My first attempt at MEAD

[ffemt128]

that is pretty high for a bakers yeast and luckily it did get that far or you would have had a nasty sweet wine. I wouldnt expect that high ofen though and believe you got lucky that it fermented that far. Im not suore great at figuring out what that would leave for an sg with the 5 lbs of honey so would go into our general wine making area/Calcs. and helpful tools where there is a calc for that.

I agree, was probably lucky. PA at start acording to the hrdrometer was around 20 and ended at about 5%. Luck was on my side I quess.

I'll have to try the double batch and see where the starting SG would be. How would this turn out with wine yeast and a little age vs the bakers yeast. I was considering bulk mixing the honey and water then taking one gallon recipe using this again and possibly the a the second gallon with berries. Maybe do both with berries haven't decided.

 

[Wade E]

Well like I stated I used the wine yeast on my JAOM and it came out nasty although I havent tried it in about 1 1/2 yeatrs so maybe I should try it again. This is made to come out with RS and mine went super dry using wine yeast and that could be the reason even though I did sweeten back.

 

[xxplod]

very nice color! looks tasty.

 

[Mud]

How do you get the oranges out of the bottle?

 

[ffemt128]

I cut mine much smaller than they suggested. They came out with a little shaking after everything was racked off. This batch for me was overly sweet, but it makes a good after dinner drink, just can't have too much. My son made a batch and if his is dry we'll use mine to back sweeten.

 

[fatbloke]

Hey all,

Ok, so part of this is my POV, opinion and thinking about the development of the recipe...

So, the fruit (raisins), would seem to be there to give some body to the product - plus some nutrient.

The orange is for flavour and acidity - and nutrient.

The spices to give it a bit of "interest", though also to help counteract the orange.

The honey is pretty irrelevant - as it's there to give a generic honey taste and to provide the sugar for the alcohol.

Now, if you think about it, given the sugar in the honey and fruit, it's gonna be a reasonably high gravity mix anyway. The use of bread yeast, would almost definitely be to make sure that there's some residual sugar. As has already been posted (and I've found through experiment) the use of wine yeast will ferment this dry and it's not very nice dry........

The use of a whole orange cut/sliced it probably to give it a sort of "English Marmalade" hint as that would give a little bitterness to counteract the sweetness.

Now as ffemt128 pointed out, it still finishes quite high. Let me tell you, most of the commercial meads available here (traditional type style) seem to be dessert meads. I tried and tested 4 different ones (year before last). To see what the difference in taste was, the pH and gravity reading were an extra bit of data. They were all about the 3.2 to 3.6 pH and the gravities were all between 1035 and 1045 (finished - those were the numbers from the retail bottle packaging). Much too sweet for my taste - I like mine about the 1010 mark.

Now it's not surprising that ffemt128 only got 4 bottles from a gallon - you do tend to get a lot of lees and being bread yeast it's vvv fluffy and doesn't flocculate down well - not forgetting the volume taken up by the fruit.

Oh, one bonus is that it can be watered down, but with high % alcohol. Doing that will tend to give it an "alcohol hot" flavour, but that does age out brilliantly.

This recipe doesn't respond well to modification. Even if it's just changing the fruit from orange to lemon or lime. They tend to come out pretty "bleargh!"

So if the wife's not that keen ffemt128, just bottle it an store it away for a year or two.....

 

[Wade E]

Yeah, I tried the wine yeast thing once and take my word that Fatbloke is right on the money with this!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[ffemt128]

The remaining 2 bottles are nicely tucked away at this point. We will likely open one when my son comes home from Afghanistan as he wants to try it but the other one may just sit in hiding.

On another note, I gave a coworker this recipe and his FIL has has made 2 small batches and currently has a 6 gallon batch of this going. He likes it that much.

 

[fatbloke]

The remaining 2 bottles are nicely tucked away at this point. We will likely open one when my son comes home from Afghanistan as he wants to try it but the other one may just sit in hiding.

On another note, I gave a coworker this recipe and his FIL has has made 2 small batches and currently has a 6 gallon batch of this going. He likes it that much.

It does seem that if the recipe is adhered to religiously, it does make a very palatable drop of splosh!

Me? I just make it as per, then I let it down to the desired sweetness with vodka then it gets aged for at least 6 months (usually 12) before I even entertain bottling.

Apart from your hydrometer, with mead making, the other most important thing is patience (damned hard sometimes though).

regards

fatbloke

 

[winechuck]

It would be better to go with a higher grade yeast - baking yeast should be your last resort

 

[winechuck]

even though the recipe called for baking yeast.

 

[winechuck]

Looks like it's time to get D..R..U..N..K!!!!!

 

[fatbloke]

It would be better to go with a higher grade yeast - baking yeast should be your last resort

Erm, no, I'd have to disagree completely there winechuck.

I've thought about this a lot as well as made about 10 or 12 variations.

Just changing the yeast just ferments it dry and even ageing the modified version didn't make much of a difference. Plus the increased fermentation activity seem to remove more of the orange and spices notes from such a batch.

I suspect that Joe was very considered when he put the recipe together. For instance, the use of a whole orange when it's known that the white pith of an orange gives some bitterness. Though using bread yeast (in an unmanaged way) leaves enough residual sugar/sweetness to counteract much of the bitterness that maybe derived from the orang pith. Giving more of a hint of "English marmalade" that does go quite well with the limited spicing that's recommended. I have made one with too many cloves and Joes guidance is spot on about that.

It does seem that it's a very carefully crafted recipe - I can't say for certain if that was the intent (I don't know Joe Mattiolli) but adherence to the recipe does seem to give a more than acceptable result just usung easily available, grocery store ingredients.

Which would also offer the maker a "benchmark" to compare more complicated recipes/brews/results too.........

It might just be that you prefer yours drier! Personally I didn't yet find a modified version that I enjoyed, compared to the original recipe version

regards

Fatbloke

 

[Daisy]

I never tried for the Mead yet,I read the above post and came to know about the recipe given by Doug and he describe in such a way that it seem to be very tasty.At some point I am not agree with winechuck.
If you want to know more about the wines then you refer to winegrowersdirect.com.au.

 

[Midwest Vintner]

i just made some mead and used some lalvin d47. will only go to 14% abv or so, which is good because starting gravity was 1.120. i don't want to go above the 15% mark. this way, there should be enough residual sugars to be semi-sweet. atleast i'm hoping that's where i'll be.

i've read good things about the d47 in mead, so i'm hoping it's good. the honey was really good. my aunt has hives and they're pulling from natural prairies. the aroma is very nice.

 

[Racinready300ex]

I'm getting ready to try this recipe as my 1st mead. One question, I don't see any mention of sulfite or sorbate prior to bottling. Is that not needed? Or did he just leave that out of the instructions?

It just says when it's clear it's ready.

I'm going to go pick up a smaller carboy after work, then all I need are the oranges and rasins and I'm ready to go.

 

[fatbloke]

I'm getting ready to try this recipe as my 1st mead. One question, I don't see any mention of sulfite or sorbate prior to bottling. Is that not needed? Or did he just leave that out of the instructions?

It just says when it's clear it's ready.

I'm going to go pick up a smaller carboy after work, then all I need are the oranges and rasins and I'm ready to go.

No, there's no sulphite or sorbate in the recipe. You might rack it and then sulphite, but there's no need for sorbate - the yeast will have pooped out with the alcohol and the only reason to sulphite would be if you were worried about shelf life and/or have poor bottles/stoppers that might allow some ingress of air.

I sorbate/sulphite if I'm likely to need some further sugar addition to a mead i.e. fruit, juice or pulp to make something more fruity tasting/smelling, or if it's being back sweetened with fermentable sugars (honey or table sugar).

JAO doesn't really need that at all. With the bread yeast it finishes sweet (maybe a little less sweet here, as I use all his numbers for reference, but of course I make it to an imperial gallon (4.55 litres) not a US gallon (3.78 litres) hence I use nearly 3/4's of a litre more water - it still comes out brilliantly.....

regards

fatbloke

 

[xxplod]

well my fist batch turnd out a tad bitter -im not sure if useing two extra oranges than it called for was the reason lol probably , but hopefully age will mellow that out. oh yea -i added 5 lb honey to try and chill out the bitter taste and to sweeten it up a bit and it did not start fermataion again. hmmm?

 

[fatbloke]

well my fist batch turnd out a tad bitter -im not sure if useing two extra oranges than it called for was the reason lol probably , but hopefully age will mellow that out. oh yea -i added 5 lb honey to try and chill out the bitter taste and to sweeten it up a bit and it did not start fermataion again. hmmm?

Yes and yes....

I'm guessing that because the recipe is easy/straight forward/basic, it's simple to conclude that there's not much thought gone into it - plus wine makers with some experience also can't necessarily appreciate the cleverness of it, as they see some of the ingredients and think it's a total non-starter.

Ok, so basically honey, water, some raisins, would be fine, but they don't like it when he says about using a whole orange cut into segments. The baulk at the thought of the pith being part of the recipe, as they "know" that can cause bitterness, so when they taste the finished thing they focus of that.

Well, if you take breakfast marmalade, then you get some sweetness, the orange flavour and some bitterness to balance the sweet. I'm presuming that's the same as JAO.

Then when "they" see bread yeast, well that just about wipes them out.

The whole point would seem that Joe uses bread yeast in the recipe, because it doesn't seem to require much in the way of nutrient, which the recipe doesn't have. It also has a lower tolerance for alcohol, so it will poop out earlier than wine yeast might do. Which logic would dictate, that there will be some residual sweetness, given the honey and the sugar in the fruit etc. So it should never get to the point of being "alcohol hot".

Additionally the small amount of bitterness imparted from the skin/pith of 1 orange is enough to add some to balance the sweetness some yet shouldn't be enough to display as a defect in it.

His excellent guidance/suggestions regarding spices are also very well thought out.......

So in there xxplod, you'd see that if you made a 1 gallon batch, 2 extra oranges will have almost definitely caused the detectable bitterness - only a certain amount of that can be covered up, and I'm doubting the wisdom/benefit of trying the 5lb of honey thing (5lb extra or a total of 5lb, so 1 and 1/2 lb extra ????).

It's pretty much why, I suspect, that Joe included such strictures as don't aerate, don't stir, don't mix, don't rack etc etc etc.

Of course, phrases like "medium" or "large" when referring to the orange might not be accurate for some people, but any reasonable guess isn't likely to make a massive difference - Well I shouldn't have thought it would anyway.....

regards

fatbloke

 

[xxplod]

Yes and yes....

I'm guessing that because the recipe is easy/straight forward/basic, it's simple to conclude that there's not much thought gone into it - plus wine makers with some experience also can't necessarily appreciate the cleverness of it, as they see some of the ingredients and think it's a total non-starter.

Ok, so basically honey, water, some raisins, would be fine, but they don't like it when he says about using a whole orange cut into segments. The baulk at the thought of the pith being part of the recipe, as they "know" that can cause bitterness, so when they taste the finished thing they focus of that.

Well, if you take breakfast marmalade, then you get some sweetness, the orange flavour and some bitterness to balance the sweet. I'm presuming that's the same as JAO.

Then when "they" see bread yeast, well that just about wipes them out.

The whole point would seem that Joe uses bread yeast in the recipe, because it doesn't seem to require much in the way of nutrient, which the recipe doesn't have. It also has a lower tolerance for alcohol, so it will poop out earlier than wine yeast might do. Which logic would dictate, that there will be some residual sweetness, given the honey and the sugar in the fruit etc. So it should never get to the point of being "alcohol hot".

Additionally the small amount of bitterness imparted from the skin/pith of 1 orange is enough to add some to balance the sweetness some yet shouldn't be enough to display as a defect in it.

His excellent guidance/suggestions regarding spices are also very well thought out.......

So in there xxplod, you'd see that if you made a 1 gallon batch, 2 extra oranges will have almost definitely caused the detectable bitterness - only a certain amount of that can be covered up, and I'm doubting the wisdom/benefit of trying the 5lb of honey thing (5lb extra or a total of 5lb, so 1 and 1/2 lb extra ????).

It's pretty much why, I suspect, that Joe included such strictures as don't aerate, don't stir, don't mix, don't rack etc etc etc.

Of course, phrases like "medium" or "large" when referring to the orange might not be accurate for some people, but any reasonable guess isn't likely to make a massive difference - Well I shouldn't have thought it would anyway.....

regards

fatbloke

oh i forgot-- i made a 5 gal batch not a 1 gal