Starting an Orange Mead

[Brann_mac_Finnchad]

I'm planning on starting an Orange Mead this week and though I would have folks here take a look at my proposed recipe and let me know what they think.
Specifically the yeast strain (dry)--I'm leaning towards the Red Star, and if I have to worry about acidity.

Orange Mead
3 pounds honey (nothing special)
2 quarts good orange juice
Either Lalvin 71-B or Red Star Pasteur Champagne yeast
Water to 1 gallon

 

[biochemedic]

I've never fermented citrus juice (unless you count pomegranate), and I do think the acidity is something you'll have to watch. Perhaps you could get "low acid" orange juice? I think I've seen that in the store. When I did my Pom mead, I started the fermentation by itself then added the juice when things got active. You probably wouldn't be able to do it that way given the rather high volume of juice you're planning, being 1/2 of your volume. In contrast, my Pom was only 1 gal of juice added to 5 gallons of fermenting mead.

Overall, though, you might get as much orange flavor from adding zest as from fermenting juice...

71B is a great yeast...just sayin'...

Don't forget nutrients, and degassing frequently during active fermentation will also keep the acidity down...

 

[TheBrewingMedic]

Since you are planning on using orange juice as 50% of the must and honey as 25% you will have to watch the pH very very closely having two acid sources. Orange juice usually hovers around 3.5-4.0 and honey 3.6-3.9, both averages and subject to potential wider ranges. While this starts you off with a good pH for mead fermentation the production of CO2 with the whole carboxyl acid thing going it's likely to drop fast and once it gets below 3.2 it'll slow your yeast down, if it gets into the 2.5-3.0 range it goes on strike.

like biochem said, make sure you are adding nutrients up front and regularly and definetely aerating/degassing probably twice a day minimum during most of your primary. Stay ahead of it and you should be ok.

using a fruit juice for that high of a percentage of your must you potentially could expect a vigorous start, meaning that instead of an airlock you may want at least a blowoff tube if not open fermentation for the first day or so to prevent mead geysers from decorating your walls and ceilings. Once fermentation settles from rolling boil to subtle simmer you could airlock it. if you have a container larger than 1 gallon for your primary that would help too.

Also agree on the 71-B on this one, would work well, but I'm also a Lalvin fan, if you had your heart set on Red Star the cote des blancs might be good. unless you are looking to go really dry with it, but I'd imagine this recipe fermented dry will make it litterally a mouth puckering effect.

 

[Arpolis]

Strait orange Juice has about a PH of 3.3 at it's lowest. Yeast are good with ph levels above 3.5 so you will probably be just fine.

Nutrients is something you should consider. Oranges don't have a lot of amino acids, which is what is used to produce protein. Raisins have about double the amino acids per volume and different sets compared to oranges so taking about 25-30 raisins, lightly chopping them and putting that in the must will help the yeast stay healthy. It would be even better if you can get a commercial nutrient like DAP to add instead.

 

[Brann_mac_Finnchad]

Thanks for the advice.

I started it this afternoon...
I did end up using the lalvin yeast, and nutrients (can't remember brand).

How does one remedy a high acid mix--is there something you can add to it?
And I'm a new at this--how do you aerate/degas? Is there a special tool you have to use?

 

[TheBrewingMedic]

aerating/degassing is really pretty simple, if you are fermenting in a bucket use a sanitized spoon or wisk and stir the sh!# out of it. If you are using a bottle or jug or carboy, shake the he!! out of it lol...same as aerating when you initially put your batch together.

you can use potassium bicarbonate if the pH gets too low

 

[Brann_mac_Finnchad]

I think I can manage that, lol.

Thanks.

 

[Insomniac]

Start slowey with the shaking and stirring , too much too quickely and it'll go everywhere!

 

[Brann_mac_Finnchad]

When I checked on it today the airlock had been turned into a shot glass, but hadn't yet erupted..

However the SG seems to have gone UP by ten points. What's with that? Yes, I did wait for carbonation to subside in the tester. Maybe I made a mistake reading it yesterday...

 

[tonyandkory]

When I checked on it today the airlock had been turned into a shot glass, but hadn't yet erupted..

However the SG seems to have gone UP by ten points. What's with that? Yes, I did wait for carbonation to subside in the tester. Maybe I made a mistake reading it yesterday...

I have found that usually this is due to either reader error or the sugar source not being thoroughly dissolved.

 

[Brann_mac_Finnchad]

It may have been a combination of both--plus lots of carbonation. I left it in the hydrometer for a few minutes, and once the current bubbles cleared it started fermenting again.

The gotmead calculator is saying I should have had a starting gravity of around 1.15, but I don't know how I could have misread it by That much.

 

[Brann_mac_Finnchad]

I have finally racked it to the secondary, taste is good so far. You can definately taste the orange--which is what I wanted.

However last time I took at SG reading was on the 23rd of last month, and it hasn't changed since then--it's still 1.020, which is a little sweet, even for my taste. Could it have stalled because not enough nutrients? I don't think that the ABV is too high for the yeast (Lalvin 71-B)

 

[amandabab]

with the orange juice, I'd pour the nutrient on it and add a 1/4 tsp of energizer.
Lalvin 71-B should be OK. Lalvin 1116 will restart anything and ferment battery acid with enough nutrient though

 

[Matrix4b]

You will more than likely end up with a lot of lees. This is primarily the pulp dropping out. I was thinking on if I do another Orange Vanilla mead. I was initially going for a creamcicle flavor. It didn't happen. Not nearly enough creamy and the orange was a bit too sharp. You see I used organic orange juice concentrate for my first one. In a 5 gal, I used two frozen oj concentrate containers. The pulp immediately settled to the bottom, we are talking a minute or two. I tried stiring a few days later and the same thing has happened. I ended up with a good flavor but not exactly what I wanted.

So onething that I have discovered is how to make extracts, in this case orange extract. My plan next time is to make an orange extract and then add that extract with vanilla extract in the secondary. And both malto-dextrin and lactose in the secondary to bring that creamy mouth feel.

Good luck with yours. I await your results. Using just OJ, not concentrate.

Matrix

 

[Brann_mac_Finnchad]

I'll try adding some nutrients this evening, I don't have any energizer though.

There were a lot of lees--it took several weeks for all the pulp to settle out though (I also used a pulp-free OJ). I am going for a creamcicle (after more of an ORANGE flavour, with good notes of vanilla) flavour, and added a couple of vanilla beans after racking it last night.
I'll have to look into making extracts and using the lactose.