Newbie Mead Maker Question

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rcosu

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Hey all, I have a question or two I hope I can get some help with!

So I'm curious about adding fruit. I've made a few melomels so far, and I've put the fruit in a few different ways (typically in the primary though). I've tried using whole fruit but with mixed results because some of it seemed to come out rancid. Would this be an indication of contamination?

Also, I was thinking of using a fruit press of some kind next time, and just adding juice rather than the fruit itself so that it just ferments completely into the mead. I guess I'm just kind of curious if people have had good results this way, and what kind of press they use (most of the ones I see online are kind of pricey!).

Thanks for any insight!
 
I typically add whole fruit in secondary after freezing it. Adding to secondary has the advantages of better fruit flavor extraction and high alcohol content to destroy contaminating bugs. The freezing process also extracts more juice/flavor and kills a lot of the bugs on the fruit. Hope that helps!
 
I do similar to loveofrose, except I add it into primary about a week into fermentation. This way there should be plenty of alcohol to slow anything down and the yeast is in active fermentation so it overpowers whatever makes it past the alcohol. I also use frozen fruit so the freezing reduces the amount of possible contaminants. Of course, I've also added it into secondary.

Though I haven't pressed my own fruit, I have used some of the commercial fruit purees available through my LHBS. The purees work great and usually come with a wine recipe that includes the addition of sugar. I simply follow the recipe and replace the sugar with honey. Right now I have a Black Currant mead made from a puree, to which I added frozen blackberries about a week into fermentation. It's almost ready to secondary and then I'll add French Oak.
 
Thanks for the info! Follow up question though! =)

For using frozen fruits like apples or pears, do you cut them up and/or peel them before freezing?
 
Your question covers a lot of territory, what kind of fruit are you talking about? Freezing isnt going to do anything to prevent contamination, that is what KM if for. When you say rancid do you mean after you take it out of the fermentor? After the yeasts have eaten it up of course its not going to be fresh smelling, but if it smells horrible you might have an infection, does the wine smell horrible after you take out the fruit? There are many philosophies on adding fruit. If you just want fruit flavored mead you can add the fruit to the end of the fermentation when its finished, if you want it to be a richer flavor add the fruit in the primary so the yeast can work on it also, and the combination of the two, fermenting most of the fruit in the primary but adding a little bit back when the fermnetation is done works very well. All this is referring to soft fruit like berries.

Now if you are talking apples and pears you will get much better product by crushing and pressing them, though some people do freeze crabapples and thaw and ferment them without crushing and pressing. But if you just put apple slices into a bucket you are doing it the very hardest and least effective way.

WVMJ
 
Ok, sorry about that! Let's see if I can narrow it some!

Fruits I've tried - blueberries, strawberries, kiwi, pear and apple.

I've used whole blueberries and strawberries that were halved, and also pureed.
Kiwi was pureed and sliced.
Apple and pear were juiced.

I use campden tablets, but a strawberry and kiwi when sliced came out what I would describe as rancid. Even after taking it off the primary and what was left of those fruits, it smelled rotten, and the taste never seemed to improve. My other meads seem to turn out ok (varying degrees of ok-ness), and the apple and pear were the best, and since they were juiced, I had thought about trying the blueberry, strawberry, and kiwi again like that. I hadn't considered freezing them though..

Also, except in one case that's still working through, I added the fruit in the primary.
 
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