First time mead - opinions on my recipe?

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Jdrummer24

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Hi, I'm planning on starting my first mead in the near future. I currently have two gallons of a very simple wine recipe fermenting right now and they are my first ever shots at the home brewing world.
The batch I intend to start next is 5 gallons of apple pie mead. I'm making up the recipe as I go so I was hoping for some oppinions. I was planning on using 12 lbs of honey, 1lb of brown sugar, 4 cans of Welch's 100% apple juice concentrate, a packet of yeast, top my carboy off with water then add three sliced apples and a stick and a half of cinnamon before starting the fermentation process.
My main concerns are whether or not the sugar content is right and whether or not my flavors will be potent enough but I'm open to all educated criticism.
 
Welcome to HBT!
Well, just at a quick glance I think it would come out rather light on flavour.
the recipies section has some good references to look at such as this recipe: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=389463

Thank you much for redirecting me! If you have any suggestions on whether or not that particular mixture of honey and brown sugar will be sufficient nutrients for my yeast to survive or on the amount/kind of yeast, it would be greatly appreciated.
 
Nutrients are very important when brewing mead. I would suggest looking up SNA or staggered nutrient additions for most meads. Some low alcohol meads you can get away with a single dose of nutrient, but most times proper nutrient additions can be the difference between 6 months for a mead and 1 year or longer for the same mead to be drinkable.

To sum it up, always add nutrient to mead.
 
I'd say your batch specific gravity will pretty high based on the recipe. I'd start with 6 pounds of honey and target a starting gravity of about 1.100-1.110. You should buy a hydrometer so yo can measure SG. Buy some Fermaid-K at the same time so you can feed your mead the proper nutrients. Hydrometers and Fermaid-K can be purchased on Amazon.com.
 

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