Show us your Mead in a photo!!!

Blackberry melomel. A modified JOAM recipe. Can't wait to taste!
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Mead aging in the cellar.

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Raspberry Apple Juice & Clover Honey

Started in Jan. Racked in Feb. Cleared!

Bottled today.

Johan__ said:

Mead aging in the cellar.

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Very pretty!

I've thought in the past about starting to collect some clear long-necks for mead and/or cider...may have to revisit that idea, especially now that I'm bottling a lot of my mead largely in 12 oz containers instead of wine bottles...usually only a 1/2 to 3/4 of a case in the 750's.

Simple bochet, made about a year ago.

NibblesMN said:

Simple bochet, made about a year ago.

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Amazing anti-gravity mead! :rockin:

Bottled my Lemon Melomel yesterday! I have tried it twice now, a small taste while fermenting and a glass yesterday.
It is very lemon flavoured, like a hard lemonade. I like it! I hope it ages well.

front label and back label with ingredients

From left to right:
Cherry Bochet Lactomel
3 States Show Mead
Raspberry Saison Mead

Blackberry Orange Melomel, and a Apple Cyser. I've since re-racked and its been aging for about 6 months now.

Well, December 2012 I made up a gallon of cranberry mead with 71B. All was good but after sitting in a corner for a while and before my last racking I noticed the bright pink had turned nearly clear! The red cranberry color was left at the bottom of the 1 gallon jug. Below shows the color left behind, a glass of nearly clear mead after bottling and here, my last bottle 4 years later and a little darker. Tasted nice, definite honey at the end but nothing that could be discerned as cranberry.

jamaral141989 said:

Blackberry Orange Melomel, and a Apple Cyser. I've since re-racked and its been aging for about 6 months now.

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How the heck do you get your fruit in and out? Looks like you have apple quarters stuffed into that one gallon jug.

Once I re rack the mead they actually come out pretty easily. Sometimes a little shaking it upside down is needed but never had issues getting them out. Also I cut them into 8ths. Those were just some big apples.

Double down on the raspberry. Semi sweet on the left (just racked, still cloudy), dry on the right. Hard to be patient

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Metheglin and coffee mead

I'm new to mead making (about a month in) but here's my attempt at a raspberry melomel

Appearance-wise this looks like it's supposed to. Details please. What yeast did you use? Starting gravity? What kind and how much honey? Tell us how you made it. We share triumphs and commiserate failures here.

Thanks for the encouragement (but what is this thing you call "failures?" lol). I'll admit I kind of rushed headlong into this whole mead making thing, so I don't have the OG on my batches up till now. I did buy a hydrometer Sunday, though, so future batches will be properly documented.

As for ingredients, it's probably 1/2 to 3/4 gal of spring water, 40 oz. (2-1/2 lbs) of pure clover honey, and a whole packet (5g) of Lalvin K1-V1116 yeast. I also added 18 oz. of raspberries. The yeast was started with a 1/2 tsp. each of diammonium phosphate and an energizer and pitched into the must.

Okay, now I'm ready to receive instruction on what it was I actually should have done! Cheers!

Yeah, some meads don't turn out the way we hoped, that doesn't make them bad. Failure is probably too strong a word. Creatively different flavors... yeah, that's it.
Here's what you should have done different: NOT A DAMN THING.

You've done everything right in the proper proportions. If it is bubbling away, then let it ride. Write down the date when you pitched the yeast, then six to eight weeks from that date, (Mark it on your calendar.) take a reading with your new hydrometer. Gallon jugs are useful in that you can simply drop them in and take a reading without having to pour a sample.
Presuming the bubble fermenting has stopped after the six to eight weeks, two conditions have to be met: The reading must be 1.0 or lower, and two: the fruit should have fallen to the bottom of the jug. I've noticed that if the fruit in the primary has fallen, then the flavor is much better.
Raspberries have a high sugar content, so be prepared for the yeast to make a comeback when you get around to racking it. One of my pineapple meads blew it's cork yesterday. (The dog lapped it up and got drunk while I was at work, the sneaky bastard.) Despite filtering, racking and waiting a few extra weeks while it cleared, some yeast cells were dormant. The process of racking stirred and woke them up. They decided to munch on any remaining sugars and I now have naturally carbonated pineapple ginger mead.

You may want sparkling raspberry mead. Typing that out makes it sound like something you should shoot for. I am assuming you know what Camden tablets are and what they're for. My mistake is I always underestimate the amount needed to kill any yeast cells. I've a few batches that turn out sparkling. That in itself is not a failure, but a feature. The wife says my traditional tastes like champagne, but perhaps she's biased.

A mead rainbow? Its a treat walking down to the cellar!

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Here are Plum, Mulberry, and Pear Melomels.

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Just pitched blackberry mead

Mead No. 7

When pitched...



And 2 days later...



It's an attempt at a sweet mead. I used less than a half gallon of spring water, 5 lbs. of clover honey, and a half tsp (approx. half package) of Pasteur Blanc yeast (also 1 tsp. each of nutrient and energizer).

I had chosen Pasteur Blanc because on a website it said it had an alcohol tolerance of 13%-14%, but I subsequently found on another site it's as high as 18%. I'm hoping that using 5 lbs. of honey and the smaller than usual amount of water will exceed the yeast's capacity. Anyone have any ideas?

Also pictured are (clockwise) Meads 4, 6, and 1. No. 4 is a traditional mead using orange slices and raisins (a JAO knockoff I guess); No. 6 is my raspberry mead still in its primary; and No. 1 is my attempt at a knockoff of the Midnight Jack mead I tasted at Melovino Meadery. It is in a secondary where I added black raspberries, black currants, and black cherries.

Using this calculator, http://www.brewersfriend.com/homebrew/recipe/calculator/, your SG is estimated to be at 1.21SG. If your mead finishes just above 18%(18.4%) your FG would be at 1.07. That will be way to sweet to drink.

You will probably have to make another batch of the same recipe but say 1lbs of honey (gives you an SG of 1.042 = 6.8% @ .990FG) and an Ale yeast (maxes out around 14%ABV - Lallemande Abbaye Belgian Ale Yeast http://www.danstaryeast.com/company/products/abbaye-belgian-ale-yeast) to get a dry mead to blend with the super sweet batch. I would go so far as to say that you will probably have to make at least 2 gallons of dry mead to fully utilize the super sweet batch.

You can use this calculator http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/blending.asp for figuring out how much of each will be needed to get to your desired alcohol level. However, once you mix the dry mead with the sweet mead, the fermentation will probably kick off again to digest the new sweet mead.

I had to do something similar with my first batch of Mango Wine that pooped out too soon (@1.040)

Ummm, not sure what exactly is what.. there's some JAOM, a pumpkin and vanilla, one I made with some blue agave nectar (same sugar density as honey), Peach, and some others.

Johan__ said:

A mead rainbow? Its a treat walking down to the cellar!

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That cellar is amazing sir!!

Metheglin

Started this batch in January 2015. It is hands down my favorite. Himself likes it, but his favorite is the Erlking. Primary was Blackberry and Elderberry, American Oak powder, blueberries, and blueberry honey. Secondary, I added strawberries and elderflower. Tertiary was rum soaked french medium toast cubes, dried elderberries, and backsweetened.

This is our 2nd batch of Erlking Mead. It seems to be clearing nicely and we are hoping to bottle it sometime next month. This was started last December. Apple juice, cranberry juice, yaupon holly honey, cranberries, ceylon cinnamon, allspice, cloves, and star anise.

Johan__ said:

A mead rainbow? Its a treat walking down to the cellar!

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What bottles are these?

Here we go...
First one, Clive and All Spice Metheglyn, next Chocolate Bochet and last Sam's club Apple juice and local honey cyser...

Opinions taken on the bigger as is black as a barrel interior... I think I might have gone too far on the caramelizing....

Here is the raspberry I made.

Now with the picture

Black cherry mead

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Making 6 Florida wildflower meads using 6 different yeast strains.

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Here is a sample of my 1st true BOMM using Wyeast 1388, 6lbs of Wildflower honey, 6lbs of Orange blossom honey and 4lbs of Clover honey. SG 1.110 FG 0.990 = 15.7% ABV

Truly tastes great as is, there is still a residual honey taste and doesn't taste dry.

Pear/cardamom

Batch #1 Orange Blossom in a 2 gallon American Oak barrel.

Hibiscus melomel,View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1473646812.013272.jpg

Interesting, I add hibiscus to one of mine. It seemed to "mellow" or smooth out the taste.

Racked a gallon of 6 month old mead on to 800g of cooked brambles and another gallon onto 50g of dried elder flowers.

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