Turning Dandelion Honey Mead Into Braggot

[corwin3083]

I posted a couple weeks ago about a dandelion honey mead with a bitter aftertaste; since then, I've transferred it to secondary, added campden and sorbate and sparkalloid, and damned if it isn't still growing a pellicle.

So I was trying to think of ways to salvage it, and it occurred to me that I could take the third runnings of a saison I have planned and rack the cleared mead onto that, and turn it into more of a brett braggot, OR I could just blend it with some of my saison after that's fermented out. Either way, I'd bottle it in heavy belgian bottles with corks and cages in case the brett keeps working in the bottle.

Worth trying? I guess we'll find out unless someone has a reason not to...

 

[fermentinginpa]

That sounds pretty good, looking forward to hearing how it turns out!

 

[corwin3083]

The saison is fermenting happily away. Hopefully it'll finish within a week or so; I used WLP565. Will update again once I get to the blending stage.

 

[corwin3083]

Brief update: Did a blend tasting last weekend, decided to go with a 1:1 blend. It really brought out a surprising amount of sweetness from somewhere, despite the mead being at SG 1.000 and the saison being somewhere below 1.010. It also balanced the unpleasant bitterness in the mead with the much tastier hop bitterness in the saison. I'm aiming to bottle this tonight, if all goes well and I get out of work on time.