Hippocras

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Tau

Landlord.
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Just started a mead Hippocras.

1360g Gales original Honey.
120g (ruffly) Acacia Honey
1 Lemon
Herbs: 6 bay leaves, rosemary and Thyme all from garden. 2 Tea bags.
Boiled herbs and tea, strained into diluted honey, most of the wax was removed from honey after heating to 70c.

Starter with Harris 18% yeast in starter. Nutrient 1tsp to start with, will add through ferment. 2 tsp citric.

Not sure if I should have added the herbs after ferment, oh well l'll wait and see.
 
Fermenting well, so addition of herbs at start didn't make a difference, was concerned that thyme might prevent yeast fermenting (being anti bacterial seems not anti-fungal). Added another tsp and a half of nutrient and topped up.
 
Just took a reading and tasting. S.g 0.996, tastes like fire water to me with just a hint of honey and herbs add, not sure I could drink a whole bottle. Still fermenting might drop a bit more almost 17% now.
 
Ages is best chippy... but if it's clear and tastes good I drink it

If it's getting too dry tau rack to secondary and give it a month then add a small amount of sugar or honey (stretilised ) and if there is no further fermentation you can rack off any sediment and add more honey to sweeten, to taste, I would then leave in a fv for another month to be sure fermentation has ended otherwise you risk making bottle bombs
 
Where did you get the yeast tau?

Amazon, as I had some credit there. But quite a few homebrew online shops sell it. Harris yeast rated 18%.

I'll leave to complete ferment, still a little foam and co2 release through airlock. Did think about adding wormwood at start, maybe a bottle later, but not sure how long it takes for wormwood to pass through body, woudn't want to trip and drive :nono:
 
Took another reading dropped to .995, decided to rack (no camden) and add 150g acacia honey to sweeten a bit, tastes a bit like a dry scrumpy at first and lots of other drying after tastes. Not bothering with wormwood, to risky. I'll leave till monday and stabilize.
 
Still fermenting might drop a bit more almost 17% now.
Have to adjust abv. as over estimated sugar content of honey. Was 81% sugar so can't be much more than 14.17%, left the extra 150g of honey for 12 days so might be as high as 15.7% doubt though. To add insult I forgot grape juice, so is Metheglin not a hippocras :oops:
 
The thread says hippocras but ended up methgelin. Since tanz''s post I've re tried drinking and really improved over 6 months and love it! Drunk 3 bottles in 2 days :)
 
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