Basic mead taste question

[reality_felix]

hi, i have a batch of basic mead which i get the recipe from HBT without adding any yeast nutrien and asic blend. it been fremented for 15 day already and all yeast had been setter down. when i open to see the result,i found out that, it taste and smell very yeasty, like drinking a yeast solution. it also have some sour taste after flow to mouth and totally dont have honey smell .i wana ask, is that all mead or young mead taste like this? or is my mead have problem? it is normal?

 

[summersolstice]

You're just going to have to be patient. You can't expect a mead to taste like anything good after only 15 days. Give it several months and try it again.

 

[fatbloke]

hi, i have a batch of basic mead which i get the recipe from HBT without adding any yeast nutrien and asic blend. it been fremented for 15 day already and all yeast had been setter down. when i open to see the result,i found out that, it taste and smell very yeasty, like drinking a yeast solution. it also have some sour taste after flow to mouth and totally dont have honey smell .i wana ask, is that all mead or young mead taste like this? or is my mead have problem? it is normal?

As summersoltice says, especially if you haven't used any nutrient or acid additions.

it's about as "traditional" as you can get, but it's gonna be a very long, slow ferment.

Also, you must remember, most meads are pretty damn horrible when freshly fermented (have you checked with hydrometer to see how far the ferment has got in the 15 days you mention ???). The changes that time brings, are incredible. If you can keep it for 12 months, you'll find that it's changed completely.

 

[reality_felix]

thank for all response, i have taste some sample from it, it taste very dry and all yeast already setter down at bottom. by this time can i do raking or should i wait for few more week?i still wonder where the sour taste come from, is that possible it come from honey itself?

 

[fatbloke]

thank for all response, i have taste some sample from it, it taste very dry and all yeast already setter down at bottom. by this time can i do raking or should i wait for few more week?i still wonder where the sour taste come from, is that possible it come from honey itself?

The "dry" is just that your recipe didn't include enough honey for there to be some residual sweetness in it after the ferment had finished i.e. you'd need to calculate the amount required for the alcohol tolerance of the yeast (one of the reason why Lalvin yeasts are good, because they publish very extensive data.....), for instance, if it's a yeast that has a tolerance of say 14% ABV, then you'd have to have enough honey for maybe 15 or 16% ABV - so that the yeast dies off when it's reached it's 14% leaving the sugars of 2% alcohol.

Or even make a batch that ferments dry, then back sweeten it.

Anyway, yes you can rack it. If it's still cloudy, but there's a fair amount of sediment at the bottom still rack it off, the rest of the cloudiness should drop out over time. Besides, it depends on the yeast, some need to be removed quickly as they can give "off flavours", other's are fine left where they are until you're ready to bottle.

I normally rack them off.

Have a look round to work out what you want to do about racking loses and reducing any head space in the fermenter once it's racked. You can use water, or honey/sugar or sanitised glass chips/marbles etc it's up to you. Just remember that if you sweeten with a fermentable sugar, then it's possible that you might start it fermenting again.

Hope that helps a bit....

regards

fatbloke

 

[reality_felix]

Thank you fatbloke. it really help me lot for inform me that. i will try to rack it tonite.