Carbonating mead

I have had one of my meads in secondary for a couple of months now, and I am going ot bottle it this weekend. I am trying to carbonate it. Should I add some champagne yeast, or should I be OK without?

Also Ive never had a carbonated mead before (but this was ordered by my better half). Does anyone have any idea how much corn sugar to carbonate with?

- magno

Prime it the same way you would any ale. I doubt you'll need any extra yeast, you'll want to wait a few months before drinking anyway. Bear in mind, that you can carbonate a dry mead with yeast, but trying to carbonate a sweet mead is really tricky.

What's the current gravity?

Last I checked the gravity was 0.998. I doubt I should have bottle bombs, but let me know if you think otherwise.

Thanks.

You should be fine with the yeast already in there- just prime and bottle. I'd probably bottle it in beer bottles, with caps, though. Wine bottles/corks are not meant to hold pressure.

Lorena

lorenae said:

You should be fine with the yeast already in there- just prime and bottle. I'd probably bottle it in beer bottles, with caps, though. Wine bottles/corks are not meant to hold pressure.

Lorena

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Good point. The two other meads that Im doing for my wedding, which are uncarbonated, are going in wine bottles. This batch will go mostly in St. Sebastian pottery flip-tops, the rest will go in 22 oz and 12 oz bottles.

Below 1.000 is the correct answer. I know people that bottled mead after a year figuring even though it was 1.012 it was done. Nope!

Mango, what yeast did you use, and how much honey? I'm trying to figure out if your yeast is approaching it's limit. If it has, you may not get any conditioning. If it hasn't, you may get some bottle-grenades.

Mead's tricky that way.

steve

The batch that I am carbonating is actually a cyser, and I used WLP 775 English Cider Yeast, with 6 lbs honey and 3 gal apple juice.

The batch has already been bottled, but your input is still appreciated.

- magno

magno said:

I have had one of my meads in secondary for a couple of months now, and I am going ot bottle it this weekend. I am trying to carbonate it. Should I add some champagne yeast, or should I be OK without?

Also Ive never had a carbonated mead before (but this was ordered by my better half). Does anyone have any idea how much corn sugar to carbonate with?

- magno

Click to expand...

You should force carb with a FiZZ GiZ CO₂ dispenser and a FiZZ GiZ cap. I know this is an old thread. Now 'n again, people bump into it. Force carb'ing does not alter the sugar content. And, you get INSTANTANEOUS feedback from your palate. No need to wait months for natural carbonation to occur. Adding yeast 'n juggling the sugar content to achieve the desired level of sweetness after the yeast have eaten their proportionate share can be a real challenge.

I've bottle carbed a few batches....meads that I plan on carbing (typically melomels), I'll use a "hearty" yeast like KV-1116, shoot for a lower OG, typically ending up maybe 7 - 9 % abv, ferment dry, and bottle carb as I used to beer, and in beer bottles. The bottle carbing takes longer than ales (could take months, but it gets there) and the carbonation seems much "finer" than beer carbonation - dunno if it's actual, or just seems that way beings as there's no head on it like on a glass of beer. We have some sparkling peach, sparkling cyser, sparkling ginger, soon to bottle/eventually to sparkle cherry, for now.....might scale back on my haphazard mango recipe for a sparkling mango in the future.....my Mrs prefers the lighter sparklers, she's not a fan of oaked ginger habanero firewater, etc