How do you mature your meads?

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ozinkent

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Hello,
how do you mature your meads?

bottling... bulk maturing? (air locks or not)

im interested in bulk maturing my next peach mead, and wondering if i could mature it in a fermintaion bin ? (you know, the plastic ones in 'home brew' kits) with a tight lid... or would i need an airlock? (but i assume i wouldnt need it if i stopped fermenation)

or the only other option is to Syphon out of primary, in to the bin... clean the demijohn... then Syphon back in to the demi and risk oxidiation, advice?

Thanks
 
I'm aging mine in my 1/6bbl sanke kegs (adapted) with solid caps over the tops.

I make sure to always have one empty on hand, in order to transfer from one to another.

I'm also using a CO2 push to transfer the batches (I do that for everything I ferment). Simply put some CO2 into destination keg, top off the source keg, vent pressure in both, add modified TC caps (to send/receive between kegs, filling to the bottom of the destination). Then give the source keg a few psi of CO2 to get the fluid moving.

BTW, I ferment mine in the same 1/6bbl kegs too. Starting off with between 4 and 4.5 gallons at the start.
 
I brew one gallon batches in plastic water jugs. Then I age in one gallon glass jugs, or sometimes after bottled. But I like aging the whole batch together.
 
I've bulk aged both of my batches for the last year in glass carboys with airlocks. Every time I racked I would flush out the carboy with CO2 to keep a layer to protect from oxygen. Over the course of the year they've degassed on their own. I'll be bottling one next month and the other still has a year left to age out before I bottle.
 
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