Just finished making my first mead! (:

[Rahahb]

I just started brewing beer in January. And for a long time I've wanted to see what mead was like. So I started browsing around for information and saw how easy it was. I wanted a quick and easy fix so I decided on this one:

SMoY Mead
This recipe is one I got from Sir Michael of York (SMoY, hence the name) and has become one of my favourites. Syr Michael, raised in the East Kingdom, wrote the original article on brewing in the Knowne World Handbook. He has won East Kingdom brewing competitions several times with this recipe.

Ingredients
1 Gallon Water 2 1/2 lbs Honey
2 Lemons 3 nutmegs, chopped (or 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg)
1 pkg Ale or Champagne yeast

Add the honey to one gallon of water and bring it to a boil. Skim off the foam that boils up, and keep boiling until it stops foaming, approximately 30 minutes. Slice or juice the lemons and add along with the nutmeg. Mix well, turn off the heat and let stand covered until cool. Pour into a gallon jug and add the yeast. Champagne yeast or ale yeast works best.

Let it ferment for two weeks, and then siphon into bottles. (Siphoning off the good liquid and leaving the dregs is called 'racking') Seal or cap the bottles and let sit at room temperature for two weeks, then put in the refrigerator. If you let it sit out longer, the bottles may start to explode. You can drink it at any point now, and should have a frothy, pleasant drink.

http://www.greydragon.org/library/basic_mead.html

Says drinkable in 4 weeks. I peeled the lemons, squeezed, and put them in. Saw some people getting a nasty pith taste from rinds in the JAOM thread so I wanted to eliminate that possibility. I might get the ingredients for that mead tonight and compare these 2 down the road. OG was 1.097. Pitched @ 12:05. Hope I see activity soon.

:rockin:

 

[Beebe]

Woot Woot!

Congrats! You will have to tell us how it turned out!

I had a buddy that made a ginger mead and thats how I got hooked!

Now I have a traditional and a prickly pear bottled with a blackberry mead in works. All were 5gal batches!

 

[Rahahb]

I'll try to remember to check back in when it turns out. I don't know how they are supposed to taste though. :/ I guess if it's drinkable, that's how.

I got the ingredients for the JAOM tonight. Bought one of those Carlos Rossi wines. :/ (for the bottle!) So in a couple of days I'll have my second mead going. If these turn out, I'll probably go with a bigger, longer aging mead and see how I like it.

Note: Noticed airlock activity when I got home tonight. 3-4/minute.

 

[commonsenseman]

Looks good!

Did you use any yeast nutrient?

 

[Rahahb]

Looks good!

Did you use any yeast nutrient?

Nope. Just followed the instructions. Uh oh.

 

[Golddiggie]

If it doesn't start fermenting, or seems to be going real slow, add 1-2g of DAP to the batch...

 

[Rahahb]

Thanks for the tip. It's @ 6-7 bubbles/minute now. Up from 3-4 from about 3 hours ago.

 

[fatbloke]

Don't forget, that while you can get some bitterness/pithy taste when making the JAO recipe, I suspect it's deliberate.

Why ? Well if you think about it, it uses ingredients available from a grocery store and while the ferment poops out earlier than you might expect, given that bread yeast will leave quite a bit of residual sweetness, then the bitterness that is imparted from the orange pith counteracts some of the sweetness, a little like adding tannin and/or acid to other recipes.......

Make the JAO as per the recipe as it normally comes out good, and very easy to make...... as Joe says, just follow the recipe and don't deviate.....

regards

fatbloke

 

[Rahahb]

Point taken. Guess it's like adding bittering hops to an otherwise non hoppy beer. Just enough to counteract the sweetness. I'll consider adding the whole thing.

It's safe to say fermentation has started. 18 bubbles/min. That's at 60 degrees too!

 

[K5MOW]

Congrats on the Mead.

 

[Rahahb]

So, I decided to stray from the instructions for this mead in hopes that I could make it better.

I racked it off the fruit and needed to replace some volume so I added another 1/2 lb of honey and 3.5 cups of water.....but I forgot to take a before/after gravity reading...

Any way to guestimate the change in og -> fg without that information?

 

[inkyquills]

Really curious as to how this worked out for you, as I started a SMoY myself just before finding this forum. I'm glad you took an OG as this was my "guess I need a hydrometer" project But now I have a ballpark thankyouverymuch.
Two weeks was tonight but it's still bubbling away (every five-ten seconds) so I'm putting off bottling. Everything I've read about mead tells me this recipe is crazy quick (kind of its draw as I'm trying to sell the SWMBO on the hobby) but I think bottle bombs might hurt me worse than patience.

 

[Rahahb]

I really wanted to follow the directions on this recipe but the people around here advised against. Maybe in the future I'll see if it's really that good that quick.

I'm still bulk aging mine. I checked gravity on 5/9 and it was 1.002, down from 1.008 on 4/4. I racked on 5/9 as well. Hasn't cleared yet(I don't know if it's suppose to). I have no idea how this will turn out in the short run so I might just let it go for a while and try to forget it.

I still haven't tasted much more than a couple ounces of mead at this point, and I've got 4 gallons of it sitting around. lol One of my batches of JAOM is 3.5 months old now so I'm eyeballing it. haha

You may want to start another batch asap. Look into Joes Quick Pyment. Looks like a legit quick mead that most people are saying they can drink young(5 weeks). Mine is right 4 weeks now so I hope to see in a week or two more.

 

[inkyquills]

I just racked mine on to some bentonite. Gravity was 0.999 (.0998@71F), used a Pasteur champagne yeast, 20 days in primary.
I thought about doing raspberries in the secondary (I had SWMBOY try a framboise lambic and lamented that if only I had a secondary I could try fruit beers and melomels) but decided against as I've only commercial meads and a cyser to compare against this first try, and I've already added enough variables (in addition to the nutmeg I steeped cinnamon, allspice, and grains of paradise (ran out of coriander) and added yeast nutrient).
Tasted the sample I pulled for the gravity check. Definitely mead and a little better than the worst commercial bottle I've tried, so
I'll try that pyment and the JOAM, but I'm doing the basic EdWort's Apfelwein atm. It looks pretty close to my most successful cider so far and I've got some dextrose to kill.
Good luck!

 

[inkyquills]

Apologies for the multi-post; bad connection.

 

[Rahahb]

Question: will this mead eventually clear on its own? Should I help it along somehow? And is clearness in any way an indication of how close to done a mead is/isn't done?

 

[Golddiggie]

Mine cleared very nicely within a few months, from when active fermentation stopped. It still crept lower in SG, but it was clearing nicely. It went from really cloudy while fermenting to a nice golden color. I let mine go about 6 months before I bottled part. I have a batch still in carboy, that will remain there for a few more months.

If you rack it every couple of months (or 6-8 weeks) that should help it to clear up. I did mine only a couple of times before it was ready. I'll probably do the batch still in carboy in another 2-4 weeks, to get it off the lees.