Melomel Help

[parks1031]

Just started my first traditional mead yesterday with my eyes on the horizon planning my next batch. I really want to make a cherry melomel and have been looking everywhere for information. What is a useful tool to see how the addition of cherries in first affects gravity and ABV at the end? Also how would the addition of more cherries in second affect things? I want to make a 1 gallon batch using EC-1118 with a final ABV of around14%. Any info or tips would be appreciated!

 

[VikeMan]

If you know the OG of your base mead, you can estimate the effective combined OG (and ABV) using the FruitCalc spreadsheet, which can be downloaded at:

https://drive.google.com/drive/fold...ZTg0YWNm?resourcekey=0-HihRJws5cp48a4weGT5J2Q
ETA: With high-ish ABV beverages like Meads, the impact of adding fruit will almost always be to decrease the ABV, because of the water in the fruit.

 

[MightyMosin]

Good calculator over at
https://gotmead.com/blog/the-mead-calculator/

 

[parks1031]

Good calculator over at
https://gotmead.com/blog/the-mead-calculator/

So if I were to use the calculator, my current idea is 14%, 2.878 lbs of honey, 2 pound of cherry in primary fermentation. Do you have any recommendations on how long I should leave the cherry in primary? Should I add any juice or cherries in secondary?

 

[MightyMosin]

I'd say leave in primary until the fruit goes white-ish... Extract out as much as possible.

If you have a press, you can then extract out just about every bit before secondary and then rack.