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Definitely going to try to squirrel one away. Worst case, I'm wanting to upgrade to 3 gallon batches, and should have plenty to tuck away at that point. This will probably the first thing I make a larger batch of. Quite proud of how this turned out, despite being so young.

Last of the sediment finally fell out of suspension. Unfortunately, due to the sediment from the little bit of pulp that got through the strainer during the last addition of berries making the sediment extremely loose (if you looked at it wrong, you'd have to wait for everything to settle back...

5 days: 1.054 SG. Sulfur smell greatly diminished, almost unnoticeable.

72 hours: 1.078 SG. Sulfur-like smell which goes away when degassing still present. Added additional gram of Fermaid-O. Will see if underfeeding was the issue if smell still present at next check.

48 hours: 1.088 SG. Bentonite added. Might have gone too light on the nutrients, getting some pretty pungent sulfurous gorilla farts from this.

Quick update. Took a peek at the bottles on day 2 of bottle conditioning. This is already clearing up a lot more than I expected. Not sure about this bottle having a layer of foam though. None of the others have that. Tested seal a few hours after priming, it's definitely holding pressure.

24 hours: 1.100 SG. Was figuring this might take a day or two to start up, unlike wine yeast, but I was wrong. Already chewed through 8 points worth of sugars, and have decent offgassing. Very thick layer of foam formed when degassing and aerating. Just eyeballing it, was probably around 1/2...

Interesting, I was unaware of this recipe being posted. I've never seen it done with white grape juice either, usually see frozen concord concentrate. My fiancee wanted white though, so I decided to give it a shot with this stuff:

While not necessarily fitting the definition of "bootleg," thought it sounded better than "hobo pyment." I'm sure most people with at least a passing interest in fermenting, or just getting drunk, are familiar with cheap wine made from grape juice, table sugar, and bread yeast. Intentionally...

Day 9: still at 1.010 SG. Added additional 0.3oz of hops to fermenter. Doesn't need much additional flavor, will check again in the morning. Day 10: primed with 0.68oz turbinado sugar, fined with gelatin, and bottled. I don't expect this to be much clearer after it finishes carbonating. Added...

Mead was pretty clear this morning and had a thick layer of sediment from the berry juice (pressed in a metal strainer, some was to be expected), and additional honey. Gravity unchanged from 1.028. Racked off of sediment to a new jug to finish clearing. Taste notes: nice mix of fermented and...

When sampling, the flavor is good but seems like it needs something. Primary fermentation should be finishing soon, was thinking about dry hopping with an additional 0.1-0.3oz of lemondrop for 1-3 days to boost the citrus notes that seem to have blown off during fermentation.

Thanks Max. The color is actually exactly what I was shooting for. Was worried it would come out so dark you couldn't see through it, but seems to have worked out nicely. To be honest, the single bottle was removed because I both want to compare outcomes and want to put a friend's love of dry...

Gravity pics

5 days: 1.020 SG 6 days: 1.016 SG 8 days: 1.010 SG

Day 17 (2/17/19): Racked onto blackberry juice (2lbs frozen blackberries soaked in a small amount water and pectinase for several hours; solids strained off, small amount of sulfite added before racking). This added approximately 10 points to the gravity. Backsweetened with enough honey to give...

The lower abv one is the only one with any sediment in the bottle surprisingly. Think it's just particulates from the added honey. The traditional definitely needs a little age, but is already drinkable. Only a little rough around the edges despite being right at 1.000 SG.

Lesson learned. Wait to bottle after stabilizing and backsweetening. The bottles of cherry mead already have a small amount of sediment despite being crystal clear before the addition of extra honey. The dry traditional is still crystal clear and zero sediment. Shouldn't be much of an issue...

Personally I've heard that mango can be difficult to work with (no first hand experience, it's still on my to-do list). Supposedly works best if you put it in secondary or tertiary, after stabilizing.

Of course. I twist/jiggle the hydrometer to try to knock as many bubbes off as possible once it settles and check several times for inconsistency.