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I’ve never said to much about stabilizing, so I guess I should. Nothing wrong with stabilizing. Sulfite allergy is a myth. No one complains about white wine and they have far more natural and added sulfites than red wine. It is far more likely to have an allergy to some ester the yeast produce...

I’ve not tried the Omega yeast yet. Which one was better?

After further testing, Wyeast 1388 was better for sweet mead. It just needs a higher SG to end sweet.

Day 26 Very potent cherry. The tannins from the cherry wood both reinforce the flavor and make it taste drier than the 1.011 FG would suggest. It needs more time on the cherry wood to increase body. I also think a bit of vanilla would help the cherry pop more. Added 1 whole vanilla bean.

There is really only one safe way to make a sweet carbonated mead. Keg the sweet mead and force carbonate it. Truth is once you get a keg, you don’t know how you survived without. Even a 2.5 gallon keg would be fine.

My guess would be excess DAP. It is now known that yeast cannot uptake DAP after 9% ABV or so. It tends to lend a taste like you describe when it’s leftover. It really doesn’t age out. I would suggest looking into TOSNA. I avoid DAP these days.

Ha! No, it’s a grain used for English and Scottish beers: https://www.northernbrewer.com/products/english-maris-otter

Mead of Ra Uncarbonated fresh out of cold crash. Surprisingly smooth with dates in the forefront and mandrake bitterness on the back to balance the sweetness. It has a very unique taste that is really hard to describe. Almost heather or maris otter in nature. Very flowery. Extremely tasty...

1. The new breaks are based on using Fermaid O. Fermaid O requires the yeast to process peptide chains into YAN. You can find all the details here: https://denardbrewing.com/blog/post/Liquid-yeast-SNA/ 2. Mead is a higher gravity than beer. That is why we require more yeast. Forget what the...

Attenuation means nothing to honey as there are no unfermentable sugars. As long as the ABV tolerance of the yeast is not reached, honey will go to 1.000. In this recipe, there is some wheat DME that contains about 0.005 points of unfermentable sugar. As a result, I expect it to finish around...

Day 3 Gravity 1.028. I tasted it at room temperature cloudy with yeast as the Egyptians would have. What a surprise! This is a very clean brew that has balance between the honey sweetness and mandrake bitterness. I figured this would take a few tries to get right, but maybe not. It really...

Actually, it is well researched. Many folks use mandrake root as a recreational hallucinogenic. Me personally, I would rather not have hallucinations. As a result, I was very careful to research about the dose and thermal stability of the active tropane alkaloids. I also researched dose in users...

It’s hard to say. Yeast can originate from anything a bee pollinates, the hive location or the human harvesting it. The real question is does the yeast that survives in bee hives make better mead. I tend to think the selection process of surviving a honey hive would make the yeast more suitable...

For the folks that need examples: Wyeast 1388 control Yeast Isolate A White Filamentous Fungi Black Mold As a testament to the antimicrobial properties of honey, half my plates are blank like this. A little taste of my lab! From this batch, 3 isolates are pure enough to make mead...

Day 2 Added nutrients. As always, swirling daily. Day 5 Gravity 1.028. Tastes wonderful with a nice tartness. Still fermenting strong. Can’t wait to see how this is once the cherry wood comes through.

Day 1 1.080. Foaming vigorously. It smells very herbal at this point.

Mead of Ra is an ancient Egyptian inspired mead for my historical series. This recipe is heavily inspired by the mead found in Kit Tut’s tomb. From all my research into ancient Egypt, Egyptians brewed many variations of a red brew. Common ingredients were wheat, barley, dates, honey, ginger...

No worries Bernard. I love the genuine questions you are asking. Peer review is always a good thing as you understand. Let us back up. Let’s say the honey has 5 strains of yeast. I streak for isolation 1 time and pick a single colony. Only, let’s play devils advocate and say it was actually 3...

Beauty is the finished product; not the process to get there. You don’t have anything unusual here. Rack the clear part into a new container and taste. If it’s good, bottle after it clears again. If it isn’t, let it age with minimal head space.

The entire basis of microbiology is streaking for isolating. This is something that has been proven with genetic testing for a very long time. I didn’t invent this, I was trained how to use it. The idea is that repetitive streaking from a well isolated colony generates a pure strain (since each...