Help with Mead %

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mdavies1011

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Hi All,

I have never made mead before so thought I would give it a bash over the weekend. I used the following recipe I found on the forum -

3 1/2 lbs Clover or your choice honey or blend (will finish sweet)
1 Large orange (later cut in eights or smaller rind and all)
1 small handful of raisins (25 if you count but more or less ok)
1 stick of cinnamon
1 whole clove ( or 2 if you like - these are potent critters)
optional (a pinch of nutmeg and allspice.....very small )
1 teaspoon of Fleishmann’s bread yeast
Balance water to one gallon

The only change I made was to change the yeast to one that was recommended by my local brew shop.

Thing is I forgot to take on OG reading at the start, I would like to know what alcohol % it will turn out. Is it possible to work out via the ingredients or could someone give me a best guess please.

One other quick question, Is mead traditionally served chilled/room temp? carbonated/still?

Thanks
 
Bought mead and its to be served cold, and no carbohydration in it. Good luck with your project! :)
 
I made this same mead and also didn't take an OG. I always struggle to when making things in demijohns because of the topping up that occurs throughout the process. Most meads are around the 14% ABV mark I believe, so I'm just going to use that as a rough guess, and see how trollied it gets me when it comes to drinking it.

Mead is traditionally drunk at room temperature, but this recipe contains mulled type spices and it's been recommended to me to warm it up slightly and drink it like you would a mulled wine. Whichever takes your fancy I guess.

Mine is still fermenting 3 weeks on, I'm waiting for the oranges to sink, then I'll rack it off and leave it until christmas before bottling and drinking.
 
My last mead (recipe is in here somewhere), came out at 17%... feel free to nick it. Good that you changed the yeast - bread yeast should only ever be used for bread!
Always serve mead at room temp.
 
Typical honey is 80% fermentable sugar
3.5lb sugar would give about 17.5% so your back-of-envelope theoretical is about 14% IF you can get it to go all the way to dry.

I've made this recipe (but with a different yeast)- it took 4 months before it was ready to bottle, and another 9 months before it was /really/ nice to drink.
 
I've got a brew of mead on, but not with added fruit or spices. My OG was 1.070 with 2 1/2 lbs of honey, but I did top up with the rest of the jar of honey and half cup of brown sugar, so not sure what % it will be but I don't mind, it will be strong enough! I used a champagne yeast that will hopefully cope with the amount of sugar in there!

I think it's easier to make a still mead as a sparkling mead would be to be bottled in bottles suitable for fizzy brews, not wine bottles. Slightly sparkling mead could be bottled in crown-capped bottles, which is what I hope to do!
 

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