My mead is terrible. What can I do?

[Psychlopath]

After four batches, five gallons each, of "JOAM," I felt confidant enough to make this recipe.

Under the guidance of my local homebrew shop, I used a (Now unknown) Champagne yeast and provided yeast nutrient for 5 days. Since then, it has been aging in a closet.

That was back in January.

Today was a tasting day, and it was bad. The mead was beautifully clear and amber colored, but the flavor reminded me of how an old book smells. Heavy, bordering on bitter with a very strong raisin tone. Completely offensive garbage.

I did a search and found "Sour mead," "bitter mead," and "cloudy mead," but nothing that I connected to what I had today.

What are my options here? I feel like its salvageable, but I'm just not using the right search terms to figure it out. What can I do to make it more palatable?

 

[MrTCS]

You said it's been aging in a closet since January but didn't mention if you racked it to a secondary vessel, or did you leave it in primary this whole time?

 

[Cavpilot2000]

It sounds oxidized (old book, heavy raisin, etc).
What kind of vessel has it been sitting in? Anything but glass or stainless is going to allow your concoction to oxidize over a 10 month period. And even those will if you let an airlock go dry or some other means of air ingress.

Also, are you sure you even like mead? It usually doesn't taste like what most people think a honey-derived drink would taste like, and for many it is an acquired taste.

 

[Mogambo]

Poor storage and Oxidation are major cause of papery or wet cardboard like taste.

Also after fermentation and moving into secondary to mature the mead, minimum amount head space should be kept to avoid contact of oxygen.

As Cavpilot2000 mention glass is ideal storage.. Irrespective of vessel used after some time oxygen start seeping in.. It's always the trade off between aging and flavor at home brewing.

 

[bernardsmith]

The other possibility with oxidation is that there was significant headroom between the top of the liquid and the bottom of the bung. While yeast is actively fermenting they produce a great deal of CO2 (carbon dioxide) - about half the weight in sugar is the weight of the gas they produce. Not small change. When all the sugar is fermented (usually two weeks give or take a week or so) the yeast are no longer belching out CO2 and that gas eventually is mixed with air - yes, even through your airlock and eventually the gas is completely replaced with air and air will oxidize the mead. Doesn't happen in a day but you say you began this mead 11 months ago. That is enough time for oxidation to take place. - And oxidation is an analog of rust. Can't be undone... If indeed, oxidation is the problem: what you might do is take a small sample to your local home brew store. Someone there is likely to be able to identify with some certainty the nature of the problem (if there is one other than you don't really like a dry mead - or the fact that if you followed the recipe and used 6 (count 'em 6) cloves rather than perhaps 1 or (gulp) 2 in a 5 gallon batch you might be tasting the overpowering taste of cloves.

 

[Yooper]

Definitely sounds oxidized to me. If it is, there is no fixing it.

 

[AkTom]

Bottle it. Some small 6 oz. bottles are nice. Wait another year and try one. I’ve had mead that wasn’t very good. Waited another several months and they will sometimes turn the corner for good.
My first mead was a JAOM. Not a good idea for a rookie. I learned methods that don’t work well with standard meads. jAOM is mead, just not a regular mead. Or so I’ve come to learn.
I didn’t read through the recipe thread you followed. Degassing and racking help.
Sorry for the ramble.
Cheers

 

[Cavpilot2000]

Also, unless you hate it, oxidized mead isn't always terrible. Many nice drinks are deliberately oxidized to gain their signature flavors (tawny port and sherry).

Agree with the idea of bottling it in small (12 oz or less) bottles and treating it like you would a tawny port or sherry (dessert wines, assuming it is sweet enough to pull that duty off).

 

[Psychlopath]

Thank you all for your time! I didn't see these replies this morning, so I took a sample to my local brew shop, Brewniverse. The guy there admittedly isn't a mead guy, but tasted it and said he thought it was because it got too hot during the ferment.

I didn't take temp control seriously, as I wound up leaving the state last minute for several weeks to deal with a death in the family and kind of forgot about it after that.

His suggestion was the same as here, to give it more time.

I also got the time for the next local brew club meeting where some mead judges attend, so I think I'll know for sure come the first part of next month. I'll be taking a decent size sample there to figure out if it's oxidization or not.

I kept it in a Better Bottle. I don't have any glass or stainless fermenters, but maybe I should be looking into them. The next batch will be much more controlled, so I have faith that it won't be the end of the mead experiments! I had no clue the stuff would oxidize inside of plastic.

Did I miss where the reason behind the tiny bottles should be used? I don't have any that small, but I can pick some up online, I'll start looking after this reply.

AkTom: All of my previous batches were JOAM, starting with a 1 gallon that taught me fast to shave all the pith off the orange skins. Why is that not a good starting point? Even the first batch, with the pith in there, turned out well after enough time. I didn't know about this forum back then, or maybe I'd have gone with a different route. After the wife tasted it, though, she wanted to have some around a all times. She doesn't like the beer I make and I don't like the mead, it's way too sweet for me, but it keeps something around for everyone in the family.

 

[AkTom]

JOAM is a specialty recipe. It works. Dun duh, dun duh... the big fat hairy ugly but. But it was designed to work. Most recipes can use a little more tlc. Nutrients, stirring, degassing. Using more or less honey. When to add fruit. Yeast selection. Ale and wine work well. Things JOAM taught me backwards, if you will. I don’t regret doing it, I wish I had learned more “traditional” methods first.
Don’t forget session meads. Another thing that process
wise is far different from JAOM.
Again, I’m not down on JOAM. I just wish I hadn’t gotten in that track. I hate having to relearn things. Mead is fun and I love it. Lots more for me to learn.
Cheers

 

[Maylar]

JOAM is a specialty recipe. It works. Dun duh, dun duh... the big fat hairy ugly but. But it was designed to work. Most recipes can use a little more tlc. Nutrients, stirring, degassing. Using more or less honey. When to add fruit. Yeast selection. Ale and wine work well. Things JOAM taught me backwards, if you will. I don’t regret doing it, I wish I had learned more “traditional” methods first.

It was my first mead. My avatar is my JAOM at 30 days. The most positive thing about that experience is that it taught me that I LIKE mead. No regrets here.

Rock & roll, brother.

 

[bernardsmith]

JAOM is what I call a novelty mead. It works and it is often the first mead that neophytes make but it works because the creator of this novelty really understood the underlying principles and then looked for non-intuitive ways to express them. So the large pieces of fruit for example, in a JAOM provides an indication of the production and presence of CO2 in the mead. A seasoned mead maker would use an hydrometer to measure this and would actively degas to remove the CO2. When the fruit drops to the bottom you know that no more CO2 is being belched out by the yeast AND you know that very little CO2 is still absorbed in the liquid; The fruit uses the pith of the orange which is bitter and that bitterness balances what is supposed to be a sweet mead. With JAOM you use bread yeast, in part (I think) the assumption is that bread yeast will not be able to ferment the JAOM dry and so it will leave you with a sweeter finish. Seasoned mead makers tend to use wine (or ale yeasts), aim to ferment dry and then back sweeten... and so on.

 

[AkTom]

It was my first mead. My avatar is my JAOM at 30 days. The most positive thing about that experience is that it taught me that I LIKE mead. No regrets here.

Rock & roll, brother.

I like mead too. Fun to make. Good to drink. I just wish I had learned better practices to start. Then my drinking time would be sooner.
Now I’m thirsty and it’s time for work. I hate it when that happens.
I’ll be making more mead this weekend. I have about 12# if honey just crying for me to something with.

 

[D. Scott Gilbertsen]

Sounds like too much head room/oxidation and I guess I missed it if you racked it to a secondary or not. None the less, don't quit and keep on making mead!

 

[Psychlopath]

I missed it if you racked it to a secondary or not.

Nope, you didn't miss it, I completely forgot to reply that I did NOT go to a secondary. ALL of my previous meads were a JAOM or a minor variant, and I based this recipe off of that.

After reading bernardsmith's reply, I feel like I still barely even know enough about brewing beer or mead to be allowed to be allowed to buy yeast, and maybe my other cooking should be called into question. I feel like I'm banging rocks together here.

Be that as it may, I'm setting up another honey buy from the only bee keeper I know in the area and I'm going to try this same recipe again, only with controlled temperatures! And blackjack and strippers!

But seriously, the fermenter that this particular mead is in now has a 1 year shelf space set aside just for gett'n fixed. I'm going to pull a few bottle's worth, as suggested above, and the rest will just stay as is for tasting later.

This thread has been more productive than I'd have hoped!

 

[D. Scott Gilbertsen]

After brewing beer, wine and mead for almost 5 yeras, I still think I'm a novice. Keep it up and good luck!