Mazers:
Two returning home brewers with limited experience with wines - we "speak" in terms of beer.
Mead:
15# of wildflower (darker than I have seen before, complex taste) honey, one campden to get rid of chloramines, 5 gals water. Fed twice with Kferm during the ferment. No boil. Some tannin added, I think 1/4 tsp per 5 gallons offhand. I've never used that before but the guy at the LHBS nearly insisted that I needed it. Also used pectic enzyme, just in case.
Current Status:
My mead is in the secondary and is finished or damned close. It is below 1.000 and finished or nearly finished dropping. I also cooked up some sparkaloid and added that. It is dry but tasty, definitely "hot" and will need to age.
Goal:
I'd like to add some sweetness back into it, and set it aside to bulk age before bottling.
Sweetening?
I keep seeing 1.010 as a "common" number for sweetening. I realize this is incredibly subjective but the apparent experience of those using it, and their (again apparent) tastes seem to indicate this might be close to where I want it. I need to have a target, something other than "to taste" because my taste changes with the hour. If I have figured it correctly, I need 1.1# of sugar to get here.
Stabilizing?
One campden/gallon + 1/4tsp/gal Sorbate? I also have access to Potassium Benzoate and Potassium Salycilate (in like 100#+ of each, no that was not a typo) if either of those would be better.
Plans?
So plans are (please correct me if I am off) let it cold crash a couple weeks, rack and top off with sweetener and stabilizers, and forget it for a while at ~65F. Or am I way off?
Two returning home brewers with limited experience with wines - we "speak" in terms of beer.
Mead:
15# of wildflower (darker than I have seen before, complex taste) honey, one campden to get rid of chloramines, 5 gals water. Fed twice with Kferm during the ferment. No boil. Some tannin added, I think 1/4 tsp per 5 gallons offhand. I've never used that before but the guy at the LHBS nearly insisted that I needed it. Also used pectic enzyme, just in case.
Current Status:
My mead is in the secondary and is finished or damned close. It is below 1.000 and finished or nearly finished dropping. I also cooked up some sparkaloid and added that. It is dry but tasty, definitely "hot" and will need to age.
Goal:
I'd like to add some sweetness back into it, and set it aside to bulk age before bottling.
Sweetening?
I keep seeing 1.010 as a "common" number for sweetening. I realize this is incredibly subjective but the apparent experience of those using it, and their (again apparent) tastes seem to indicate this might be close to where I want it. I need to have a target, something other than "to taste" because my taste changes with the hour. If I have figured it correctly, I need 1.1# of sugar to get here.
Stabilizing?
One campden/gallon + 1/4tsp/gal Sorbate? I also have access to Potassium Benzoate and Potassium Salycilate (in like 100#+ of each, no that was not a typo) if either of those would be better.
Plans?
So plans are (please correct me if I am off) let it cold crash a couple weeks, rack and top off with sweetener and stabilizers, and forget it for a while at ~65F. Or am I way off?