Left on the lees?

[StitchMySmile]

Hey guys, I had thought that I racked one of my meads out of primary but it turns out I didn't. It's been sitting on the lees for say four or five months. My question is, if I age it out more will it remove that weird lees flavor after I rack it? Or am I doomed to drink odd tasting mead for awhile. Thanks guys

 

[aceparadis]

Time does amazing things to meads, can you describe the flavour thats comming from the autolysis? I've left my mead on lees for over a year and never had any problems.

 

[StitchMySmile]

It's kind of hard to describe but its almost sour but not quiet. Kinda sorta like fruit that went bad but the flavor of the mead over all is still drinkable. Basically the first few sips is borderline unpleasant but after I get the warm fuzzies it taste tolerable. I know that must be confusing as hell but that's the best I can describe it.

 

[gratus fermentatio]

What yeast strain did you use?

 

[StitchMySmile]

Lavlin 4377 wine yeast. Same stuff I use for most of my projects.

 

[aceparadis]

You could rack and pitch fresh yeast and see if it cleans up some of those nasties, otherwise age it out.

 

[gratus fermentatio]

Lavlin 4377 wine yeast. Same stuff I use for most of my projects.

Never heard of it. You sure about that strain designation? Could it be one of these strains?
http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/strains.asp
Regards, GF.

 

[StitchMySmile]

Lalvin 71b-1122 is what I use, not sure why 4377 was stuck in my head. Sorry about that.

 

[Yooper]

It might age nicely, but it won't go away completely.

Some wines are aged sur lie, but when they are the lees are stirred. Maybe aging on the lees with give you a certain "je ne sais quois" that you can never replicate in the future!

I'd give it some time to see how it ages out, before judging the final result.

 

[StitchMySmile]

Thanks for the advice. It's been aging for awhile. Hard not to drink it up but I wanna see the aged result.

 

[biochemedic]

Generally speaking, I think autolysis is like a Griffin (mythical), so 99% of the time I'd say you're tasting something that has nothing to do with extended primary aging. Even in this case that may be so, but I have read that 71B is one yeast in particular you don't want to leave on the lees for very long. That being said, I've left a cyser on 71B for at least 4 months and didn't have any off flavors...

 

[Sharkman20]

My mead took 6 months before primary fermentation stopped and was in primary the entire time. It's now a year old and tastes great without so much as a hint of any off flavors whatsoever.