Mead recipe

[brockettbrews]

I want make 2 gallon batch. I was thinking about putting strawberries in it for flavor. What would be a good recipe??


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[brockettbrews]

Was thinking 3lbs of honey and a pound of strawberries. Do you boil it??


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[Arpolis]

There is no need to boil the fruit. Boiling will set pectins and make this harder to clear. A simple recipe could look like:

1 gallon
2 - 3lb honey (shoot for an end gravity of about 1.080)
1lb sliced strawberries in primary
2lb sliced strawberries in secondary
1tsp pectic enzyme
1tsp yeast nutrient
1/2 tsp yeast energizer
Yeast (lalvin RC-212 or Lalvin 71b-1112)

 

[brockettbrews]

Thank you. That really helps. I watched a couple videos on you tube. Craig tube


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[brockettbrews]

I bought some red star yeast will this work


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[brockettbrews]

Can I use an orange blossom honey


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[Arpolis]

Red star has many yeasts that can work. What did you get? Cote de blanc is a good one for berries.

Orange blossom honey is a good base for most any mead. That should work out great for this.

 

[brockettbrews]

I got it off amazon it was a champange yeast.


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[Arpolis]

Red star champagne is a decent yeast. It will be nutrial in flavor profile and make a dry wine. You will probably want to add crushed Camden and sorbate when racking onto your second set of strawberries to retain some sweetness. So I would let it ferment dry and mostly clear in primary. Rack to secondary and add the Camden and sorbate. Let it further clear and after 2-4 weeks or at least 1/4" of sediment collected rack again but onto the new berries. After a couple weeks you can do a near if not final racking off that and sweeten to taste. Let it bulk age and rack every 30 days till no sediment drops and then feal free to bottle any time after that.

 

[brockettbrews]

i got the pasteur champange yeast red star will this work to make mead???

 

[MarshmallowBlue]

Like Arpolis said, Yeah it will work fine. It will ferment pretty much whatever you throw at it dry. So you're going to want to stabilize it at some point (secondary) and backsweeten it to your desired level of sweetness. Backsweeten with strawberries/ strawberry juice for a stronger aroma/flavor contribution form those berries.

 

[brockettbrews]

got one more question. do you have to use all the same honey?? if i use 4 pounds of orange blossom and 2 pounds of clove honey will this work???

 

[Arpolis]

No that causes an advers reaction called autosyfilitous. Differnent honeys have specific colonies of organisms in them and if they interact they attempt to kill each other by making some toxic chemicals that taste horrible in mead....

:cross:

I am sorry that seems a little mean now that I re-read that. It is fine to use whatever honey you have. Any will "work", you just get a different flavor profile. I have mixed orange blossom and clover just because I ran out of one or the other and have had fine results.