Okay, I was putting my mead into secondary and was using sorbate/sulphite. I was finally just topping it up in its secondary container...pouring in some honey water and I noticed the mead was fizzing a bit. I just assumed it was some yeast / co2 reacting to the sugar so carried on. After I topped it up I looked at the bottle that I had used. Low and behold....TONIC WATER! This stuff is horrid...it has sweeteners / quinine in it and tastes foul. Anyhoo...will my mead ever recover from this? Will the harsh quinine taste ever disappear? It was around 450ml of it in a 4.5 litre (1 imperial gallon) carboy.
Accident...
- Thread starter tobinobin
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Hah we can only hope...this'll definitely be a batch that I just let age for a good two years. Will be interesting to see the results. It was originally going to be a dry-ish mead...but I'm toying with the idea of making it medium to try and hide the quinine taste.
My guess is that you are breaking new ground by adding Tonic water to your mead mid fermentation... I'd RDWHAHB and see what happens! I can't imagine that it'll affect your brew too much dew to the fact that only 1/9 of it is Tonic water.
I'm guessing you might want to add some honey to it so it doesn't taste watered down.
I hope it taste great once it ages a bit!
Good luck!
I'm guessing you might want to add some honey to it so it doesn't taste watered down.
I hope it taste great once it ages a bit!
Good luck!
I would think that is a good way to go, but I'd sure like to hear from one of the experts on it!
Well now your mead is buffered against malaria... :cross:
The CO2 in the tonic will come out (obviously) the harsh bitters of the quinine - I don't know. Have you sampled what you have yet?
The CO2 in the tonic will come out (obviously) the harsh bitters of the quinine - I don't know. Have you sampled what you have yet?
Haha - I'm now prepared for when global warming brings Scotland's temperatures up to levels that would be hospitable to mosquitoes!
I tried it...it had a bitter undertone. Added more honey and should be a bit better now.
turtlescales
Well-Known Member
Let it age, see what happens. Maybe down the road you'll find yourself with another batch that you are only so pleased with and you can blend the two into something amazing.
That sounds like a good plan. Cheers! I'll post a reply on this thread in a good year or two from now to tell you guys my findings heh.
AxisDenied
Member
I have added tonic water to my HomeBrew before. Sadly the results were not good.
Ok, why hasn't anyone asked: WTF was tonic water doing in your carboy!?!?
Still, I think it might be awesome...I love tonic water, and it's my go-to 'drink' when I can't drink...
Still, I think it might be awesome...I love tonic water, and it's my go-to 'drink' when I can't drink...
I mistook it for still water when I was filling up the carboy lol...I know I know, I'm having quite the off day.
It sounds like an off day, and as someone else posted, perhaps one of the most fortuitous mistakes in the history of mead making...if it turns out interesting... But I'm still confused, and always need to know...having never been to Scotland, so they sell regular water and tonic water in identical containers, or did you accidentally fill the carboy from your tonic water tap instead of the water spigot?
It sounds like an off day, and as someone else posted, perhaps one of the most fortuitous mistakes in the history of mead making...if it turns out interesting... But I'm still confused, and always need to know...having never been to Scotland, so they sell regular water and tonic water in identical containers, or did you accidentally fill the carboy from your tonic water tap instead of the water spigot?
Embarrassingly....neither. The tonic water was a 1l curved bottle, whereas the still water was in a much larger 2l bottle. Think of it as one of those moments your brain just scrambles lol, like putting a bowl in the bin etc etc. We'll see how it goes hah, hopefully drinkable in a few years!
Sorry to call you out on it, but I had to know! Perhaps this could be a planned brew...I'm thinking a lime zest metheglin bottled with a bit of tonic and fresh lime juice in each bottle...hmmm....
I have to agree with Biochemedic, Tonic and lime go very well together! But will lime in the secondary work? Other then JAOM, I've never tried citrus in mead! Off to the "Mead Recipies" section to check.... brb!
OK, so here are some citrus based meads:
Light Lemonade Mead
Nerro's Sour Citrus Melomel
Sweet Raspberry Mead
"Cuties" orange mead
If you decide to lime it up to go with the Tonic, they may help guide you.
And I bet if you incorporated any of the following recipies into your current brew it would taste great. But these are just ideas, the last thing I'm going to try to do is tell you what to do with your mead!
I also don't see any harm in just leaving it, unless you find it very foul!
Good luck!
Light Lemonade Mead
Nerro's Sour Citrus Melomel
Sweet Raspberry Mead
"Cuties" orange mead
If you decide to lime it up to go with the Tonic, they may help guide you.
And I bet if you incorporated any of the following recipies into your current brew it would taste great. But these are just ideas, the last thing I'm going to try to do is tell you what to do with your mead!
I also don't see any harm in just leaving it, unless you find it very foul!
Good luck!
Thanks for the lime idea guys! Sounds very interesting...thanks Dev for the recipe links. Since I've stopped fermentation, I'm quite interested in a raspberry flavour...would this work now that it's all stopped?
After taking a closer look at the “Sweet Raspberry Mead” I am thinking that something seems a bit off with it. I’d maybe go with this one instead:
Raspberry Melamel
It looks to be almost the same recipe, but in more realistic proportions. Just divide everything by 3 to get a 1 gallon recipe. As far as adding to the mead after fermentation has been stopped, it should be fine. It might come out sweeter then intended, but
Raspberry Melamel
It looks to be almost the same recipe, but in more realistic proportions. Just divide everything by 3 to get a 1 gallon recipe. As far as adding to the mead after fermentation has been stopped, it should be fine. It might come out sweeter then intended, but
tobinobin said:
If you pop them in whole, I have heard it is best to freeze then first. A grain bag would make racking easier (just put thawed fruit in the grain bag before adding to the mead)
Some people prefer to put them through a blender first. Since you have already stabilized this might make sense, as fermentation probably helps release the juices, and your fermentation will be drastically hindered.
So I think freeze, then thaw, then blend.
