Boil? Best fruit? add acid?

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
Apr 1, 2015
Messages
18
Reaction score
12
So I am very new to both drinking and making mead/melomel however I have made some semi-successful beer, cider and wine batches. The only mead I have ever drank was my own and I was not overly impressed. I think the lack of aging and using too little honey was my downfall. What is the best fruit to use? I've made a marion mead that seemed a little bland. My thoughts are doing a prickly pear one once they get in season although I get a lot of free strawberries from work. Raspberry lemonade sounds pretty good too. Also should I boil the fruit/honey or take more of a winemaking approach and use sulfur (kmbs) to sterilize it? Wouldn't boiling loose a lot of the flavor/smell? Lastly should I balance with acid like in wine? and if so which acid and how much?
 
Also curious about sterilizing fruit, is it necessary or should I just peel and freeze it?
 
I wouldn't use heat for any wine making process. You can kill wild yeasts using K-meta 24 hours before pitching the yeast. Freeze fruit then allow it to thaw- that helps with the production of juice. Add pectic enzyme to break down the pectins in the fruit - that will help produce juice and will help in clarifying the wine.
If you use fruit I would add the fruit to the secondary or else use the juice in place of water to dilute the honey.
 
Back
Top