First Mead

[Manoau2002]

I have been thinking about making mead for a while and I decided to just go for it last night (without really looking at any recipes) and bought 6 kilo's of honey (cheap walmart stuff) and 8 500mg jars of blueberry jam (again cheap walmart stuff)

I dumped the blueberry jam into a pot with about a gallon of water and got it hot enough to break down the jam into a juice. I had about a half kilo of white sugar kicking around so I dumped that in as well. I dumped the blueberry jam juice into the fermenter with the 6 kilo's of honey. After adding some water, in total I had about 5.5 gallons of liquid.

After it cooled down (this morning) I pitched a packet of belgium ale yeast I had in my fridge. (Didn't know when I could get to a homebrew store with my work schedule) Later in the day I made it to the homebrew store and bought some ec-1118 yeast and some yeast nutrient. I am planning to add more nutrient on the 3rd, 5th, and 10th days in the fermenter.

Any ideas how this will turn out? Any suggestions to improve it? How long should I let it age? The sugar content appears to be above what my hydrometer can read - is there to much sugar between the honey, jam, and white sugar?

 

[S-Met]

Honey, wally jam and sugar are all mostly sugars.

By my math, you have around 24-25lb of possible fermentable sugar with a theoretical potential alc of 25%. But I'm not sure if I did the approximations correctly because of beer drinking, so could be way off.

My bigger concern is if the jelly had any preservatives. That may mess with the ferment. Second concern is if the yeast can handle it.

 

[Manoau2002]

I have a large carboy so I was able to add another gallon of water. I am now getting a reading of an alcohol potential of about 16-17 percent.

I bought the Walmart Jam thinking it might be preservative free (I didn't see any funky chemicals listed) It does however have ascorbic acid (Vitamin C) - which according to some research does have preservative qualities. Should this affect the fermentation much? - I know people add oranges and orange juice to mead all the time and these also have ascorbic acid.

 

[S-Met]

Ascobic acid is safe.

 

[bernardsmith]

You might find the jams have both pectins and high fructose sugars. The pectins will help make the mead hazy so it might have been a good idea to have added pectic enzyme rather than further cook the jam. High fructose sugars are not supposed to be a problem (for wine making, I mean, not health) but the only times I have ever had stalled fermentations is when I have used jams as my fruit source. Your experience may be very different

 

[Manoau2002]

You might find the jams have both pectins and high fructose sugars. The pectins will help make the mead hazy so it might have been a good idea to have added pectic enzyme rather than further cook the jam. High fructose sugars are not supposed to be a problem (for wine making, I mean, not health) but the only times I have ever had stalled fermentations is when I have used jams as my fruit source. Your experience may be very different

Yes the Jam does contain both pectin and some high fructose sugars. I watched some youtibe videos about using Jam after the fact and found out about the pectic enzymes. I may try that if I do another batch. I have only drank mead once before and it was a huge let down -didn't taste at all like I suspected. Resembled very low quality white wine. (As in low quality compared to grocery store white wine) But a couple coworkers talk about mead frequently and one makes it so I figured I would give it a shot. (I have been brewing beer for several years off and on)

 

[bernardsmith]

The secret of mead making is to be able to make what is called a traditional mead: honey, water, yeast (and nutrients). If you can successfully make a mead with just these four ingredients then you can make any kind of mead (with fruit, spices, herbs, hops etc etc etc). What most mead makers manage to do is try to mask poor meadmaking with the adjuncts.. That, and the assumption that mead must be sweet or it must compete with scotch or vodka in terms of its alcohol level. You can make a great mead, sweet or brut dry with 5% alcohol or 15% and everything in between sweet and dry and between 5 and 15% (You can make a mead with a higher ABV but the key to all wine making is balance and not inebriation). Of course, since all flavor AND alcohol comes from the honey then the lower the ABV the less rich the flavor... BUT there are varietal honeys whose flavor can take center stage even at low starting gravities and there are blends of honeys that even before you dilute with water the taste should be a spear holder and not the star performer...

 

[S-Met]

What I don't know very well are yeast tolerance and honey fermentation efficiency. I think that not all of honey is fermentable amd some of the fruit/jelly sugar may not ferment all the way, but probably on track for a 12-14% mead, depending on the yeast. The ec-1118 is a beast, if you use that next time, but I dont think i would pitch that on top of your Belgian yeast unless it gets suck.