Could do with some advice - super high gravity mead.

[Insomniac]

Hi all, 3 - 4 months ago I posted about a mead that was... unintentionally high in gravity.

I had decided to throw together all the random pots of honey I had collected over the last few months, as well as finish off the bucket of honey I had been using - as there wasn't enough in it to make a batch by itself.

Only after I had made this and pitched some yeast did I realise that I had created a monster, sitting at about 1.19 OG, and very much not fermenting at all. After a trip to the shops for some more yeast to make a starter with I made a starter with Youngs super yeast compound and by some miricle it took off the next day.

Today this has now cleared so I racked it for the second time and took a new reading. 1.14 - bugger.

So, its about 8% and insanly sweet. Well beyond what anyone would drink other than a shot or so.

So, any thoughts? All I can think of doing currently is splitting it exactly in two once another carboy is free and topping up with water and a little bit more honey and repitching - something I probably should have done in the first place...

Edit: I just found my original post, turns out it was somewhere between 1.19 and 1.23 depending on the sugar content of some banana stuff I put in as well, which means its somewhere between 8% and 12%...

 

[TheBrewingMedic]

You could split it and repitch -or- Try racking and repitching with an agressive yeast like Lalvin 1118 (I'm big on using a fresh clean environment) -or- Wyeast makes a liquid zinfandel yeast for higher sugar musts

 

[fatbloke]

still very high.

I'd suspect you could dilute it down and then restart it - just don't follow the f*****g sheep toward the EC-1118 mountain.

If you let it down to, ooooooh, I don't know, say 1.115 or something like that, then you can probably just manage it as restarting a stuck ferment with K1V-1116.

Or you could just do a "baccy run" to Belgium, but head for Brouwland and snag 5 litres of their 96.3% ABV alcohol (only €166.71, but they won't ship it, it has to be bought direct). Then just fortify it into a honey liqueur.

 

[Insomniac]

Well, I've ordered both 1118 and some Gervin GV4. I do have a pack of 1116 left but I was planning on using that for my Chocco-Bochet on Wednesday, and I didn't order more 1116 this time as I have a ton of D47 I need to get through first!

Has anyone used GV4? Is it ok? Awfull?

I think what I will do is pull off a litre or so into one of my mini-2 litre bottles, then I can top up with water in both bottles to the same SG and repitch in both containers to try and get it going. Will probably use the GV4 this time, save the 1118 for some science experiments where I find out just how bad it is or isn't!

 

[Insomniac]

Split this into two batches, added a litre of water to each which bought it down to 1.09, for both I then added a teaspoon of nutrient, aerated, and pitched 2.5g of the gervain after rehydration. Just have to see if it starts up now!

 

[garlicbee]

let us know!

 

[Insomniac]

Update, a day after the original repitch there was no signs of anything all the yeast had sunk straight to the bottom or was floating in undissolved clumps. So I took the second pack of gervin, this time giving it a bit of sugar and a few hours to yet itself a bit more active. This pitch 2 days on has at least made a little difference in that dont of the yeast works its way to the top and very slow forward pressure has resumed but most has again just sat itself on the bottom. So today I'm rehydrating both packs of 1118 and will be step feeding them for a few hours and pitching later tonight at some point...

 

[Tw0fish]

Humm.

Knowledgeable high-gravity brewing pals:

Could OP have just shaken up the must (y'know, float the dormant yeast again), divided and diluted to get it going again? I guess I mean, does drunk yeast come back?

In my head I'm imagining some kind of mead concentrate that you rack into a bottle and top off with water for a quick convenient drunk

 

[Bhunter87]

I have a huge mead, also unintentional. My OG was ~1.155. Pitched 1118 and added nutrient for the first week every 48 hrs. It plowed through most of it but it's still very sweet and hot. I'm going to rack onto tart cherries and chocco and top off with water, then repitch 1118 again. It will just end up HUGE and pretty sweet regardless.

Anyways.... 1118 did a good job. A lot of ppl don't like it but for your situation, I'd suggest that

 

[cgenebrewer]

why do people not like 1118?

 

[TheBrewingMedic]

shhhhhhh....some here might accuse you of being a sheep following a goat to a mountain or off a cliff or some crap like that if you mention the alpha alpha alpha ocho yeast too loud

 

[Bhunter87]

Baahhhh

 

[Native302]

I made a cherry vanilla mead with tart cherry concentrate in the primary, pitched a starter of 1118. It fermented 100 gravity points in 4 days and blew all aroma and flavor out of the airlock. Tastes so freaking bland...5 gallons of crap. I will now have to rack onto more fruit and back-sweeten. I'll never use 1118 again.

 

[Golddiggie]

I made a cherry vanilla mead with tart cherry concentrate in the primary, pitched a starter of 1118. It fermented 100 gravity points in 4 days and blew all aroma and flavor out of the airlock. Tastes so freaking bland...5 gallons of crap. I will now have to rack onto more fruit and back-sweeten. I'll never use 1118 again.

A smarter method would have been to ferment the base mead first. THEN add the flavor elements to it. You'll get MUCH better results this way. I did a blackberry melomel with D47 and the fruit I added in primary was a waste of funds. Luckily, I knew it was highly likely to happen (having read all about it on the got mead forums) and I had more blackberries to add once fermentation was complete.

Don't blame the yeast for something that wasn't it's fault...

 

[Bhunter87]

+1

I let it ferment out already and just going to repitch after topping off to eat a little more sugar and lower my FG just a tad. It shouldn't affect my berries much

 

[Native302]

Just not a fan of 1118......that's my personal opinion for what it's worth. Made the same mead the same way with 1116 and it lost no aroma or taste and it took 3 weeks to drop 100 points. Much better yeast, but to each their own. If you all like 1118 then use it, I won't again.

 

[bodhi86]

I used 1118 on my buckwheat cyser and besides it being too sweet, ( starting gravity WAY too high, still bout 15% tho) I thought all my favors came out awesome, a cider smoky flavor that with diluting with a dry cyser should turn epic. The quick ferment and ability to eat anything endears me to it. I don't hold it against them though, I'm an abnoxious beer snob, some people are just yeast snobs, to each their own.

 

[fatbloke]

why do people not like 1118?

I'm not a fan, but that doesn't make it a bad yeast.

The issues are more about it being some sort of magic bullet, a panacea for all errors. It's not. It's very good for what it was used for, i.e. making champagnes and sparkling wines, its also one of the best for restarting stuck ferments.

Yet it seems that its also suggested by a lot of HBS, who don't know much about mead making, I suspect both for marketing and ignorance reasons.

It has a habit of blowing a lot of the aromatics, and some of the more subtle flavouring elements straight out the airlock. This makes the purchase of a good varietal honey (possibly a quite expensive purchase) a wasted effort.

Others might point out that if the base mead is a little uninspiring, it doesn't matter as the main focus would be what's used for any back sweetening. Which is partially correct, but to recover any lost aromatic and flavour elements would require so much honey as to make it VVV syrupy, worse than the sweetest of dessert meads.

Hence as I suggest, its not bad, it will ferment a must - to a quite high alcohol level, so it has its place, but its not perfect.......

And no. I no longer routinely use it.

p.s. while that lot applies to mainly traditionals, it also seems to have a considerable bleaching effect on colour, as well as hammering the flavour of any fruit in primary. So taking what we like about a particular fruit flavour, we do tend to forget how its likely to taste, with the sugars replaced by alcohol and the fruit acids rather modified by the ferment. Especially the primary ferment.......

 

[huesmann]

Yet it seems that its also suggested by a lot of HBS, who don't know much about mead making, I suspect both for marketing and ignorance reasons.

I'm sure that's a lot of it, but I think its sheer foolproof-ness is also one of the reasons it's suggested by HBSs--they don't want customers coming back pissed off that the yeast they were told to use didn't work. Well, they'd get to sell more yeast, but they'd lose customer goodwill!

 

[tinman1]

I know this post will make most cringe.... I make about 4 batches (5 gallon) of sparkling ginger mead every year. My yeast of choice- 2 packs of Nottinghams ale yeast. Most of my meads start 1.120 and up range. I just dry pitch it, cover the bucket with saran wrap, rouse once a day, let it be happy. I always have rave reviews ( and the LHBS begging me to enter it into competitions). 1118 is always a backup when fermentation is stuck, but ironically, I have never had to use it in my mead ( except I do add 1/4 pack 1118 rehydrated into bottling bucket to produce the " sparkling", along with 5 oz of corn sugar)

 

[bodhi86]

I'm sure that's a lot of it, but I think its sheer foolproof-ness is also one of the reasons it's suggested by HBSs--they don't want customers coming back pissed off that the yeast they were told to use didn't work. Well, they'd get to sell more yeast, but they'd lose customer goodwill!

i completely agree. the fool proof nature of 1118 makes it perfect for the newb, i myself am new which is one reason i use it, im expanding to d47 71b and the like, but the flavor a yeast adds (or takes away) isnt my main focus at this point. i feel a lot of newbs have the same idea. if a recipe is good, its good, the "wrong" yeast wont (completely) ruin it, once you find a recipe that is good but could use something, then start switching around yeasts, and perfecting it. thats my thought at least, many people wouldnt agree, but i have a long time to learn, i like trial and error. plus as most people here know, we home brewers as a group tend to be know it all types, or at least stubborn types, so even if someone tells us something we tend to listen but not practice until said experience is in our own books. as a final note, 1118 is amazing in step fed applejack, my buddy makes a 8month ferment applejack that taste better than anything ive ever had, so to reiterate what the bloke said it definately does have its place, it probably just not in the more graceful meads.

 

[TheBrewingMedic]

I know this post will make most cringe.... I make about 4 batches (5 gallon) of sparkling ginger mead every year. My yeast of choice- 2 packs of Nottinghams ale yeast. Most of my meads start 1.120 and up range. I just dry pitch it, cover the bucket with saran wrap, rouse once a day, let it be happy. I always have rave reviews ( and the LHBS begging me to enter it into competitions). 1118 is always a backup when fermentation is stuck, but ironically, I have never had to use it in my mead ( except I do add 1/4 pack 1118 rehydrated into bottling bucket to produce the " sparkling", along with 5 oz of corn sugar)

Tinman, how dry does your ginger mead turn out? this post could almost be over on the thread about carbonation that is going strong, I think your advice could be used over there

 

[tinman1]

It actually comes out perfect. There is still some residual sweetness left in the mead from the Notts not bottoming out, so the addition of 5 oS of corn sugar and a little bit of 1118 gives it just enough dryness to compliment the residual sweetness. I use alot of fresh ginger and orange peel in mine which helps out with the sweetness.

 

[Insomniac]

Well with it now having had a bit more water added and with the 1118 in there as well its finally fermenting. Not all that fast, a bubble in the air lock every 5 seconds, but it may pick up more I guess.