First Commercial meads

I was out in PA all last week and managed to bring home 6 bottles from Stonekeep Meadery!!! Got x2 Strawberry Melomel(which is slightly carbonated which I'm guessing wasn't intended since it was just corked in a normal bottle but is good anyway). Got x3 of their Hibiscus melomel and x1 bottle of their traditional(wanted 2 but they only had 1 left). I sampled them all while I was out there and they were all fantastic, however I wasn't a big fan of their black courant mead(didn't buy any), but others seemed to love it.

I have to say, I am extremely surprised how good these were, so far all I've really had has been my own mead, none of which are really ready to drink yet, so I'm very happy to have a few good bottles

Here's the bottle of strawberry that we cracked open with dinner tonight


Just thought I'd share, hopefully mine will turn out half as good as these!

Can't remember exactly, it came to $101 total, so that would be around $16/bottle(probly $14-$15 without tax, I lost the receipt and don't remember what the tax was in PA)

i am sure the vice tax over all is much more than that most states in total are around 25% or more its all the embeded tax + sales is 28%

Well if the tax really is 25%, then it was more like $12/bottle, which I wouldn't consider all that expensive for a bottle of wine or mead(yes I know you can occassionally find a really good bottle of wine for $5, but that's hard to do).

While I don't have any of my own mead that's ready to drink yet, I have plenty of homebrew available, but I'll still ocassionally pack up a 6 pick or bomber of something new from the store.

I'm also not brewing or making mead to save money on my drinks, I'm doing it because I enjoy the process and like the end result, but I still don't see myself ever not buying commercially made drinks no matter how much I make,

Fair enough, however also keep in mind that I have yet to be able to find any commercially available meads for sale in my area(Other than chaucer's but I consider that a dessert wine and am not a fan), so cost wasn't really so much of a concern here, it was more just the opportunity to pick up something to compare my own meads to. If I could just drive to the store and buy some more I probably would only have grabbed 2 bottles, however since getting more would involve flying out to the east coast again, I got 6

I picked up a bottle of Red Stone here for around $28 I think it was around 24 oz or maybe a little larger. It was the only mead I have seen here in Hawaii that has made the list of "good commercial meads" popping up in many threads here.
I spent the money to get a comparison between a good commercial traditional mead, and what I have been making. Needless to say IMNSHO, mine is better if only because it did not have to suffer shipping at unknown temperatures, etc.