Dessert Mead

[archthered]

I am making my wife a mead for Christmas (2016). I am working on the recipe and would like your thoughts. At this point I am open to suggestion. My wife has particular taste when it comes to wine in general and this includes mead. Specifically she likes sweet wines and prefers fruit meads.

I was going to make a dessert fruit mead. Here is the recipe. Batch size 1.2 gallons (6 750ml bottles). 4# honey, 1# raspberries, 1 vanilla bean, 1oz cocoa nibs, and potentially mug wort and lavender. Probably using Wyeasts Sweet Mead yeast or possibly a champagne yeast to up abv (pectic enzyme and a stabilizer will be used but I haven't done the math on that yet)

Heat about a half gallon of water to 150, add honey, continue to heat till temperature hits 160 and maintain for 5 minutes. Try to finish the next part at about the same time as the bulk of the must. Split berries into two half pound bags, freeze both. Thaw one bag, squish berries add a half cup or so of water and heat to about 170 for a minute, add to the rest of the must, add pectin enzyme, let sit for 5 minutes, add water to bring up to 1.4 gallons. Cool and add to primary, add yeast.

When fermentation finishes thaw and squish second bag of raspberries add a cup of water and heat to 170, drop cocoa nibs and vanilla bean in to water and maintain temperature for 1 minute. Cool and put in secondary, rack mead into secondary. Check after a week to see where flavor is at and regularly there after, remove/rack off of cocoa nibs and vanilla bean when desired flavor is reached. Then let sit till ready to bottle, backsweeten as needed.

I've never made anything with cocoa or vanilla and I know in most wines you get these flavors from oak etc but I want this to be a true dessert wine with robust flavor.

I am also toying with the idea of adding just a touch of lactose to for a creamy smooth body, I'm currently not planning on it but would love feed back on the idea.

I am making 6 bottles and I'd like to make two with the same base but modify them just a touch, for something special. Growlers from local breweries will serve as the fermenters. I will split off enough for the two bottles after removing from the vanilla and nibs. To one I will add a small amount of lavender and to the other mug wort. In both cases a small amount of the ingredient will be added to about a half, or even quarter, cup of boiling water. Once added the heat will be cut and the liquid cooled. and added to the fermentors. When the flavor is right these will be racked off and allowed to sit till bottling.

I know this all may sound a little crazy but I think I should end with a sweet raspberry mead with a distinctive taste of chocolate and vanilla. The lavender one should have a nice flowery undertone while the one with mug wort should have an herbally finish. Feel free to tell me this is crazy.

 

[Matrix4b]

Ok a few suggestions:

"Heat about a half gallon of water to 150, add honey, continue to heat till temperature hits 160 and maintain for 5 minutes. Try to finish the next part at about the same time as the bulk of the must. Split berries into two half pound bags, freeze both. Thaw one bag, squish berries add a half cup or so of water and heat to about 170 for a minute, add to the rest of the must, add pectin enzyme, let sit for 5 minutes, add water to bring up to 1.4 gallons. Cool and add to primary, add yeast. "

1. Why are you heating the water to that high? Also, 5 minutes of boiling honey? No. You do not need to heat honey to sanitize it. Just heat it warm enough to melt the honey.

2. You want to add the fruit to the primary. I see that you are essentially cooking the fruit and then mostly rendering it to juice and adding the pectin enzyme. I was wondering the need for this? I suggest that you keep all of your fruit and add it to the secondary. Also, 1 pound for 1.2 gal batch? For a good raspberry flavor I recommend tripling the amount of fruit and adding it to the secondary. Adding so much sugar up front might not be good and you will lose a lot of the flavor. Contrary to what it seems, there is not a very strong flavor in raspberries.

"When fermentation finishes thaw and squish second bag of raspberries add a cup of water and heat to 170, drop cocoa nibs and vanilla bean in to water and maintain temperature for 1 minute. Cool and put in secondary, rack mead into secondary. Check after a week to see where flavor is at and regularly there after, remove/rack off of cocoa nibs and vanilla bean when desired flavor is reached. Then let sit till ready to bottle, backsweeten as needed"

Ok, here you are putting the berries in the secondary. Good. But then you are heating them up again. Why? Realize that at this point your must is about 10% alcohol and should be just fine for fruit sanitization. Also, I would use 3 beans. Well, that isn't true, I would make a vanilla extract and then use that, 3 beans would go in 1/2 cup of cheap white rum or vodka (scrapped out the insides and pods chopped up and put in) for 3 months then run through a coffee filter and use 1/2 of that, yes 1/4 cup of home made extract for a really good vanilla flavor. The cocoa nibs will take a long time to render flavor too. I would leave them out for a time when you can let them sit in the must for a year. Not sure about the mug wort or lavender, These could be good. I also would use the 4 pounds of honey in the primary and then stabilize and back sweeten with an additional 2 pounds for a nice sweet mead. Also, I don't trust the Sweet Mead Yeast and Champagne yeast is too aggressive, I recommend Lavin 71B or Lavin D47 for a nice clean yeast that doen't contribute much and does it's job reliably.

"I am also toying with the idea of adding just a touch of lactose to for a creamy smooth body, I'm currently not planning on it but would love feed back on the idea."

1/4 to 1/2 pound of lactose would make it creamy and nice.

"I know this all may sound a little crazy but I think I should end with a sweet raspberry mead with a distinctive taste of chocolate and vanilla. The lavender one should have a nice flowery undertone while the one with mug wort should have an herbally finish. Feel free to tell me this is crazy. "

Go easy on the herbs. I would split your batches and add 1/4 teaspoon to each at most, let the herbs sit for a couple of weaks and oak with lightly toasted oak 1/2 oz for 3 weeks prior to bottling.

You did not mention aging. I recommend, even though it's a small batch, at least 6 months of aging. (after it clears to where you can read through it)

Most of this you are overthinking. Keep it simple. Fruit in secondary, herbs in secondary, don't boil honey, a bit more fruit, and for a sweet flavor add 2 pounds of honey in backsweetening after stabilizing with potassium sorbate.

Good Luck
Matrix

 

[imasickboy]

Or just make a mead with nothing but 4 pounds orange blossom honey, your water, D-47 yeast, and yeast nutrient. The D-47 will give up before it eats all that honey, so no backsweetening necessary.

It covers both things your wife likes, sweet and fruit. Keep it simple, I say.

 

[archthered]

Thanks for your advice. I do want to make a clarification.
Sorry if I gave that impression but I am not boiling the mead, I'm only heating it to about 160 and holding it for 5 minuets, I don't want to boil off the aromatics but I need to kill any germs, my honey still has floating bee bits etc and this has worked before.

I usually put most of the fruit in the primary, and heating to 170 kills any germs but keeps flavor and aroma. I've used this in the past and it has given me great results in the past, though I will consider upping the amount. I know alot of people don't do much to sanitize fruit but I've always been worried about infection.

I like the idea of making a vanilla extract, do you think it would work with the cocoa nibs?

I'm glad to hear the lactose doesn't sound crazy.

I will reconsider the yeast.

I'm definitely going to age it, I was hoping to start in a week or two which should give it plenty of time before Christmas 2017.

I appreciate the tips and welcome more. I'm trying something complicated like this largely because we went to a winery and she loved their dessert wine, chocolate raspberry, and I wanted to try something similarish.

Thanks

 

[Matrix4b]

I am not sure if a cocoa extract will taste much like chocolate. I don't know. It is worth working an experiment though. It might work.

As far as fruit/honey and sanitizing. I don't feel it necessary. Go ahead if you wish and I know you got good results before but I feel that you would have better results for flavor and aroma with out. Largely, once you hit the secondary, sanitization is not a problem when you are at about 10% ABV or so. Heating the honey as you do would remove bee bits and a bit of wax, if it has any. And may end up making the must a bit clearer. I worry about ruining the flavor myself.

Extract or a Tincture is easy to make, I have done so with hazelnuts and vanilla and mint. Relatively same Process:

Put in vodka or Rum for about 3 months, shake for the first week once a day, at end, run through a coffee filter to make it liquid only.

Prep that I did on nuts: Toast Hazelnuts, remove red papery shell, then grind up in a coffee grinder at a rough grind.

Prep for Mint: Bruise up the mint before hand so that the juice inside the plant membrane is accessible.

Prep that I would do for nibs: start with roasted nibs, roast if needed, then remove the papery shell, grind up like the hazelnuts or at least chop up a bit to break up the nibs. Then leave in the rum for 6 months. Filter out as other items.

Turning a tincture to an extract. This is simply reducing volume, simmer on a wide fry pan on low for 1 hour, the reason for a frying pan is that it will have a large heating area and lots of contact with the heat, reduction will happen easier. Then when liquid is about 1/2 volume, put in jar and store until needed.

Good Luck.

Matrix