New to mead, bottling question

[Maddoghoek]

So I have 5 gallons of light lemonade mead (only 5lbs of honey) that tastes just about where I want it. It's currently sitting at 1.004 SG, and I would like to bottle and put it in my basement it to have it ready for X-mas. I know longer is better for aging, but the amount of honey is so low it's shouldn't take much time. My question is, how do I stop from making bottle bombs? I'm confused as to what I need to use and the quantity I need to use. I have a LHBS with wine making kits 10 minutes away, so I can easily get whatever I need to make this happen. EDIT: is it possable to pasturize mead, or will this adversely effect the overall taste?

In addition to that, I have 12oz long neck and some random 22oz beer bottles I would like to use to bottle. Am I safe just capping them with regular beer bottle caps, or should I invest in some corks? Are there even corks that fit these types of bottles?

Any advice would be appreciated!

 

[fatbloke]

So I have 5 gallons of light lemonade mead (only 5lbs of honey) that tastes just about where I want it. It's currently sitting at 1.004 SG, and I would like to bottle and put it in my basement it to have it ready for X-mas. I know longer is better for aging, but the amount of honey is so low it's shouldn't take much time. My question is, how do I stop from making bottle bombs? I'm confused as to what I need to use and the quantity I need to use. I have a LHBS with wine making kits 10 minutes away, so I can easily get whatever I need to make this happen. EDIT: is it possable to pasturize mead, or will this adversely effect the overall taste?

In addition to that, I have 12oz long neck and some random 22oz beer bottles I would like to use to bottle. Am I safe just capping them with regular beer bottle caps, or should I invest in some corks? Are there even corks that fit these types of bottles?

Any advice would be appreciated!

If you bottled into beer bottles, given the quantity of fermentable sugars left, it'd probably make a nice, light sparkling batch.

Which might be better, as I'd have thought that it'd be lacking in body somewhat.

If you just want it as a low alcohol, still batch, then don't use heat. Heat is a very harsh way of treating most brews, honey and many other ingredients (of course, there's a few ingredients that benefit from heating i.e. elderberry, black currant, to name two).

You probably have either sulphite powder or campden tablets - don't know about the powdered stuff, but 1 campden tablet crushed per gallon is usually the correct dose, then potassium sorbate - dosage as per pack, but from memory, it's usually about half a teaspoon per gallon.

 

[Onihige]

So an ABV of about 4%? Do you want sparkling mead or still mead? If it's already still, measure to see if fermentation has stopped (though I'm guessing it will go lower, to about 0.995). If you get the same measurement in three readings (some days apart) - it's done fermenting and you can degass if there's still some CO2. Then bottle and cap.

If it's fermented completely dry and you want it sparkling, just add a tiny bit of honey or sugar to make it ferment again and bottle. It will ferment in the bottle creating CO2, making it fizzy.

Don't heat the honey.

And I would not save such a weak mead for christmas, especially during such a hot summer... if it tastes fine now - go for it.

 

[Maddoghoek]

Huh... I hadn't actually considered sparkling. Do you think I'll be safe to bottle at that gravity and still end up with some decent carb? It has a slight fusel "bite" to it, but not really harsh or anything. It's been in the same carboy for about 2 months, and looks pretty darn clear already.

 

[fatbloke]

Well actually, that picture tells me that there's still some way to go on the clearing, or that you might consider filtration of some sort.

The 2 x 1 gallon batch I was preparing for bottling 4 or 5 days ago, was clearer than that when I blended them both together.

I added the back sweetening syrup to 1.012 and after a taste test, added 1.5 tsp of acid (mix of 2 parts malic and 1 part tartaric) and a tsp of wine tannin.

I ran out of time so just put it back into the 2 carboys/DJ's (sanitised of course). At the time it looked about the same as Maddoghoek's picture (well it's more browny gold in colour, but the colour is a different issue).

When I looked at it the following day, there was about an inch of a fluffy looking brown sediment, but the mead on top of the sediment was amazingly clear.

Don't forget, that the "definition" of clear is usually described as "being able to read a newspaper though it"........

 

[Maddoghoek]

Ok, I'll start with some geletin to clear. I haven't procured a second carboy yet (kinda expensive), and the only other container I have is my plastic 7 gal bucket. Won't go a long way in letting me see what the clarity is if I can't see it. Mabye a swamp cooler cold crash?

 

[BrewerBear]

You do not want to transfer to bucket and leave it for any length of time,it will have to much headspace. You can transfer to the bucket,clean and sanitize the carboy and then put gelatin in the carboy and transfer back to it. If that recipe is from homebrewer_99 it is very good, I bottled a batch a couple weeks ago and have a version with pink lemonade I'm planning on bottling this weekend.

I have all of mine bottled in beer bottles. I think they do make a cork for beer bottles(#7 maybe) but I would just cap it instead. Enjoy

 

[Maddoghoek]

Yup, that's the one. I handed my brother in law the tube from a gravity sample and he wouldn't give it back lol...

I didn't consider just doing a double transfer either. Hrm. Probably my best bet.

Thanks everyone for the advice!