Hopped Mead

[Jericurl]

I'm not a huge hops fan, but Manthing is so I'd like to surprise him with a lower ABV hopped mead for his birthday in March.
With a lower ABV, I'm assuming this will be ready to drink much sooner than most of my meads.
I bought some Williamette and German Hallertau (1 oz each) hops awhile back and I'd like to use those if possible.

I've got plenty of wine/mead under my belt, but I've never made beer. I did buy himself a beer kit awhile back, but once we saw the 2 pages of instructions we pretty much put it on a shelf, and there it remains.

Anyway, I'm looking for some advice here on how to proceed. Any recipes, ideas, or even just steer me in the right direction I would appreciate it.

 

[Curtis2010]

Does he like mead?

Have you considered a Braggot?

 

[Jericurl]

He loves mead. He loves beer.

At this point, I'm open to anything, I just don't know where to start.

I don't have any chilling worts (or whatever), and I'm really not interested in buying beer supplies other than basic ingredients. I'm just wanting to make him something good and drinkable by March.

Braggot is basically a mead made with grains, correct?

 

[Maylar]

I think a hopped mead is a variety of metheglin.

You might want to read this thread on gotmead:
http://www.gotmead.com/forum/showthread.php/19611-Mead-with-just-Hops

And for beer/cider/mead lovers there's this one:

https://www.denardbrewing.com/blog/post/Craff/

 

[botigol]

I'll second the braggot suggestion. I'm at work, so don't have the recipe I used, but I'm pretty sure that I used 6 lbs light LME (liquid malt extract) and 5 lbs local honey. I went light on the hops, probably around 20 IBUs and no late or dry hops, but you could easily adjust.

What is the largest size stock pot in your kitchen? When I started making beer, I used the 5-gallon canning pot from when I made jelly. Depending on the size of batch you are looking to make, there are different options available.

What kind of beers does he like? This will give us an idea of how to help you attain the correct hop presence.

 

[loveofrose]

Stupid easy and very fast:
https://www.denardbrewing.com/blog/post/Fidnemed/

Just remember, once you introduce hops light is the enemy. Keep it dark, keep it safe.

 

[bernardsmith]

I've made hopped meads several times and they can be delicious. What I think you want to look for is a variety of hops whose flavor characteristics rather than whose acidity is going to be key ... so you might want to look for something like Nelson Sauvin or Galaxy but that is perhaps my bias.
What I would do is simply take a tablespoon (not much more) of hop pellets for every gallon of water you intend to use and place them in a muslin bag (could be a cheese cloth) and add them to the volume of boiling water and allow them to boil for no more than 10 minutes. Remove the bag and allow the water to cool to room temperature. You now have the hopped tea with which to mix with the honey. Boil for much more than 10 minutes and you will be extracting the alpha acids from the hops. Boil for much less than 10 minutes and you will not be extracting the flavor.
What you may do if you like is then add another T of hops /gallon to the secondary IF you are looking to extract any aroma from the hops. So you are adding the hops COLD - no heating. This is called dry hopping.. After about a week you want to remove those hops from the secondary as the alcohol begins to extract vegetative flavors.
For a more detailed recipe where the author boils some honey in the water because he argues that you cannot extract anything from hops without any sugar in the water (I presume he is a brewer who only ever adds hops to boiling wort) see the online recipe for IPA mead -
http://meadist.com/making-mead/mead-recipes/hop-head-mead/
(not really an IPA because no barley... but like I say, the author is likely a brewer - and if he finds a hammer everything is a nail)

 

[Curtis2010]

He loves mead. He loves beer.

At this point, I'm open to anything, I just don't know where to start.

I don't have any chilling worts (or whatever), and I'm really not interested in buying beer supplies other than basic ingredients. I'm just wanting to make him something good and drinkable by March.

Braggot is basically a mead made with grains, correct?

Hey, he likes both so you cant go wrong!

Braggot derives roughly half its fermentables from honey and half from grains. You can brew as a Braggot from the start or blend beer and mead. The upside to brewing separately and blending is that you get beer, mead, and braggot and can blend to taste.

Of course, you dont want to buy a bunch of beer stuff so just mashing some grains as part of the brewing process would be easiest.

Maybe do some small batches of hopped mead and braggot so he could try both.

 

[Curtis2010]

...

Of course, you dont want to buy a bunch of beer stuff so just mashing some grains as part of the brewing process would be easiest.

...

Or, just use LME/DME as suggested in another post for a dead easy braggot.

 

[andrewmaixner]

A friend of mine made a braggot with orange blossom honey, bitter (Seville) oranges, some zest, and Pacifica hops (very orangey).
It was very good, and I'm sure that one could skip the grain if desired and go all-honey, steeping the hops in a 0.010 honey solution to get desired bitterness if you want.