NEW to MEAD

[jacus0]

Hi All

Long time forum lurker, first time poster here. I originally joined when I was learning to brew beer and brewing with friends, but now I’m the only one still brewing really and I find myself drifting here: MEADS!! Me and my wife fell in love with this drink and have embraced the idea of brewing for ourselves.

We started couple months ago and started easy with a gallon of Apple-Juice with Orange Blossom honey for our first, shooting for something sweet. I had to split it between 2 jugs, but they were both poured from the same mix. Here is what we used:

2 lbs. Orange Blossom honey (Florida source)

1gallon TreeTop Apple Juice

½ packet yeast ( Lalvin ICV K1-V1116 )

1 tsp Yeast Nutrient

SG: (we forgot to take a reading)

EG: 1.020

IBV: 13% (prediction …maybe haha)




In the end, after 2 weeks fermentation and 1 week cold crashing, which then we attempted to age with an oak spiral. In hindsight, we feel this mead would have been better to not have aged and drink it as is. What is left now is a bottle that’s aged 4 weeks with spirals and has balanced immensely. It had a light sweetness to it, but not the sweetness we expected. We still needed to add more to bring it up from the dryness.




Now we have a new batch going for another sweet mead, this time sourcing the honey from Arizona when we visited recently. We still used Apple Juice as the base, but the local honey was something new to try. Also, we used some heirloom yeast we saved from the first batch to add with the new yeast. Thought it be a cool experiment to try and see what it does, maybe bring something from the orange blossom (never tried it with beers either)

2.75 lbs. Wild Mountain (Pecan) (Prescott, Arizona source The Honeyman)

.75 gallons TreeTop Apple Juice (will top it off later)

½ packet yeast ( Lalvin ICV K1-V1116 )

2oz of heirloom yeast

1 tsp Yeast Nutrient

SG: 1.15 - 1.17 (1.16 if you want to split hairs haha)



The first fermentation has been aggressive compared to the last one we made (we had to change the airlocks 3 times because it backed up). Now it is bubbling smoothly and constantly!

Glad to be here and looking forward to more conversations!

 

[Seamonkey84]

Welcome aboard! Aging was a wise choice, Apple wine/cyser need time to mellow a bit. The acids in apples are kind of harsh at first. Enjoy! The whole process is addicting, as you prob know already lol.
Heirloom yeast??

 

[jacus0]

Welcome aboard! Aging was a wise choice, Apple wine/cyser need time to mellow a bit. The acids in apples are kind of harsh at first. Enjoy! The whole process is addicting, as you prob know already lol.
Heirloom yeast??

Thank you much, glad to be here and brewing again! I have never aged anything before so it was interesting to see what would happen. It tasted pretty nice before aging, refreshing almost. We called it Heirloom Yeast, since it was yeast left over after cold crashing the first batch we brewed. It sounded fancy to us lol....So we saved some, and then used it in this new batch with fresh yeast, to see what would happen. Fingers crossed !!

 

[PantherEnjoyer]

Sounds good. You can pitch straight onto the old yeast, but be mindful of a few things with mead making vs beer.

Reusing yeast in mead is less hit and more miss, only because honey doesn't have the same nutrients. You added nutrient which is great.

The yeast also get pretty stressed brewing in high ABV environments, so just be careful. I would only use your "heirloom" one time then start again. That's just my opinion.

Also, if you pitch a different strain, more than likely they may lag as they battle for dominance. If you pitched from the same packet you should be fine!

You mention adding more to your first batch to increase sweetness. You can only do this once yeast has stabilised by either chemical additions, filtration or ABV overload. If you add more sugar, no matter how clear the mead, it will start back up again. Maybe slowly but it will.

You can back sweeten in a glass, by adding the mead to some fresh apple juice as you drink. Works well with a cyser.

The new honey (pecan) sounds delicious! Keep us updated on how you go. Mead making is a slippery, but tasty slope!!