questions on raw honey mead and nutrients

[zosolm]

After reading about and experimenting with different kinds of honey, I have heard that raw honey gives a more desirable taste profile than pasteurised and so have decided to make a raw wildflower honey mead. I use Llalvin D47 and have in the past added a teaspoon of DAP and a few raisins and a little tea for tannin to my batch because I read that this yeast requires nutrients if making mead. I've heard people use Fermaid K, but i'm not too familiar with what this does or if DAP does the same job as it, so here are my questions:

-Raw honey has beeswax and other things in it, so do I need to use more raw honey than pasteurised? (if so, does anyone know a ratio? I was planning on using 1400g for a 1 gallon batch)

-I thought perhaps I would not even need to add my Llalvin as I there may be wild yeasts in the raw honey, would this work? (I do not plan on heating it)

-Aside from 1/2 teaspoon of tea and 20 or so raisins, is this sufficient tannin for the yeasts to cope and other than DAP for nitrogen is there anything else I need to give the yeasts for nutrients? (I usually also boil a teaspoon of cheap dried yeast as I read that dead yeast hulls are good "food" for yeast and add the juice and rind of a lemon to give it the right ph)

-Is there anything extra I have to do with using raw honey? this is my first time using raw, I usually use the stuff off the supermarket shelves so any input specific to using raw would be helpful

My actual recipe planned would be:

Ingredients:
-1400g raw wildflower mead
-1 or 1/2 teaspoon DAP
-1/2 teaspoon of tea
-20 raisins
-Juice and rind of lime or lemon
-1/2 teaspoon Llalvin D47 (or maybe not if I can use wild yeasts?)
-1 teaspoon boiled super wine yeast
-Enough water boiled then cooled to fill up the demijohn

Method:
-Boil super wine yeasts vigorously to ensure they are dead, then add tea and chopped raisins.
-Add rind and juice of lemon
-Allow to cool, pitch into demijohn
-Add honey to demijohn
-Boil water, allow to cool and top up demijohn
-Add Llalvin D47 (if not using wild yeast) and DAP
-Bubble, rack, bubble, rack, rack, bottle
-Drink

 

[frazier]

It sounds like a fun project - I would direct you to the Mead Forum, where the people who know this stuff hang out. My only comments are based on what I know about honey from being a beekeeper, and that is: 1) Raw honey does not contain beeswax, or significant abounts of anything else (a few ppm of pollen grains, but that will be in your store-bought honey anyway). 2) Wild yeast - could be. But if you don't want to pateurize it, just pitch your wine yeast and you'll probably be ok. As for what yeast to use - ask at the mead forum!

Good luck,

 

[Kent88]

I've done a couple batches of mead, one of them even successful. Looking through your old posts it looks like you aren't new to this, but not sure what your usual methods are, etc.

I've seen people post that they've just used wild yeasts, but their alcohol tolerance probably wont be good enough to get to the 12%+ abv desired. Would probably also take more than a few months. I used lalvin 1118 with my first batch and felt like it sustained a healthy fermentation and it was done in 3 months.

If you want noticable bubbles, use a yeast energizer. Using only a yeast nutrient at first did nothing. Not sure about DAP or fermaid k. ymmv. Look into staggering nutrient additions.

The debate over to boil or not to boil continues. If you don't want to, than adding some potassium metabisulfate to the diluted honey "must" a couple days before adding yeast should do the trick, if you don't want the wild yeasts.

 

[zosolm]

thank you, I didn't know there was a mead section! I will just repost this thread there where it belongs

 

[zosolm]

i've reposted here https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f30/default-questions-raw-honey-mead-nutrients-520815/#post6772152 but is there a way to delete this threat so it doesn't appear twice?