Tasting time arrived last weekend.

[Blackbyrd2]

I can now report the following;

Pomegranate melomel is sweet, slightly tart, almost syrupy. Tastes like a liqueur, in sweetness, consistency and in alcohol content. This would be great after a meal for sipping in teensy sherry glasses, but mass consumption I think would give you the mother of all hangovers. Next time, I use a matching quantity of water, at least. Beautiful ruby color.

Black Cherry melomel is also sweet, not as tart, almost cloying, not quite so syrupy. (It had more water in it.) Also scary to think of mass consumption. Might even be sweeter than the pomegranate, as the pom has a nice tart undertaste to it. It never did clarify.

Apple was made to original specs: 1 gal apple cider, 1 gal honey, 1 gal water.
Although still slightly sweet, had a much higher alcohol content. There's a bite to this one, that I think would probably mellow if it survives the upcoming event. If we don't drink it all or give it all away, it will go onto shelves in my garage for the next year or so. Gorgeous clarity, nice flavor, but yeah, aging would do it wonders.

General concensus is that the first two taste absolutely wonderful, except for being so sweet. Everyone seems to think the apple is dangerously alcoholic, so I'm not sure if that means they'll give it a wide berth, or favor it over everything else.

The 'engine' is still bubbling away, although it's a slow ferment at this point, and has been for weeks. It won't be going to the event, so when it gets done, it will likely be racked and aged also.

I need to start a new batch soon. I have an open carboy, and will soon have a couple more. I'm thinking watermelon...

 

[BrewStef]

The Pom and Cherry sound delicious. I always wanted to try a Pom.

How long did you let them age for? What yeast did you use? Did you think they would be not as sweet?

Cheers

Stefan

 

[Blackbyrd2]

They haven't aged much at all. They only just finished cooking recently. I racked em to let them clear, and eliminate some of the sediment on the bottom, but I could probably ave just bottled them at the time.
I used some champagne yeast, and expected them to be fairly dry, and highly alcoholic, but what I got was extra sweet. If you read my post about no fermentation from a while back, you'll see exactly what I did when starting them.

I actually expected more tartness from the pom, and I also expected the actual flavor of both the pom and cherry to be fairly muted because it was going to be so dry. The flavor isn't any stronger than I imagined it would be, but the sweetness emphasizes it a bit.