most really seem to take a major step forward when they are a year old. The spice and fruit flavors mellow and the honey becomes more noticeable. My over spice mead and grapey mead became quite good and the cyser continued to improve.

Craig

I"m a big fantasy novel reader/ AD&D player, so I'd seen many references to mead over the years.

When someone started an SCA group in my hometown I was introduced to brewing, and to mead making. mead was the first thing I ever fermented (illegally when i was 17 in my closet, hidden from the parents).

I'm 31 now so its all good.

claphamsa said:

I was bored one new years day, so I drove an hour to Fredrick MD and got all the stuff for a 1gallon batch.... it was awesome!

Click to expand...

I was at a brewday with clap and another forum member and loved the sweet mead we had.

I had tried some other really dry and/or really "out there" stuff from some people in my local club, but having some of clap's mead set me off to making my own.

My girlfriend is allergic to gluten, so I wanted to make something that wasn't beer.