MEAD!!!!

[Vetch]

Hi, I'd like to make up 2 wine sized bottles of mead. Can someone tell me what am I doing? No one seems to say how to make it other than add honey, water, and yeast (and others stuff if you like).

Now Do I want to boil the water first?
Do I want the Must mixed so it's a wine like liquid or can it still be mostly honey and glob around as honey mostly does?
Basically step by step can someone tell me what I should be doing and what to look for. I'm interested in a simple mead that doesn't take vary long to become drinkable, and also tastes good.

Thank you in advance.

Some people boil the water and dissolve the honey in the hot water. I feel that this will drive off some of the aroma.  Others use campden tablets (sulfites) to disinfect - but this is not absolutely necessary. The guy that wrote the Compleat Meadmaker said he usually does not boil or use sulfites, and things turn out fine. If you are not going to boil or sulfite, I would suggest using a healthy dose of yeast to get things going in the right direction.

Last batch (which looks, smells and tastes good so far) I put the honey in a 5 gallon carboy and added about half the amount of water needed. I then swirled and swooshed it so that much (not all) of the honey dissolved. The rest of the honey dissolved fine while it fermented.  (Many people believe that the must should be initially aerated so the yeast can grow aerobically before they switch into anaerobic mode - using room temperature water and shaking or swooshing to dissolve the honey does this.) Then I topped it off with water (not all the way - leave some space for the bubbles) and added the yeast and a little yeast nutrient, put the stopper with air-lock on it. Put it in a cool spot (75 d F) where it wouldn't get bright light, and it started bubbling away.

You might want to add some acid (lemon juice, tartaric acid crystals) and some tannin (I use green tea). The acid improves the chance of a good fermentation, and a certain amount of both acid and tannin make for a better tasting mead.

After about a month, I 'rack' the wine - carefully siphon off the wine but leave behind the yeast that is on the bottom. Add a little water to bring the bottle back up towards being full (reduce oxygen in the bottle) and let it go for another month or so, rack again. Repeat a third time, and the mead should be ready for bottling.  If you have a wine filter system, or use bentonite clay or gelatin finings, you could bottle after one or two rackings and cut a few months off the process. You do need to be sure that the fermentation is complete and isn't 'stuck' - if there is a little fermentation in the bottles, you get sparkling mead. If there is a little more fermentation in the bottles, they could explode. So it is good to wait longer before bottling, at least until you are familiar with the process. Some people use hydrometers to measure the amount of sugar present before and after the fermentation to see if things are done - I have a hydrometer, but don't bother with it any more.  After bottling, there is aging - some wines might be good at 6 months, but a year is usually better.

Only 2 bottles?  One gallon will yield ~5 bottles.

Do you want a dry, sweet, or very sweet (dessert wine) product?  I usually use 2 to 3 pounds honey per gallon to get a medium to sweet wine, with a decent alcohol level (12-14% estimated).  But I have made some excellent meads using much more honey - it had a high alcohol content, and was very sweet but delicious.

[BMAC]

Hey,

IMHO bread yeast makes wonderful bread, but booze, not so much. There are specific mead yeasts, one for dry and one for sweet.

BTW mead making got me started in bees not the other way around   lol

cheers

peter

Peter,

I kind of got that from u about getting started in the bees....

So how often do u brew beer?

[Moonshae]

This forum got me started in brewing beer. Someone was looking for a honey beer recipe, and it got me interested. I've gone wild with it since then.

I hope to make some mead from my own honey soon. My homebrew club has some award winning meaders, so I've got some good folks to look to for advice. One guy made a fantastic toasted coconut mead. Unbelievable! I definitely prefer the drier meads to the sweet ones. Yeast selection has a lot to do with that.

For a couple dollars, I think it's better to invest in a good mead yeast than use bread yeast, which isn't selected to grow well in alcohol...that's probably why the mead turns out so sweet, the alcohol kills the yeast before it can fully ferment the honey.

[Sean Kelly]

Wow, where did my post go?  It was here 2 days ago in response to MrILoveTheAnts questions.  It was huge too!  Man I hate it when that happens.  lol  Now I forgot what I said.  lolol

Sean Kelly

[nepenthes]

What happens if you use More yeast?  :-D

[Vetch]

More yeast might get things off to a better start, but in the end, successful fermentations have the amount of yeast needed. Yeast divides rapidly (exponentially) and will level off once the sugar is converted to alcohol.  So there is not much danger of adding too much yeast - an extra packet or two of yeast will cost a dollar or two, will help insure a good result, and wont change the flavor or quality.

Not racking the wine soon enough or often enough can make the wine a bit yeasty, but that is an issue regardless of how much yeast one starts with.

[danno]

As Vetch stated that not racking can cause a yeasty flavor.  what happens is when the yeast runs out of sugar (food) they will start eatting the dead yeast carcasses that have sunk to the bottom.  Dont let this happen.  It can wreck a good wine

[jcrocket]

ooptec 
Anyone that has any experience making wine or beer know that yeasts are different but the author of this orange recipe makes it clear that you need to forget what you know and follow this recipe to the T.  I have made this a couple of time for my VERY SWEET wine loving friends and it turns out great everytime.

I'm something of a heretic in meadmaking. I use lager yeast. A lot of the real meadaholics insist on wine or champaign yeast, but I've found lager to be a nice compromise between ale and wine yeasts. Higher alcohol than ale, less than wine and not as sweet, but not too dry. Worked very well in the cyser (cider and honey) I made.

I tried a sweet mead yeast and it was sweet alright. More of an apertif, sipping wine. I like something that maintains the flavor of whatever I've put in, has a good alcohol kick, but doesn't leave me rolling on the floor.

[nepenthes]

how do you get something that makes you rolling on the floor  :roll:

[SgtMaj]

how do you get something that makes you rolling on the floor  :roll:

I once bought the game twister, and that made me roll on the floor.

Oh, and if I was ever set on fire I would roll on the floor, too.  I wonder if he's on fire...  :-D

On a more serious note, I understand that many of you have grape vines, and I'm curious about what it takes to get them started and how long it takes to get grapes from them (I assume you get nothing the first year, but how many years does it take to get grapes?).  I would like to plant a vine or two since the grapes in the stores are less and less ripe every year. 

[Cindi]

SgtMgr.  About the grape vines.  I am pretty sure that I read somewhere that when one purchases grape stock, it takes about 3 years to get a berry producing plant.  I think that is pretty true.  Do some internet research, I bet that there are some garden sites that you could get this kind of information from.  I think it is like asparagus, it must form some pretty large root systems below ground before the fruit can be harvested.  I am not positive,but this rings a bell in my mind.  About 4 years ago I went to this vacant lot where a house had been torn down.  My Cousin had told me to go and get some grape roots because the grapes in that place were beautiful.  She said that they were large black grapes, no clue what type.  I did plant these that year, and this year they are loaded with young grapes.  So I think it does take quite a while.  I have another grape vine that has small sweet grapes, the skins are sour, that took several years before it bore fruit as well.  My only thing around here is trying to get the kids not the pick the grapes until I give them the ready word.  I threatened them with horrible things (oops, did I say that?  hee, hee) to come to them this year if they picked them and told them I would give them all that they wanted, if they would just wait for me to cut them clusters.  I told them that they needed to be cut off the vines with scissors or pruners, pulling off the cluster will damage the plant and then there will be not grapes next year.  We'll see if they are listening.  I do have a slingshot, oops, did I say that, hee, hee.  Others here may have more information that they could give to you.  Beautiful day, beautiful life, all is beautiful on this wonderful world.  Cindi

[Sean Kelly]

how do you get something that makes you rolling on the floor  :roll:

Make a moonshine still.  But that will also put you in jail.  It's treated the same as if you were making drugs.  But you do it right it'll knock your socks off!!!

Sean Kelly

[SgtMaj]

I know there is some way that you can legally have a moonshine still, I think it has to be registered and used for making fuel or something like that. 

[buzzbee]

You can distill essential oils ;) ;)
http://www.keystonehomebrew.com/index.cfm?pgid=spirits

[Sean Kelly]

I know there is some way that you can legally have a moonshine still, I think it has to be registered and used for making fuel or something like that. 

Not in the United States.  I heard the same thing and decided to send a letter to the BATF.  They said in many words.... NO!  I work in the fuel industry and the refineries have posted alcohol permits from the BATF just so they can use and make denatured Ethanol.

Now you can legally buy, make, or own a moonshine still... you just can't use it.

Sean Kelly

[Vetch]

Apple-Jack is the simplest, safest technique for increasing the alcohol content of a brew - 30% to 40% is typical.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applejack_%28beverage%29

[SgtMaj]

SgtMgr.  About the grape vines.  I am pretty sure that I read somewhere that when one purchases grape stock, it takes about 3 years to get a berry producing plant.  I think that is pretty true.  Do some internet research, I bet that there are some garden sites that you could get this kind of information from.  I think it is like asparagus, it must form some pretty large root systems below ground before the fruit can be harvested.  I am not positive,but this rings a bell in my mind.  About 4 years ago I went to this vacant lot where a house had been torn down.  My Cousin had told me to go and get some grape roots because the grapes in that place were beautiful.  She said that they were large black grapes, no clue what type.  I did plant these that year, and this year they are loaded with young grapes.  So I think it does take quite a while.  I have another grape vine that has small sweet grapes, the skins are sour, that took several years before it bore fruit as well.  My only thing around here is trying to get the kids not the pick the grapes until I give them the ready word.  I threatened them with horrible things (oops, did I say that?  hee, hee) to come to them this year if they picked them and told them I would give them all that they wanted, if they would just wait for me to cut them clusters.  I told them that they needed to be cut off the vines with scissors or pruners, pulling off the cluster will damage the plant and then there will be not grapes next year.  We'll see if they are listening.  I do have a slingshot, oops, did I say that, hee, hee.  Others here may have more information that they could give to you.  Beautiful day, beautiful life, all is beautiful on this wonderful world.  Cindi

My parents had the same problem with the grapes not reaching maturity when I was growing up.  Speaking from experience... even the threat of physical violence is not a major deterrant to kids picking grapes fresh off the vines.  :evil:  Even when not completely ripe, home grown grapes are at least a thousand times better than store bought grapes.

[Brian D. Bray]

I know there is some way that you can legally have a moonshine still, I think it has to be registered and used for making fuel or something like that. 

Not in the United States.  I heard the same thing and decided to send a letter to the BATF.  They said in many words.... NO!  I work in the fuel industry and the refineries have posted alcohol permits from the BATF just so they can use and make denatured Ethanol.

Now you can legally buy, make, or own a moonshine still... you just can't use it.

Sean Kelly

You sent the letter to the wrong people, should have sent it to the Evironmental Protection Agency on refining fuels.  What is illegal under one scope is often legal under another.  Proper appliance of use and law.  The BATFE is focused on the illegal use and tax avoidance of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives.  They have no jurisdiction over the refining of fuels or essential oils.

[Moonshae]

Heat isn't necessary to do anything in meadmaking, just like honey processing...it drives off the subtleties of the honey. The amount of yeast pitched and the proper care will ensure it outreproduces any of the nasties. Not much can live in 14%-20% alcohol, except the yeasts selected for that specific ability, and even those have to be nurtured properly.

I prefer dry wine, too, so a batch of mead for me has to have less honey (ie, less alcohol potential to kill the yeast) or a yeast strain that can ferment under a high alcohol load. I don't mind a semi-dry mead, though, and I just had a semi-sweet blueberry melomel that was unbelievable.

The downside to mead is that for most recipes, you have to be really patient, as it can take 6 months, a year, or more for the mead to age to a drinkable state. Young meads tend to be "hot" (high alcohol burn) which mellows with time. the Joe's Ancient Orange recipe mentioned earlier in the thread is designed to be drunk young, as it is fully mature. But don't deviate from the recipe! Even the slicing into 8ths of the orange is important...the pith exposure helps to balance the sweetness. The bread yeast dies at about 14% ABV, which gives the batch a nice kick, but makes a drink many people like. If you prefer drier, you can always ferment with a yeast that has more alcohol tolerance, then add honey to sweeten to taste (just be sure the yeast is dead!).

[Sean Kelly]

Speaking of mead... my "Joe's Ancient Orange" mead is done!  Had my first glass yesterday and it was really good.... in a spicy strange way.  Final gravity 1.050, about 11% abv.  REALLY SWEET and has a kick from the clove and cinnamon.

As we speak I've got a batch of beer wort cooking on the stove.  Chill bath in 30 minutes.  Gunna be a "Cream Ale".  My first attempt at beer.  Wine is easy (especially mead), there seems to be a few more steps with beer.  Always fun though and can't wait to try it!  Should be ready in time for hunting season!!!

Sean Kelly