First mead...critique please?

[dummkauf]

Finally got around to making my first mead tonight! Made a meomel from a kit I got from midwest plus some frozen fruit.

The kit included 12lbs of blue ribbon honey, 1 packet of yeast nutrients, and a packet of red star Cote Des Blancs yeast(dry). I added a 2nd packet of yeast, the same kind, since I didn't make a starter(beer brewer in me here, not sure if this was necessary or not). I also added 4Lbs of frozen peaches and 1lbs of mango. I had meant to do 6Lbs of peaches but my fiance used 1 bag to make peach iced tea and I accidentally bought a 1Lbs bag of frozen mangos instead of another bag of peaches.....so I figured I'd toss the mangos in too to make a peach/mango mead

So anyway, mead making went like this

1.) Put the honey in the sink full of hot water.
2.) Heated up about 2 gallons of water(reverse osmosis water from the grocery store) until it was hot but not boiling.
3.) Removed pot from heat and mixed in the honey and put back on heat and heated a little longer to make sure the honey was fully dissolved. Never boiled though. Then removed the pot from heat and let cool for a bit.
4.) Ran the peaches and mango through the food processor. I did sink the food processor pieces in starsan but didn't pasturize the fruit. The fuit also doesn't contain that stuff I was warned about that stops fermentation(I checked when I bought it a couple months ago, I'm just now getting to making it ), can't remember what that was called now though
5.) Dumped fruit mush into my sanitized ale pale.
6.) Dumped the rest of my RO water into the pot to cool down the must.
7.) Dumped the must into my ale pale with fruit. Fortunatley the fruit was still pretty cold so it helped cool it down even more very quickly.
8.) Shook the bucket to aerate.
9.) Dumped in both packets of yeast and the yeast nutrients
10.) Shook some more
11.) Stuck it in the brew closet with a blowoff tube.

My only concern is that with 5 gallons of water, 12lbs of honey, and all that fruit, there was very little head space left in the bucket(maybe 2 inches). Is this going to be a problem? I have a blowoff tube, but I'm not sure how much krausen, if any, I should expect with mead.

Any mistakes you see or advice/tips would be greatly apprecaited. Thank you!

EDIT: and I almost forgot. SG was 1.073

 

[fatbloke]

Finally got around to making my first mead tonight! Made a meomel from a kit I got from midwest plus some frozen fruit.

The kit included 12lbs of blue ribbon honey, 1 packet of yeast nutrients, and a packet of red star Cote Des Blancs yeast(dry). I added a 2nd packet of yeast, the same kind, since I didn't make a starter(beer brewer in me here, not sure if this was necessary or not). I also added 4Lbs of frozen peaches and 1lbs of mango. I had meant to do 6Lbs of peaches but my fiance used 1 bag to make peach iced tea and I accidentally bought a 1Lbs bag of frozen mangos instead of another bag of peaches.....so I figured I'd toss the mangos in too to make a peach/mango mead

So anyway, mead making went like this

1.) Put the honey in the sink full of hot water.
2.) Heated up about 2 gallons of water(reverse osmosis water from the grocery store) until it was hot but not boiling.
3.) Removed pot from heat and mixed in the honey and put back on heat and heated a little longer to make sure the honey was fully dissolved. Never boiled though. Then removed the pot from heat and let cool for a bit.
4.) Ran the peaches and mango through the food processor. I did sink the food processor pieces in starsan but didn't pasteurise the fruit. The fruit also doesn't contain that stuff I was warned about that stops fermentation(I checked when I bought it a couple months ago, I'm just now getting to making it ), can't remember what that was called now though
5.) Dumped fruit mush into my sanitized ale pale.
6.) Dumped the rest of my RO water into the pot to cool down the must.
7.) Dumped the must into my ale pale with fruit. Fortunately the fruit was still pretty cold so it helped cool it down even more very quickly.
8.) Shook the bucket to aerate.
9.) Dumped in both packets of yeast and the yeast nutrients
10.) Shook some more
11.) Stuck it in the brew closet with a blowoff tube.

My only concern is that with 5 gallons of water, 12lbs of honey, and all that fruit, there was very little head space left in the bucket(maybe 2 inches). Is this going to be a problem? I have a blowoff tube, but I'm not sure how much krausen, if any, I should expect with mead.

Any mistakes you see or advice/tips would be greatly apprecaited. Thank you!

EDIT: and I almost forgot. SG was 1.073

"Kits" are, IMO, a waste of money........

As for the rest of it ? well I don't see why it shouldn't work, but as you blitzed the fruit, I can see it being a complete PITA to rack it off the sediment as there's gonna be quite a lot.

Some mixes/batches/recipes can produce a lot of foam, so I'd suggest that you keep an eye on it in the early stages and stir it gently as that should break down any foam. Keep checking it with a hydrometer and once it's past the 1/2 sugar break (about 1035 gravity) then leave it alone.

Oh and at 1073 it's gonna be quite low alcohol for mead (about 10%) so you should ensure that your hygiene methods are good, make sure that you use sulphites when necessary.

Of course, you could add more honey to it to increase the alcohol content which helps to prevent contamination as well.........

 

[dummkauf]

Thanks fat bloke. As you mentioned the low alcohol thing I just realized something. If I am making a 5 gallon batch of mead, and the recipe calls for 12Lbs of honey(looked like about a gallon), should I be mixing the honey with 4 gallons of water to get a final total of 5 gallons(excluding the fruit)? I mixed the full 5 gallons of water like the directions said with the honey, which gave me about 6 gallons. At this point I don't think it's possible to add anymore honey as my Ale Pale is almost completely full.

edit: Could I rack off into a 1 or 2 gallon carboy and then mix some additional honey into each, or at this point is seperating it into 2 batches not really an option anymore?

 

[MedsenFey]

You can separate the batches and would be wise to do so. With a full bucket containing fruit, when you aerate it (or stir in honey), you're going to see an MEA (Mead Eruption Accident) first hand.

If you have another 5-gallon bucket, I'd pour half of it into the other bucket and then you can add a little honey with no worries.

 

[dummkauf]

Ok, I don't have another bucket but will be running to the brewshop tomorrow to pick up another ale pale and lid and some more honey.

If I divide it in half between the 2 pales, how much honey would you suggest adding to each?

 

[MedsenFey]

Enough to bring the gravity up by about 17 points as a minimum (so you'd have an effective starting gravity of 1.090). That will probably be about 1.5 pounds of honey for 3 gallons (but use the hydrometer to be sure).

 

[dummkauf]

Ok, so just to clarify for future meads. When I make a 5 gallon recipe, I need to subtract the honey volume from the water volume I add so that I get 5 gallons. The recipe said to add 5 gallons of water to the honey, but also stated that it would make 5 gallons of Mead too which I don't understand how that adds up since it would all add up to about 6 gallons of total. I'll need to be having a chat with the folks at Midwest when I'm down there tomorrow if that's the case.

 

[sfyeti]

just a thought-wash your fruit well. yeast don't take to kindly to pesticides and fertilizers. also, I like to use campden tabs to make sure that nothing bad starts growing in my must.
these steps aren't necessary, but they put my mind at ease about bad things happening to my must

 

[dummkauf]

just a thought-wash your fruit well. yeast don't take to kindly to pesticides and fertilizers. also, I like to use campden tabs to make sure that nothing bad starts growing in my must.
these steps aren't necessary, but they put my mind at ease about bad things happening to my must

Thanks for the tips!

 

[dummkauf]

Ok, so I picked up another 3Lbs of honey. However rather than splitting it up, I got one of those bigger pales from the brewshop that are used for wine and dumped it all on there along with the 3Lbs of honey. I gave it a good stir and shook it. I didn't get a gravity reading since my hydrometer and tube were full of the beer I brewed this afternoon, but i figured it wouldn't be too accurate anyway since it had already been fermenting for 2 days(or so the bubbles in my glass of starsan indicate anyway).

So the final recipe has 15Lbs of honey and 5 gallons of water plus the fruit.

 

[fatbloke]

Ok, so I picked up another 3Lbs of honey. However rather than splitting it up, I got one of those bigger pales from the brewshop that are used for wine and dumped it all on there along with the 3Lbs of honey. I gave it a good stir and shook it. I didn't get a gravity reading since my hydrometer and tube were full of the beer I brewed this afternoon, but i figured it wouldn't be too accurate anyway since it had already been fermenting for 2 days(or so the bubbles in my glass of starsan indicate anyway).

So the final recipe has 15Lbs of honey and 5 gallons of water plus the fruit.

bigger bucket ? well that's just another way of doing it.......

As for the hydrometer not giving you an accurate enough figure as the ferment is already in progress ?

Think about it......... it doesn't matter that it's already fermenting, just take a current measurement, then dump the honey in and give it a good stir, let the bubbles settle as they can upset the measurement and then take a reading.

If you started at 1080 but it had fermented down to 1060, you added extra honey and remeasured and got 1080, you've still added 20 points haven't you, so it's still the same as starting one at 1100 isn't it...... you'll still get the same amount/% of alcohol in the mix.

Not to worry, you've added a further 25% honey on the original figure i.e. if you used a gallon which is about the 12lb mark, then sticking another 3lb in has raised it by 25%........

Now all you've to do is keep an eye on it and follow the instructions.....

If in doubt, ask......

good luck

regards

fatbloke

 

[dummkauf]

DOH!!! I didn't think about doing the math on the hydro reading. Lesson learned

And while we're on "follow the instructions", I'll ask.

It's been fermenting well, getting bubbles in the starsan from my blowoff tube. At this point don't I just do the following:
1.) Let it ferment until it's done(steady hydro reading)
2.) Rack to secondary.
3.) Rack again as needed until it's clear.
4.) Bottle
5.) Age/Drink?

What I'm not sure of now is if I need to rack it off of the fruit before it's completely done fermenting(between steps 1 & 2)?

I've also been doing some more reading and heard about the staggered nutrient additions. For this batch I just added the whole bag of yeast nutrients into it at the beginning. Will I be ok just leaving it or should I go get some more yeast nutrients and add it over the next couple of days?

Thanks again!