Making my Pyments

Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

MightyMosin

Supporting Member
HBT Supporter
Joined
Jul 22, 2021
Messages
577
Reaction score
839
I've started three different Pyments this year that have gone into barrels.

The first one is a Cabernet Sauvignon base that I made with Mesquite Blossom. I did a Malolactic conversion using Wyeast 4007 MLF culture that I left in secondary for ~ 4 months to make sure the conversion was completed. pH affects how long it takes to complete. A pH above 3.4 generally completes within 31 days. If your pH is below that, you should probably wait ~ 4 months or purchase a crhoma-photography test to check.

I then stabilized the mead with K-Meta and K-Sorbate. When doing a MLF conversion, you really need to be sure that the conversion is done if you are going to use any K-Sorbate. If it isn't finished and you add the K-Sorbate it can give off a germanium aroma/taste. I haven't experienced this but it is supposed to be pretty nasty. After this, I then back sweetened with Blueberry Blossom honey and a smaller portion of caramelized Mesquite honey and brought it to ~1.016 SG for a semi sweet taste that balanced nicely against the Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment. After primary, I added French oak xoakers for the entirety of the MLF conversion.

Following the back sweeting this went into an oak barrel that previously held rum. The Pyment was in there for about 5 months and then racked through a .5 micron KLR filter and then bottled.
---------------------
Following the same general practices above I did another Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment with Raspberry Blossom honey. This honey is much less bold than the Mesquite and doesn't show up as well in the Pyment. This has gone through MLF conversion and is currently aging in the same barrel that held the prior pyment. It has not been back sweetened at this point and I probably won't touch it until about June. I will decide at that point if I want to back sweeten or do anything else with it. It has much less of a mouth feel that the first one.
---------------------
The third one is a Pinot Noir Pyment using Blueberry blossom honey. This has followed the same basic processes and is in a barrel that previously held whiskey. Prior to going into the barrel it was a nicely balanced Pyment that didn't need any back sweetening. I'll leave this until about June as well while tasting along the way and then decide what to change, if anything,

I need storage space for these and I made a wind cabinet for them. The first Pyment has made it into the rack, minus what has been drunk and given away.
 

Attachments

  • 20221222_185656.jpg
    20221222_185656.jpg
    1.4 MB · Views: 0
  • 20221222_185923.jpg
    20221222_185923.jpg
    1.3 MB · Views: 0
  • 20221222_211401.jpg
    20221222_211401.jpg
    1.2 MB · Views: 0
  • 20221227_132045.jpg
    20221227_132045.jpg
    1.4 MB · Views: 0
  • 20221227_201029.jpg
    20221227_201029.jpg
    1.5 MB · Views: 0
Last edited:
I opened up a 375ml of the first Pyment; Cabernet Sauvignon made with Mesquite honey at 14.3% ABV. It's been 11 months since initial brewing and 3 months since it was bottled. When it went into the bottle it had a bit of a small burn that is just barely there anymore. I expect by June or so that will probably be all gone. The oak level is nice but I kind of wish I left it there for another month or so.

I tasted the Pinot Noir Pyment made with Blueberry Blossom honey out of the whiskey barrel. It's at about SG1.002 IIRC and it just tastes incredible... I just want a bit more oak on it and it will maybe stay until my original June estimation in the oak barrel.. periodic tasting will determine that. The residual sweetness is far above what the SG might make you think. There is some alcohol heat that needs time to fade away, but it isn't anything offensive like my first meads.

At my last tasting about 2 weeks ago, the newer Cab Sauv Pyment in barrel is slightly vegetal and much less finished. The oak is coming along nicely but I'm pretty sure that I will end up doing some back sweetening with it.
 
Last edited:
Soon, the next Pyment that I plan to start will be a white wine based grape kit. This will use a kit to make a Viognier wine. My wife chose this grape.

Like my prior Pyment attempts, I will use ~half of the grape concentrate mixed with the recommended amount of water and then measure the SG of that must. Based on that SG, I will then work up the honey must amount that will ensure that this is at least 51%+ honey based. From there, I will treat it like another mead and work up the nutrient schedule and the specific yeast to use. As the temperature is appropriate, I think I will try K1-V1116 to go for those floral esters.

I will generally try to avoid what would become 15% ABV or above. If needed, the grape must will be watered down to avoid a high gravity ferment and the associated aging time.

At some point, if I can gain access to high quality grapes, I would like to try this from a truly scratch base... for now the wine kits will do to provide the grape must... and they are mostly economical, especially if you find them on sale.
 
Last edited:
man would i love a bottle of those! these sound wonderful. I recently finished of a moscato pyment that was enjoyed by everyone who tried it, although i think it could have used a bit more acid - something to keep in mind.

where are you located, if you don't mind me asking?

the local wineries here will often make accommodations for amateurs to buy some grapes - either outright, or trade in labor, etc.
 
I'm located in the So Cal area. I should probably check with some of the Temecula wineries to see about the possibility of purchasing Zinfandel/Primitivo grapes. That would be one that I'd want to try... after I read up on and understand the proper process for processing grapes.

I have another 6.5 gallons of Pinot Noir (exact same recipe) in primary right now and it will probably finish in the next 10 days. At that point, I'll then rack and start the Malo-Lactic conversion. When I rack the first batch of Pinot Noir pyment out of the barrel somewhere around June, this batch will go right in to replace it and age.
 
I uncorked another bottle of the Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment tonight.

It has maybe 5% of the alcohol heat that it had the last time I tried it out. Since that aspect has almost entirely past, I feel that it could use some more tannin astringency. Other than that, I think I hit the acid and sweetness level just about where I wanted it to be. For my very first attempt, I have to say that I am extremely happy with this. This is better than several commercial Pyments that I have tried, while not being in that cloying sweet territory.

I enjoy the Superstition Aphrodisia Pyments, but they have too much sweetness, in general, for my taste. I have to give them props for being my reference for what I like and what I don't like
.
I'm guessing the next bottle of this will be in June or so, and I expect that at that point all alcohol heat will be gone. With the 14+% ABV, I expect that I can enjoy these several years from now without worrying about passing the prime before I blink.

If you haven't tried making a Pyment, I suggest you give it a try. This has become one of my favorite styles.

update: I enjoyed it so much I opened another tonight while make some more mead and waiting for the wife to finish at work.
 
Last edited:
I made 6.5 gallons of a Voinier Pyment today.

I started with a "Vine Co" Voignier wine kit. I used 2 L of the concentrated juice and added water to bring it to 2 gallons. This must was a SG of 1.070.

I then mixed up 12Lb of Orange Blossom honey (3 of that caramelized at 235F for an hour). This was added with water to add another 4 gallons to the mix SG 1.099. That brought the blended final OG to 1.090, which should hit 12% just about even. The primary also received 3.6g of FT Blanc Tannin, 6g of Booster Blanc and 7g of Opti-White. I added a Bentonite slurry as well.

I pitched a new to me yeast; I used the Lalvin? / Scott Labs 58W3 which is supposed to be good for Voignier wines.

I still have 2/3 of the concentrate left for playing around with this one in case I don't like the yeast or if I feel it needed more of the juice concentrate. If I'm exceedingly lucky, I will like it as it turns out and then I'll be able to make two more batches of this which would make this a very inexpensive wine kit.
 
Last edited:
My pyments so far have been made with Welch's juice. Pretty lame compared to yours. The concord grape juice is cheap, but the finished product has a bit too much of the "concord" carrying through, unless it is blended.

I recently opened a pyment/raspberry melomel blend that I had bottled about a year ago, and it was really good! The concord grape overtones had faded a lot, and ended with a good balance of grape, raspberry, and honey coming through.
 
Last edited:
I recently opened a pyment/raspberry melomel blend that I had bottled about a year ago, and it was really good! The concord grape overtones had faded a lot, and ended with a good balance of grape, raspberry, and honey coming through.
Aging can be nice to fade some flavors. It helped an over cinnamon mead I made. Called it Cinnamon Sin
 
I recently racked my Viognier based Pyment off of the sediment. It just looked done and I forgot to check its gravity. I checked that today and it is sitting at SG 0.096, so it is done.

This has a nice subtle aroma, I tried a taste of this 24 day old mead and I have to say that it is tasty with some residual sweetness from the Orange Blossom honey while retaining a nice flavor from the grapes. This is a 12% mead and there is no off flavors or funky fusel taste. I really like how easy it is (well, after enough bad mead making) to turn out a good 12% mead. Orange Blossom was a good choice against this grape as I believe the 71B yeast was. D-21 might be a nice choice for my next go at this one.

It will get Kieselsol and Chitosan and sit for a few weeks. After that, I will rack through a .5 micron gravity filter right into to a stainless steel keg to age and integrate. I don't think I will back sweeten this at all, though I may play with some acid additions but not until after I add some oak to it. I'll have to decide which oak type(s) to use, though that will be after it is racked into the stainless keg. I'm leaning toward American Oak at Medium Toast+.

A nice thing on this is that I used 1/3 of the Viognier wine kit in making 6 gallons after initial racking. I can make another 12 gallons with what I have left and that pleases me quite well as it really drops the cost of the kit on a per bottle basis. I'm going to have to start to ask people to start saving their wine bottles again.
 
Last edited:
I have considered putting together a pyment using the Wine Expert Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon kit.

Mosin, does the finished product drink very similar to a red wine?

Sounds like you have had good luck using decent grape juice from wine kits.

Todd Peterson
 
I have considered putting together a pyment using the Wine Expert Private Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon kit.

Mosin, does the finished product drink very similar to a red wine?

Sounds like you have had good luck using decent grape juice from wine kits.

Todd Peterson
The finished product is a bit dependent upon how you want it to finish. You can finish it dry and have closer to a wine like drink or you may want to back sweeten some to help highlight the honey.

I think that I have had some nice results with wine kits and I haven't been going to high $ on them as I wanted to experiment and not flush a high dollar kit down the toilet. With that said, I have been eyeing kits like the one that you mention that include the grape skins... I think that it where you need to be if you want to get closer to the red wine side with all those great tannins in there.

With a kit like that I have been thinking of starting it as a wine only and let the yeast start to chew through those sugars and get going, while the tannins from the skins do their thing... once its going good (maybe 72 hours?) add in the honey and start the TOSNA regimen. The thought being to get a good wine character going first with the yeast established and then giving them the sugar and nutrients to get through the rest; they should get enough nutrients from the grapes for a few days as long as the yeast have been properly hydrated with Go-Ferm.

I'd probably add oak in the primary fermenter. and carry them over to secondary After racking I'd go with something like the Wyeast MLF kit and set it aside for a few months to let those bacteria do what they do with the malic to lactic acid conversion. Wine often has acid adjustments done up front; don't do that with a Pyment as the honey add will be acidic by ph.

Since the Cabernet is such a bold grape I would suggest a bold honey like Mesquite; The Trader Joes Mostly Mesquite works very well. I have tried a subtle honey like Raspberry Blossom and that, unfortunately, highlights a vegetal flavor from the Cabernet grape. I'll back sweeten with some Mesquite and/or Blueberry Blossom to try and balance that batch out. I've used Blueberry Blossom in a Pinot Noir and that is an incredible combination.

For yeast, I think D-21 would be a good choice, though I have used RC212 and that works great but is the preferred one for Pinot Noir.
Take a look at Opti-Red or Booster Rouge as an additive in primary; if you want to fall between those two you might look at Noblesse as an additive. Since that kit has skins, I would probably lean toward Opti-Red.
 
Last edited:
So this last weekend I had a taste of the Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment from the barrel. it was good but was a bit plain. For 15.25% it wasn't hot at all.
On the nose it's nice but is missing some depth. Hard to describe for me. It's taste had a bit of a vegetal character that some Cab Sauv can have.

I racked the Pyment out of the barrel to a carboy and gave it some K-Sorbate and K-Meta. this has been probably close to 5 months since I did the Malo-Lactic conversion on it so it should be safe for the K-Sorbate to be in there. I got about 5.5 gallons out of the barrel.

The barrel was then rinsed with some boiling water followed by some cold water. I didn't want loose Pyment in there to mingle with the 750ml of rum I was adding back to the barrel. That is what this barrel had originally. The barrel was rolled/swished around and then stood on is ends to cover it all with rum while it was empty and the K-Sorbate was doing its job on the Pyment. After two days, the rum was racked out back to its container.

The Pyment was then back sweetened with 1.5Lb of Mesquite honey that I caramelized. This took the SG from 0.998 to 1.008. On the palette this little bit f sweetening changed it for the better. The vegetal character disappeared behind the slight sweetness and the over all flavor became more well rounded and interesting. The aroma stayed about the same though more peppery notes were apparent.

The only flavor drawback is that the 15% Pyment now had a bit if a hot taste to it that wasn't apparent before. This will just need to sit in the barrel for more time to flavor integrate and mellow slightly. That isn't surprising as I only made it this year and wines are typically aged at least a year. This is 15+% Pyment and not a 12% wine.

All in all, I'm much happier with it now after the slight back sweetening.
 
The only flavor drawback is that the 15% Pyment now had a bit if a hot taste to it that wasn't apparent before. This will just need to sit in the barrel for more time to flavor integrate and mellow slightly. That isn't surprising as I only made it this year and wines are typically aged at least a year. This is 15+% Pyment and not a 12% wine.
The slightly hot taste has completely disappeared, faster than I expected. Now it will sit longer to age in the barrel to age and oak up a bit more.
 
I recently bottled my Viognier Pyment and after the constant tasting and enjoying, I ended up with about (17) 750ml bottles. This is, IMO, a great Viognier Pyment that certainly tastes more like a wine though it has a nice honey nose to it.

This June Gloom we have going on will give some cool temperatures for at least the next ten days, so I decided to just use the rest of the Viognier juice concentrate and make up another three 6.6 gallon batches of this Pyment. I liked how the first one came out, so I didn't change the recipe up at all. I should get ~(90) 750ml bottle out of this.

As far as the wine kit goes, this was a steal as what would have made ~6-7 gallons of wine is makin me ~26 gallons of Pyment.
 
I entered my Cabernet Sauvignon and a Pinot Noir Pyments into a County Fair home winemaking competition and got a Double Gold on each of them.

I also submitted my Marshmallow Root Bochet and got a silver with that. I'm looking forward to getting the tasting notes back as this is the first competition that I have submitted to.

I'm quite happy about this.
 
Last edited:
I tasted the new Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment tonight. It needs more time; my guts say December before it might be ready to bottle... until then, let it sit in the oak barrel and age some more.

I also tasted the new Pinot Noir. It also needs more time to smooth out... I'm guessing March of 2024 for bottling.... right about time for the next County Fair entry.

I'm guessing that about October of this year I will start another Cabernet Sauvignon pyment. This time I will use a wine kit with grape skins for the tannins and likely go back to the Mesquite honey and do the ML conversion.

My next new one will probably be a gewurztraminer grape and see how that comes out... Looking forward to this one.
 
Last edited:
So tonight I opened up a bottle of the first Pyment that I made (described in the first post in this thread). It's a 14.4% Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment that I started on 3/26/2022 and bottled on 11/20/2022.

When it went into the bottle it was tasty but still a bit hot, but by February of this year, that heat that could be felt in the throat and was gone. At my local Fair and its wine-mead contest, it got me a Double Gold that I am quite happy about.

Tasting notes:
This has a nice semi-sweet flavor where the Cabernet Sauvignon is nicely balanced against the Mesquite Blossom honey that was used. Each wine-honey character is evident and plays off of the other nicely. It could be a tad less sweet to let the grapes come through a bit more.

When I have some in the mouth and I suck air in over it I get a hint of cough syrup. It isn't objectionable, but it is the best description that I have for it. That is a faint flavor that likely wouldn't be there if more grapes came through.

The mouth feel is nice and coats the pallet well. The alcohol is not hot at all, but there is a character or hint there that it used to be. I expect that the next time I open a bottle that there will be no hint of that.

The aroma is a nice blend of the honey and the Cabernet Sauvignon with the honey aroma winning out a bit over the grapes.

EDIT (Added tasting notes from a friend): It is delicious. Tastes better chilled. I had to use an ahso to get the cork out. It crumbled with the corkscrew. I was worried it went bad.
It has a slight alcohol burn on the back end. But it is warm and rich in flavor. It almost has a Brandy flavor.
It brings out the spice in Asian chili sauce. It reminds me of a dessert wine.
It is delicious and it paired well with the pork egg rolls Alex made. It is also pairing well with a candy apple. Is the mesquite the smokey flavor that is there too?

"

As I think about this, I believe that I could have used a bit less honey in the back sweetening. What was good at the initial point of back sweetening is a bit more than I want now that it has blended and aged more. In hindsight, I can say that I would leave it longer in the barrel and not be so impatient to bottle and enjoy my first pyment. I would also use less honey back sweetening, as I could always add more later on after the flavors had aged and blended... Don't try and make it perfect right out of the gate!

My 2nd Cabernet Pyment has been in the barrel for ~7 months (I think.. too lazy to grab notes) and it is about 10 months younger than the batch described above. It used a much lighter honey than the first batch, but I have to say that I believe it is better than this first batch; I might need to do a side by side later tonight and update this post later. The oak barrel seem to do something magical with the mead. It is subtle and I try and avoid tasting too often as it becomes difficult to notice the differences. I think this 2nd batch will be ready for a December-ish bottling.

Lastly, I have another Cabernet Sauvignon kit on deck. This one makes use of grape skins where my prior batches do not have that and I had to get the tannin solely from the barrel. I don't remember if I used any powdered tannin and the notes are too far away at the moment. Now that the weather is cooling, I will start this batch soon and once fermentation is complete, I will empty the barrel and bottle and this new upcoming batch will go into the barrel and I will start a MLF conversion on it.
 
Last edited:
So tonight is a tasting of my second batch of my Pinot Noir Pyment. As far as I can remember, this is pretty close my first batch that I made as I was quite happy with it. On this batch, I decided to not go with the Malo Lactic conversion. A future comparison will decide if that was a bad choice.

This was started on Feb 23, 2023, finished fermentation on March 19th and was racked and stabilized solely with K-Meta and zero Sorbate. The SG was 1.004. This was racked to a keg and sat there for about 2.5 months until my other Pinot Noir Pyment was racked out of its barrel. On July 7th, this was racked into the barrel and has been sitting there.

I did taste it a little while ago and my gut said a March bottling at that point. While it can probably be bottled in December I am willing to bet that it will get better if I leave it in the barrel. Do I try and leave it there for a whole year? I want to make another Pinot Noir... I guess I can make another and rack to a keg until I empty this barrel. I think that will be the plan for now.

Tasting Notes:
This beauty is sitting at a hefty 15% ABV and has zero alcohol heat. It could linger on the palate more and I think continued aging in the barrel will help that.
The aroma has a nice balance between honey while being slight beat out by the wine aroma, if only barely. The aroma is clearly NOT wine but a nice pyment. The slight residual sweetness washes across the tongue nicely followed by a nice acid wash. The Pinot Noir flavor is there but it certainly modified by the Blueberry Blossom honey I used in this.

I kind of think I'd be OK with only making Pyment's as I really enjoy the interplay of the honey and the grapes. My big problem is not being able to let these guys sit and age longer... I enjoy them too much.

I did set some of these prior batches aside for future tastings where I am only opening about one a year... My Cabernet Sauvignon in the barrel is on the endangered species list and the wife and I need to ease up on the tasting so I have enough to bottle.
 
Another 7.0 gallons of a Cabernet Sauvignon was started today. This time I used a much more expensive kit by WineXpert that has the grapes sourced from Lodi and includes the grape skins. This should finish out at 14% ABV. I used half of the grape juice and grape skins so that I can have another batch to make in he future. The skins in the kit weighed 5Lb and I used half in this batch.

On this one I didn't use any FT Red Tannin as I am expecting/hoping that the grape skins will provide all of what I need for this and the oak barrel will add to that. I did use the French oak cubes and chips that the kit included as well as the bentonite in primary.

For the honey I used about 4.5Lb of Mesquite Blossom and 8Lb of Orange Blossom. I'm expecting that the Orange Blossom will provide a nice flavor while the Mesquite should offer a nice punch though it all.
 
Last edited:
Did you buy kit online?
I purchased it from MoreWine. I have previously used the "On the House" brand of kits and had good results, so I thought I'd up the ingredient quality this time around. The less expensive kits were ~$80 and this kit is >$200.

I should get 30 - 35 750ml bottles depending upon the losses due to racking, tasting, and barrel absorption.
 
So I did a taste of this Viognier Pyment tonight.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/making-my-pyments.723957/post-10265178I have these in a variety of kegs with oak.

This was done in (3) ~6.5 gallon batches and then racked to carboys, filtered and then into kegs with oak added.

Interesting tasting tonight. All three batches were done with the same wine kit, same honey and same yeast variety, and same gravity.

Some batches have a great forward aroma and others have less. Some have a "corn chip" flavor at the back of the palette that varies a bit on the intensity.
The beautiful , nice aroma are associated with the "corn chip" batches. The batches that do not have the "corn chip" on the palette have a muted aroma. I really love the aroma as it enhances the flavor.

I've had this "corn chip" flavor before on mead that has used an Ale yeast and it has eventually faded away and disappeared, which is what I hope happens with this Pyment. It's not too strong or very objectionable, but I do not like this flaw. I really want it to disappear soon.

Anyone else had this flavor and any idea what triggers it?
 
I opened a bottle of a Pinot Noir pyment that I started in June of 2022 and I received a Double Gold on last year at our county home winemaking competition (in one of the mead categories).

First thing to note is that I needed to use better corks as I'm tired of these amalgamated ones tearing in half; secondly I need to get an Ah So cork puller for times like this. I've been lucky that I haven't had an instance that has crumbled cork into the bottle.

This is a 15.5% pyment that finished dry but has a ton of residual sweetness. Overall the flavor is nice.
The worst of the more critical judging comments:
Alcohol burn, On the thin side (another judge said full bodied), a little oxidized like a port.

Out of those, the oxidized comment strikes home. The color is slightly a dull red, and while I don't taste it, the spouse says there is a slight "papery" taste to it.

I popped the bung out of the barrel of the next batch of Pinot Noir pyment to get a sample to try. In comparison, the slight oxidation is evident on the first batch as the new batch is so much more "brighter" with a deeper red color. I'm not so surprised as we tasted the hell out of the original batch and left more O2 in the barrel... even though I did try to add CO2 to compensate.

The newer batch has had a bunch of CO2 added to the barrel after my tasting. I'll likely submit this to the next contest. I haven't tried the Cab Sauv pyment to see how it is. If it isn't oxidized via too many tastings, I'll likely submit that one as well, even if it is in the same category as the Pinot Noir.

All in all, I have to say that the bottled Pinot Noir pyment has stood up so far. It has been kept on its side so that the cork has been kept continually moist, but I expect that the poorer quality cork has allowed more oxygen into the bottle than has been expected and the quality has been affected.

I will be receiving some better corks soon, and I may just pull these corks and put the newer ones into extend the life of these pyments. Will that make a difference, I don't know but I expect it can't hurt if I flush it with CO2 while making the change over.
 
Started another 6.5 gallons of a Cabernet Sauvignon pyment with grape skins.

This batch is using Rasperry Blossom honey. It was mostly crystallized and took longer than i liked to get mixed in even with it having sat in Sous Vide bath for a few days.
 
Huge update on my 2nd batch of Cabernet Sauvignon pyment. Now in bottles.

Dec of 2022
Following the same general practices above I did another Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment with Raspberry Blossom honey. This honey is much less bold than the Mesquite and doesn't show up as well in the Pyment. This has gone through MLF conversion and is currently aging in the same barrel that held the prior pyment. It has not been back sweetened at this point and I probably won't touch it until about June. I will decide at that point if I want to back sweeten or do anything else with it. It has much less of a mouth feel that the first one.

Feb 2023
I opened up a 375ml of the first Pyment; Cabernet Sauvignon made with Mesquite honey at 14.3% ABV. It's been 11 months since initial brewing and 3 months since it was bottled. When it went into the bottle it had a bit of a small burn that is just barely there anymore. I expect by June or so that will probably be all gone. The oak level is nice but I kind of wish I left it there for another month or so.
At my last tasting about 2 weeks ago, the newer Cab Sauv Pyment in barrel is slightly vegetal and much less finished. The oak is coming along nicely but I'm pretty sure that I will end up doing some back sweetening with it.

May 2023
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/making-my-pyments.723957/post-10257307 for full post

The Pyment was then back sweetened with 1.5Lb of Mesquite honey that I caramelized. This took the SG from 0.998 to 1.008. On the palette this little bit f sweetening changed it for the better. The vegetal character disappeared behind the slight sweetness and the over all flavor became more well rounded and interesting. The aroma stayed about the same though more peppery notes were apparent.

The only flavor drawback is that the 15% Pyment now had a bit if a hot taste to it that wasn't apparent before. This will just need to sit in the barrel for more time to flavor integrate and mellow slightly. That isn't surprising as I only made it this year and wines are typically aged at least a year. This is 15+% Pyment and not a 12% wine.
Aug 2023
I tasted the new Cabernet Sauvignon Pyment tonight. It needs more time; my guts say December before it might be ready to bottle... until then, let it sit in the oak barrel and age some more.

I also tasted the new Pinot Noir. It also needs more time to smooth out... I'm guessing March of 2024 for bottling.... right about time for the next County Fair entry.
That is looking right on schedule.

Oct 2023
My 2nd Cabernet Pyment has been in the barrel for ~7 months (I think.. too lazy to grab notes) and it is about 10 months younger than the batch described above. It used a much lighter honey than the first batch, but I have to say that I believe it is better than this first batch;
This batch is certainly better.

3-13-24
Bottled today.

The back sweetening on this is about 1/2 the amount as my first batch but seems to carry much more sweetness and Cab Sauv flavor. This also had a MLF conversion done and supposedly you shouldn't back sweeten as left over bacteria can feed on the sorbic acid. My first batch hasn't had that issue thankfully. This batch went heavy on the sulfites before bottling, but you cannot taste them and I am hoping to keep any bacteria at bay that might want to feed on the sorbic acid.

Overall this batch is more flavorful, more apparent sweetness with about half the honey added in back sweetening. If I had to guess, I would attribute it to better process and more importantly using pure O2 to get the yeast off to a health start. I will submit this one to the County home wine/mead contest as I believe is is superior to what I submitted last year and that did very well. It also didn't hurt that it had a very extended stay at the oak barrel hotel, even if I didn't plan for the stay to be quite so long.
 
The first of two new batches of Cabernet Sauvignon pyment made with grape skins is ready to go into a barrel... but that barrel had to be rinsed several times and eventually filled with some almost boiling water to swell the wood, help remove tartaric crystals acid and generally kill off anything that shouldn't be there. The barrel was then filled with a solution that had 2 grams of K-Meta and 1 gram citric acid per Liter of water. This was left for a few days until I can get to working on it and transferring its next resident. This portion was on this last Friday.

Today I removed the K-Meta/Citric acid water from a barrel that I racked out of a week or so. That barrel has been rinsed about 3 times after I drained it and I'll let it slowly drain out anything left overnight and through the next day or so. After that, I'll add some rum into it to soak into the wood as both a flavoring as well as a high ABV alcohol to keep microbes away until this weekend. After that, I will rack 6 gallons of a Cabernet Sauvignon pyment into the barrel (with the extra rum removed) to sit and age a while before I decide what, if any, level of back sweetening that I want to do with it. This particular one is the first batch to use the grape skins. I figure I should wait to see what the aging will do before I jump the gun and back sweeten before the flavors have had a chance to integrate and get some of that oak and rum going into the overall profile.

My second batch/version of this is still fermenting. When that on is done, I will rack it into a 6 gallon stainless keg with the grape skins to sit and gather more tannins for about 4 weeks. After that I will rack and bottle my Pinot Noir pyment out of a different barrel and rack this new pyment into that Pinot barrel and then I'll start MLF on it and let it sit for a while.
[Edit 3-24-24] This went into a stainless keg and the prior batch that was in the keg went into the "5 gallon" barrel that took the 6 gallons and still had rom for another gallon or so.

I will soon-ish start a Gewurztraminer Pyment using Mesquite Blossom. I have high hopes for this though I haven't tried it before. I may try to start sooner while the temperatures are still lower... they're certainly creeping up on me. The next 10-14 days are looking like favorable temperatures to start a new mead.
 
Last edited:
I started a 6.5 gallon batch of a Gewurztraminer pyment today. I have been looking forward to doing this once I took care of some of the other in progress projects. This is using a Vine Co California Gewurztraminer kit. I used half of the kit for this. The kit is 8L of concentrate to make a 6 gallon batch and a small amount of a "finishing" liquid... not sure what that is but I'm guessing it is probably sweet.

I used 4L of the concentrate and added spring water to bring that volume up to 3 gallons. This had a gravity of 1.100.
I then added ~10.5 Lb of Mesquite honey and water and brought the batch up to 6.5 gallons at 1.106 OG.

The yeast is what I found to be the recommended yeast for this type of grape. Vitilevure 58W3. From Scott Labs:
VITILEVURE 58W3™ produces high levels of varietal aroma-releasing enzymes which leads to increased spicy, floral, and fruity aromas.

Ideally, this should work really well with the Mesquite Blossom honey. I hope so as that is all I used, though a small amount of Buckwheat to the mix might have been well; but I really want the grape to shine on this so it is probably best that I ignored my impulse to throw a bit of Buckwheat in there.

This also got some FT Blanc Soft tannin as the kit has no grape skins. Some Opti-White was used for preserving the aroma. Some Noblesse as it should help the mouth feel if I keep it dry.

I had a dry Gewurztraminer at a winery ~9 months ago and it was just so enjoyable with residual sweetness that was so much preferable to the sweet version that they also served. In my mind, I am hoping for something like that. This yeast is listed as having 14% tolerance, so I expect this to go bone dry. I am expecting/hoping that the unique flavor of the mesquite honey and the floral aroma of the grape will come through nicely for a balanced flavor without much (hope none) adjustment post fermentation.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top