Thoughts about a Blood Orange Mead

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flyboy

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I live in Arizona and as fall comes into the state, we start thinking about our citrus. I live just down the street from an orange grove and was thinking about making a mead from Blood Oranges. The ones around are a bit tart, a mix between a Ruby Grapefruit and an Orange. I have until January/February before they'll be ripe to pick but was wondering about your thoughts. Would I need to add some spice to offset the tartness or would it be ok to leave it with the honey? Let me know of any ideas and thoughts.
 
I wonder if the amount of juice you use per gallon will be the critical factor. I have made wines from oranges in the past and such wines tend to be far more tart than I had anticipated. One solution I came up with was to add a bar of dark chocolate and some cocoa nibs in the secondary (chocolate orange ). Another possible solution for a first attempt might be to make this in two batches - one batch of traditional mead and the second batch a blood orange wine. What you then do is blend the two by taste. In other words, you may find that the best mix involves X pints of mead mixed with Y pints of blood orange... and this blend you think is the bees knees then can be your go to ratio the next time you make the blood orange mead in a single fermenter.
 
I've have a blood orange mead in secondary now for about five months, although I used Vintners Harvest Blood Orange Puree. It was pretty bitter at first (six weeks into primary) but I stabilized it and back sweetened it with more OB honey to about 1.10 (semi-sweet) when I racked to secondary. It was better but I had the idea of thing in a split vanilla bean and it went from better to really good in about two weeks, then I racked it again through through a hops bag to pull the vanilla seeds out (they are tiny buggers). I haven't touched it since May and will probably bottle it in November and let it go another few months before popping a bottle, but I have very high hopes for this one.
 
I have done both a blood orange and Grapefruit, . For both, i added pears for sweetness. My opinion the pears are pretty neutral but brought some Pear sweetness to balance the tart. It balanced pretty well and mellowed nicely, turned out better than I expected.

Five gallon - I did 4 Pounds Blood Oranges or Grapefruit and 6 Pounds Pears.

I would recommend you remove the skins and as much of the pith from the blood oranges as they can be very bitter.
 
Thanks for all the great advise. One thing I discovered after moving to Arizona is tree ripened Oranges taste very different from the ones in the store. It's almost like biting into orange candy. And, when I say that Blood Oranges are a cross between an orange and Ruby Grapefruit, I can pick a grapefruit off the tree after it's ripe and eat it like an orange. They get that sweet. Tart but not mouth puckering tart like the ones in the store. Also, after a nice deep frost, they get even sweeter. So, tree ripened Blood Oranges are not going to be as tart as some that have never tried them might think. :) But, that won't be happening until the end of January or the beginning of February. In the mean time, I need to rack my Cherry Melomel and get a Cyser started. Thanks everyone.
 
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