Adding Honey to the Must after 1 week of Primary Fermentation

First, if any of you guys are members at Gotmead.com and read this same thread there, I apologize for the double bombardment. I trust both forums and like to poll the expertise of both.

That being said...

I thought I started with a gallon of honey, but it turns out it was only 10 lbs, and not the typical 12 lbs for a gallon.

On top of that, it was my first batch and I was ignorant, so I pasteurized the honey/water at the beginning, which I now know probably burned off a certain amount of flavor and aroma.

It's only been in the primary for a week, and it is still bubbling actively (once per second) in the airlock, and sounds kind of like lightly boiling water when I press my ear up to the bucket.

Would there be something wrong with opening the lid and pouring in another 5 gallons of honey at this stage, stirring, closing the lid, and giving it another couple of weeks before racking to the carboy for secondary fermentation? I don't want my mead too dry, but I don't want it syrupy or overly sweet either. I also want it to be fairly strong, which I doubt it will be if I don't add this 5 lbs.

Thoughts?

Oh, and if I do this, should I toss in a few ground up campden tablets, which I never added at the initial stage?

I'm pretty new at this, but here are my thoughts.

First, I think it pays to be very conservative. If you think something might be broken, there's no sense taking radical steps to make certain that it's broken. I've yet to regret not fixing a recipe error. However, I've also made a couple of mid-course corrections that worked out well, so like all advice, a grain of salt is recommended.

You certainly could add honey at this point, but assuming you've had a quick start to your fermentation, you're going to need to find a way to mix it with the fermenting must without inducing excess oxygen (not an issue if you're still in the stage where you're aerating regularly). It might work to just dump it in, but I'd be a bit worried about that. Another approach would be to wait until you're going to rack and make up a batch of high-gravity must, then rack on top of that. That would probably provide better mixing.

I personally would not worry about campden. I'd probably sanitize the container the honey is in if I didn't heat it, just so the naturally sanitary honey doesn't scrape some bugs down into the must. Incidentally, this is another advantage of adding additional high-gravity must at secondary---the high alcohol content of the must will provide additional resistance to infection.

I also would not worry at all about boiling/pasteurizing the must. While it's common wisdom that this harms mead, it's not going to ruin it. At worst you may have less nose and perhaps a bit of a more subdued flavor, but some people actually prefer that. This is particularly true of stronger honeys. If this is a big factor in modifying your recipe now, I would definitely not bother. I think you're more likely to make things worse than better on this front.

Finally, did you get a starting gravity? How certain are you that you came up short on the honey? Honey varies in its sugar content, so I wouldn't jump to the conclusion that you came up low on your gravity unless you measured it.

Anyway, just some thoughts.

I have found adding honey later often renews and kicks up fermentation. Plus it often goes to the bottom and sets for a few days to a week before it gets absorbed into the mix

Nothing wrong with adding honey. I say warm the honey up (in the container its in) just enough so it flows and then just gently pour it in, the yeast will find it. Of course you don't have to add it at all too. Or do as already suggested and rack onto the honey addition, but keep in mind any addition will just keep the yeast eating, so if you add it after racking you will just have more of a second primary than a secondary with all the new sediment.

Edit: Staggered honey is a good way to get higher gravity brews to ferment smoothly by not giving the yeast more money than it can handle right off the bat.

Yes, it's called step-feeding. The point is to not overwhelm your yeast with honey at pitching. Instead, you let them chow down on a honey appetizer, then feed them some more.

I think the easiest way to mix in more honey would be to pull out a couple cups of must, and mix that with a pound of honey in a blender. just be sure to sanitize the carafe. and start the blender slow.

SandorClegane said:

First, if any of you guys are members at Gotmead.com and read this same thread there, I apologize for the double bombardment. I trust both forums and like to poll the expertise of both.

That being said...

I thought I started with a gallon of honey, but it turns out it was only 10 lbs, and not the typical 12 lbs for a gallon.

On top of that, it was my first batch and I was ignorant, so I pasteurized the honey/water at the beginning, which I now know probably burned off a certain amount of flavor and aroma.

It's only been in the primary for a week, and it is still bubbling actively (once per second) in the airlock, and sounds kind of like lightly boiling water when I press my ear up to the bucket.

Would there be something wrong with opening the lid and pouring in another 5 gallons of honey at this stage, stirring, closing the lid, and giving it another couple of weeks before racking to the carboy for secondary fermentation? I don't want my mead too dry, but I don't want it syrupy or overly sweet either. I also want it to be fairly strong, which I doubt it will be if I don't add this 5 lbs.

Thoughts?

Click to expand...

Sure, you can step-feed the yeast, think I'd go with 2 lbs instead of 5 though; the idea being to replace the missing 2lbs. You might want to do some staggered nutrient additions too (SNA) if you want to continue step-feeding. Hightest has some good info here:
http://home.comcast.net/~mzapx1/FAQ/SNAddition.pdf
Regards, GF.