First batch of Mead

Well I brewed my first batch of Mead tonight. It didn't go to bad, everything timed out pretty good except for cooling the must. I had almost forgot about cooling it before adding the yeast. The yeast sat for approx. 10 minutes after I mixed it up per instruction on the package. I ran out of ice and was only able to get the temp. of the must down to approx. 78 - 80 degrees. My damn digital thermometer decided not to work when I started brewing, so I am guessing about the temp, I was able to put my hands around the brew pot and it didn't feel to warm.

So I poured the must into my 1 gallon carboy, added 1/2 tsp of yeast nutrient then added the yeast. I also added some more water to bring the batch to a gallon . I am hoping that brought the temp down alittle more. Put my sanitized bung and 3 piece airlock into the carboy and put it into a small cooler I have, and added a couple of frozen bottles of water to help keep the temp to around 75 degrees.

I poured some of the must into my Hydrometer Test jar and did a Hydrometer test. Checking the temp. (with my broken thermometer) said the temp was at 83 degrees and the Hydrometer reading was OG (Original Gravity) 1.140. So using the Hydrometer Temperature Correction script on The Recipator website, I came up with a OG of 1.143. I hope that is correct

I will check the batch tomorrow to see if it is fermenting. wish me luck.

PS I need to get a new thermometer

So... is that a good OG for Mead? and will I have a problem not pitching my yeast right away? Also.. I am using a 3 piece airlock, will I have any problems with blowoff, should I use a blowoff tube?

Meads and wines don't explosively ferment like beer does. When I started my batch of mead it made these weird yeast bubbles on the surface but never to the point of needing a blowoff tube. Also, did you shake the unholy crap out of that must before you added the yeast? For an OG that high the yeast will need lots and LOTS of oxygen and yeast. What kind of yeast are you using?

Pitching right away is just fine, but it'd start showing signs of fermenting faster if you'd made a starter with applejuice.

Also, your potential ABV is going to be 19.3%, so you're definitely going to have a sweet mead there.

Thanks for the reply eviltwinofjoni...

I shook the hell out of the bottle for about 3 or 4 minutes and then added a yeast nutient and then the yeast. I used Lalvin EC-1118 Champagne Yeast.

Mmmm sweet mead

here is the recipe I used (modified a bit)

Still of the Night Mead - (1 gallon batch)

Ingredients:

• 1/2 tsp. acid blend - (Didn't use)
• 1/4 tsp. gypsum - (Didn't use)
• 3.5 lbs. honey (clover or wildflower)
• 1/2 tsp. Fermax or other yeast nutrient
• Lalvin EC-1118 Champagne Yeast

I checked the progress this morning on my Mead and noticed a few small bubbles, so I am getting a small amount of fermentation. The problem is... the (2) frozen 20 oz bottles of water I put in the cooler with the carboy took the temp down to 62 degrees. A little to cold for a good fermentation. So now I have to get the carboy back up to around 75 degrees... Hope that doesn't cause problems with the Mead.

Well, lesson learned... Glad to know that I can keep a 1 gallon carboy cooled below 70 degrees. I will have to see what (1) 20 oz frozen bottle will do, if I'm lucky it will keep it around the perfect temp and I will just have to exchange it out each day with a fresh frozen bottle.

The OG of my first mead that I'm working on was very close to yours. I use an aquarium pump and two steril stones for getting some O2 in there. Even using a starter with my smack pack fermentation took it's time getting started. That was that was over three weeks ago and I still have airlock activity. The mead is a longer process than the beer in the primary, and an even longer time in the secondary. I did sneak a taste of it in the transfer from primary to secondary and I am VERY happy with the results...

Hey gauthierk,

How active was your fermentation... I have timed my at between 8 - 10 large bubbles a minute. Does that sound right or is it a little slow?

Also... how long did you keep it in primary before transfering to secondary?

I am planning on tranfering in about 2 weeks.

Creger, everything looks just fine. Your bubble rate is OK, and expect it to keep bubbling at that rate for quite a while.

Plan on racking after 3 to 4 weeks, but that isn't all that critical.

There as an old friend of Jeff's, who is a long-time meadmaker, show up at work Saturday. I picked his brain for a while. He said, rack it once, then throw it in the closet and forget it for a few months. Just check on the bubbler, and make sure it still has water in it. He said not to even worry about temps, just leave it alone.

He also brought in a 7 year old bottle, and that tasted GOOD!!

steve

Very cool steve... thanks for the help here & at the store last weekend. I will hopefully be in next Sat or Sun to get so more stuff

Have a great weekend

well ill have to keep an eye on this thread..been wanting to do a mead for a looonnnnggggg time now lol good luck!

Guys, (and gals) mead is just about the easiest product to ferment. It also needs a LOT less equipment.

Let's figure this out, what equipment do you need, for a typical 5 gallon batch.

A 2 gallon pot, IF you heat up your honey/water mix. ($20)(if you don't have one already.)

A 5 gallon carboy, with airlock and bung cork. ($30)

Some Iodophor. ($5)

A Wine Thief, and a hydrometer/flask. (If you worry about SG.) ($15)

Bottles.

Beer? Well, that would be $100 or more for all glass.

steve

Well, using (1) 20 oz frozen bottle of water in the cooler with the mead keeps it at around 72 to 74 degrees. Not too bad I have been taking the bottle out when I get home from work (since its all melted) and by morning the temp is around 76 to 78 degrees. I add a new frozen bottle before I go to work since my apartment gets up to around 85 degrees, that then takes it back down to 72 to 74 degrees by the time I get home... then it starts over again

It is still bubbling away, I timed it and it is bubbling about 8 to 9 bubbles a minute. I think once it gets down to a bubble every 30 seconds or so I will take a reading and see where I am at.

Well, my mead finally got to about 1 bubble every 45 seconds so I decided to transfer it to the clearing bottle. After transferring I took a hydrometer reading and the corrected reading came out at 1.017. Not to bad concidering it started out at 1.143.

I punched the numbers in BeerAlchemy and came up with the numbers below:

Apparent Attenuation: 86.8%
Real Attenuation: 71.1%
ABW%: 13.52
ABV%: 17.31

I drank the sample and it has a strong alcohol taste (it should for being almost 18%) I am sure it will mellow out after awhile, I also noticed a kinda yeasty smell which I’m sure will go away too. I plan on letting it just sit for a few months, maybe a few days before New Year’s Eve I will take another hydrometer reading. If its not too bad, I will bottle it up. We will see…

Here’s a current pic of it:

For some reason, that bottle looks familiar!

Oh, we were VERY busy today. I think we broke sales records for the second day in a row. Glad I'm getting Sunday off, but I'll be there Monday.

Since your primary 1 gal is free, how about a small batch of low gravity Mead? Something around 1.5-2 pounds, and possibly a cyser? You can use Nottingham or Lalvin D-47 for that.

steve

I thinkyou guys may have answered my mead question. I am currently fermenting my first batch and was not sure what to expect. It has been in primary for 3 weeks and just seems to keep bubbling along(not in the same fashion as beer, but fairly consistently 10-20 sec). Should I wait until it slows down to rack it or just rack it in a certain timeframe.

During the 3 week mark mine was going at about the same rate as yours, I decided to leave it until it was between 1 and 2 bpm. Just so I could make sure the yeast did all it do. Like I said in my previous post, now I'm going to let it set for 2 months to clear... then bottle.

Goodluck on your batch!

BTW... what was your recipe if you don't mind?

I was thinking about that too steve. I might purchase "The Compleat Meadmaker" to see what other options there are.

Thanks again for your help Sat.

I satarted my first batch roughly the same time as yours, cregar, and my timetable has been roughly the same also. My recipe was simply:
3 lb clover honey
1 tsp yeast nutrient
1 pack Levlin 1118 champagne
water to 1 gal
OG: 1.100

I'm going to rack sometime in the next day or so (the 5-week point) and let clarify for as long as it takes. What's the community wisdom on stabilizing and clarifying agents? Are you going to use campden tablets and/or a clarifying agent, or are you just going to let the yeast dies out naturally? I don't know what I'm going to do at that point.

One interesting thing, though: I started a scuppergnong mead (exact same recipe with the addition of juice steeped and strained from the pulp of 3 lbs of scuppergnongs) 1 week after the above batch. It's still bubbling at the same rate as the original batch was at the 4-week point but it's already clearer than the original is now. I can only attribute this to the bits of pulp helping the yeast to floculate better. At any rate, I'm very happy with the look and color of that batch - hopefully it will taste good in the end as well.

I noticed you only used 1/2 tsp nutrient, most info I've read says 1 tsp/gal. Obviously you had no problem with fermentation (17% ABV!!!!). Where'd you get the idea to use 1/2 tsp?

Happy Meading,
Focus

Focus, I wasn't planning on using any clarifying agent... this is my first batch of mead, so any advice on this from more experinced meadmakers would be great.

I honestly can't remember where I found the recipe at but it stated 1/2 tsp, so thats what I used. Yea... fermentation went good. I just used a 1/2 pound more honey then you so mine is going to be sweeter. I guess thats why my OG was 1.143

The recipe I used was 1 gallon of honey. A dark honey recommended by a local beekeeper (said it was preferred by meadmakers for its flavors). I also added 1/2 tsp of yeast nutrient for the whole batch (not sure where I read that but it seems to be fermenting OK with that little amount) and 1 tsp Irish moss as a clarifier. I used the E1118 yeast as well. Sorry these are the amounts for a 5 gallon batch.

Cregar, I just noticed in your sig, you're planning a spiced ale. Perhaps this one?

http://www.brewersconnection.com/recipes/Blitzers.htm

steve

Just racked my first and second batch yesterday.

First my observations:
Both had a strong alcohol taste to them and very dry as well which was as expected from the 1118 yeast. They also had a very strong yeasty taste which I really hope goes away with some more settling out.

Next, my questions:
1) How do you siphon from these bottles? My auto-siphon doesn't fit, so I siphoned by mouth (gasp!). I know I'm not supposed to, but this is the first time I've ever not been able to use the auto-siphon so I was totally lost.
2) How do you take your SG readings? I'm assuming a sampling flask or something. I couldn't take an SG reading bc my hydrometer rested on the bottom of the jar.
3) so you're not going to rack into another secondary? You expect that it'll be clear enogh to bottle by New Years? I hope so, but we'll see.

Look forward to comparing more notes...
Focus

Focus said:

1) How do you siphon from these bottles? My auto-siphon doesn't fit, so I siphoned by mouth (gasp!). I know I'm not supposed to, but this is the first time I've ever not been able to use the auto-siphon so I was totally lost.

Click to expand...

I just use my standard siphon tube filled with water... run the siphon till a little of the mead shows up and then put the end of the tubing in the other jar... works like a charm

Focus said:

2) How do you take your SG readings? I'm assuming a sampling flask or something. I couldn't take an SG reading bc my hydrometer rested on the bottom of the jar.

Click to expand...

While siphoning I transfer alittle into my hydrometer testing tube.

Focus said:

3) so you're not going to rack into another secondary? You expect that it'll be clear enogh to bottle by New Years? I hope so, but we'll see.

Click to expand...

I racked into a secondary about a month after fermentation started. I waited till I was at about 1 to 2 bpm before transferring.

Cregar,

What's the latest with your mead batch that you started about the same time as I did? I went away for a little over a week and when I came back, I was a little disappointed with the lack of clarification that had occurred. Just wondering how yours is clearing and if there's anything I could be doing to speed it up.

Focus

Focus said:

Cregar,

What's the latest with your mead batch that you started about the same time as I did? I went away for a little over a week and when I came back, I was a little disappointed with the lack of clarification that had occurred. Just wondering how yours is clearing and if there's anything I could be doing to speed it up.

Focus

Click to expand...

Sorry focus, must have missed this post. Didn't mean to ignore you.

It's been in secondary for about 2 1/2 months now, not sure when I will bottle it. I did taste it a few weeks ago and damn it was tasting good, the alcohol taste is mellowing out really well... just a slight taste. It's also clearing pretty well to, nice golden color.