Orange blossom, coconut, serrano, thai basil, lemongrass, jasmine mead - crazy?

AZ_IPA said:

I was thinking jasmine tea would add a little tanin, but probably not much jasmine flavor, so I may look to jasmine flowers...

I may consider making a tea out of the basil and lemongrass as well, as to not overpower anything...

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AZ_IPA said:

So after sampling some of Sacchromyces' mead at NHC, I got to thinking about some over the top stuff.

What would you think about a coconut, serrano, thai basil, lemongrass, jasmine mead using orange blossom honey?

I was thinking jasmine tea would add a little tanin, but probably not much jasmine flavor, so I may look to jasmine flowers...

I may consider making a tea out of the basil and lemongrass as well, as to not overpower anything...

Thoughts?

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Saccharomyces said:

A little tannin would be nice. I've been thinking about jasmine flowers too but for a different mead. The only thing I can think of is that lemongrass seems like really strong stuff, you probably won't need very much!

Sounds like a fun experiment.

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GilaMinumBeer said:

Sounds like Thai Orange coconut shrimp in a glass. Jasmine would be a great addition. So long as she's single.




Or at least can keep a secret.

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Saccharomyces said:

For mine I used an 11oz bag of unsweetened coconut flakes in just over a gallon of the base mead. I split four Serrano peppers lengthwise and soaked them for 3 days in vodka. I ended up adding about 2/3 of the tincture. Habanero is a good choice, since it's fairly neutral. The Serranos I used because I had them on hand from the farmer's market produce box we get every two weeks. They are a bit grassy and perhaps not the best choice, I'm going to try Habanero next time.

The base mead was California Orange Blossom honey, OG 1.096. Yeast was 71B-1122 at a pitch rate of 2g per gallon, rehydrated with GoFerm and pitched at 59 degrees. I fermented at 62 with SNA, oxygen at 0, 12 and 24 hours, and de-gassing 2x per day until I got to 1.040. I adjusted the pH to 3.4 during fermentation with potassium bicarbonate. Once I reached the target gravity of 1.004 I crash cooled, fined with Isinglass to drop out the yeast and filtered before racking onto the coconut to prevent re-fermentation. I stabilized with potassium sorbate and 50ppm of sulfites prior to bottling, and filtered again with a 1 micron filter at bottling. The finished pH was 3.8. Next time I will adjust the pH to 3.2 during fermentation, to leave a bit more acidity in the finished mead, and I'll consider adding a few grams of tartaric acid as well. It ended up a bit flabby so I feel I over-adjusted the pH a bit (the pH will rise slightly after the yeast drop out). I have not yet titrated to determine the TA but I plan to the next time I open a bottle.

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humann_brewing said:

thanks, do the peppers go in when you put the coconut in?

and what are you filtering with?

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AZ_IPA said:

I'm thinking of maybe doing a vodka-based tincture for everything but the coconut....

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Saccharomyces said:

I added the pepper tincture to taste right before bottling.

You can use any filter. The first filtration was with a coarse filter and the second was with a 1 micron nominal filter. I have a Enolmatic bottling machine, which filters in-line as you bottle, for the second filtration. First (coarse) filtering I used a whole house filter between two corny kegs, and you just push from one keg to the other through the filter. The setup I use I got at BrewMasters Warehouse, if you search for "filter" you should find it. The filters he sells are washable and re-usable -- rinse and soak overnight in double strength PBW, rinse and dry them. Then just push sanitizer (I use Saniclean coming out of an extra keg) through the filter and purge it with CO2 prior to filtering. As long as you clean them carefully and dry thoroughly to prevent mold you should be able to re-use the filters 20x before they wear out.

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humann_brewing said:

So are those 10" filter housings pretty universal meaning I could buy the one from somewhere else and get 10" filters elsewhere like BMW and they would fit?

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Saccharomyces said:

Yep, they are. I know a lot of folks buy from filtersfast dot com, they are cheap and ship same day of your order, they've gotten several hundred bucks of my dough over the years.

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humann_brewing said:

nice, one last question and then I'll stop hijacking AZs thread. Do do you determine if the filters are washable? Are the Spun polypropylene ones washable?

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humann_brewing said:

nice, one last question and then I'll stop hijacking AZs thread.

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Saccharomyces said:

The Serranos I used because I had them on hand from the farmer's market produce box we get every two weeks. They are a bit grassy and perhaps not the best choice, I'm going to try Habanero next time.

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Soperbrew said:

Do you think the grassiness you refer to is something that might diminish with age?

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SpanishCastleAle said:

I have a few smoked habaneros a friend gave me (frozen) but they are super hot (all his peppers are hotter than grocery store equivalents). I only have 3.5 gal total of my first mead (traditional) and want to try something like this for a portion of it. How much habanero do you think would be right for ~1 gal?

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AZ_IPA said:

I'm sensing a variety of hot pepper mead swaps a year from now!

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Saccharomyces said:

For mine I used an 11oz bag of unsweetened coconut flakes in just over a gallon of the base mead. I split four Serrano peppers lengthwise and soaked them for 3 days in vodka. I ended up adding about 2/3 of the tincture. Habanero is a good choice, since it's fairly neutral. The Serranos I used because I had them on hand from the farmer's market produce box we get every two weeks. They are a bit grassy and perhaps not the best choice, I'm going to try Habanero next time.

The base mead was California Orange Blossom honey, OG 1.096. Yeast was 71B-1122 at a pitch rate of 2g per gallon, rehydrated with GoFerm and pitched at 59 degrees. I fermented at 62 with SNA, oxygen at 0, 12 and 24 hours, and de-gassing 2x per day until I got to 1.040. I adjusted the pH to 3.4 during fermentation with potassium bicarbonate. Once I reached the target gravity of 1.004 I crash cooled, fined with Isinglass to drop out the yeast and filtered before racking onto the coconut to prevent re-fermentation. I stabilized with potassium sorbate and 50ppm of sulfites prior to bottling, and filtered again with a 1 micron filter at bottling. The finished pH was 3.8. Next time I will adjust the pH to 3.2 during fermentation, to leave a bit more acidity in the finished mead, and I'll consider adding a few grams of tartaric acid as well. It ended up a bit flabby so I feel I over-adjusted the pH a bit (the pH will rise slightly after the yeast drop out). I have not yet titrated to determine the TA but I plan to the next time I open a bottle.

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humann_brewing said:

Sacc, what are you adjusting the pH with? Also, what pH meter do you have?

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Saccharomyces said:

I adjusted the pH to 3.4 during fermentation with potassium bicarbonate.

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SpanishCastleAle said:

Did you miss this part:


Medsen covered some of this, including cream of tartar (the salt of tartaric acid), in your other thread humann but I'm still unclear on the difference (in use and the difference in results) between the potassium bitartrate and tartaric acid.

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SpanishCastleAle said:

Did you miss this part:


Medsen covered some of this, including cream of tartar (the salt of tartaric acid), in your other thread humann but I'm still unclear on the difference (in use and the difference in results) between the potassium bitartrate and tartaric acid.

Click to expand...