Trial successful, going big!

[Ryue]

Hey y'all,
I had made my first attempt at mead with my own recipie, screwed it up, adjusted and tried again. Second attempt at my elderberry mead recipie turned out amazing, everyone loves it and wants me to make more.

I used some local Red Clover honey, organic dried elderberries, some other small incredients and a Champaign yeast on the recommendation of the local supply shop.
Now, I have two questions. 1.) I had used the champaign yeast and later found out that wasn't a great choice, though it turned out good in the end anyways. Should I risk messing with the yeast and potentially throwing off the flavor or should I just leave it alone?
2.) For this 1 gallon batch I already did I didn't use any yeast nutrients. Took about 3.5 months to be all done and ready to bottle. With a 5 gallon batch, I plan on using nutrients to help support the yeast as well as hopefully speed up fermentation a bit. My question is how much nutrients/when do you recommend using them?

 

[bernardsmith]

Others may disagree but champagne yeast is not designed for this kind of work. It is made to prime wines (make them sparkling) after fermentation has completed but many novice wine /mead makers treat champagne yeasts as their go to... You might consider D 47 or 71B. Ignore what you read/see online and use 1 packet of yeast per gallon. Yes, packs say that they are good for 1-6 gallons but you are making mead - not wine and your starting gravity (I will bet) is towards the higher end rather than the lower. You can easily under-pitch yeast. A home winemaker cannot without turning cartwheels over-pitch (your carboys are not large enough and you would need to pitch your yeast by the kilo)...and a yeasty smell in fact indicates that you have UNDER-pitched your yeast...
Yeast nutrients provide the minerals and organic compounds that honey does not have. Fermaid O or K have instructions about how much to add. I use Wyeast's wine or beer nutrient (they are the same product just packed differently). If the product contains DAP you want to follow instructions. I add the nutrient before I pitch the yeast and add all the nutrient I intend to pitch at that time. Others follow a staggered feeding. I have not found any real evidence that that works better and you can be left feeding the mead after the yeast can no longer assimilate the nutrients (at an ABV of about 9% by all accounts).

 

[Ryue]

For those who stagger thier nutrients, how much/how often do you add nutrients? How much faster do you find fermentation finishes with nutrients compared to without them?