Help with my first batch of mead

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Zephyr259

Zephyr259

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Hi folks,

I've done a few beer kits and I'd like to try my hand at some mead. I've done some research into it but managed to get myself a bit confused.

I'd like to make a 1 gallon batch and I'd like it to be reasonably sweet, but I'm unsure of what recipe to use.

My options appear to be ferment dry then back-sweeten or match an OG and yeast so that it's still sweet when fermented.

I currently have a packet of Lalvin EC-1118 which from my reading seems to be a very good yeast but is likely to ferment dry since it has a high alcohol tolerance (18%).

Finally, there seems to be a lot of discussion on what nutrients to use. I have Young's Nutrient (DAP and ammonium sulphate) I can get Tronozymol in my local brew shop or can source Fermaid K and Go-Ferm online from Hop & Grape. Are the fancier nutrients and energisers really needed?

So, any recommendations on a starting recipe?

Thanks All.
 
I'm far from an expert on mead but since there are no replies yet I thought I'd chime in. If you want it sweet then your best bet is to do as you suggest, let it ferment out then back sweeten. Trying to match your og and yeast would be very difficult to get right, there are so many variables.
I suggest you take a look at this recipe for Joe's Ancient Orange Mead. This is a well tried and tested recipe and because it uses bread yeast it finishes quite sweet. Don't be put off by the bread yeast, I've made this recipe and can confirm it is delicious.
As for the nutrient, I've only ever used the Youngs one and it has worked fine for me. Though if you do try the JAOM recipe it specifies no nutrient, it's an ancient recipe after all!
 
Thanks, I was very tempted by that recipe but was leaning towards an unflavoured mead to start with to act as a baseline. I have 9lbs of honey now though so will probably make a batch with 3lbs and the EC-1118, then another batch of the ancient orange for comparison.

Is the JAOM recipe American? I seem to recall another thread discussing it getting confused between US and imperial measurements. My demijohns are 4.5 litres.

I'll not stress over the nutrients then, a handful of raisins seems to do the trick in most recipes anyway.

Thanks again for the help.
 
2kg should give you a fairly sweet mead. 1.5kg would be dry. You can stop fermentation early if that's what you want but i find it easier to blend in the glass rather than try and back sweeten. I always add the juice of a lemon to mine for acidity.
4jars honey(1360g)+1 Scandinavian blackcurrant conserve 350g & GV4 yeast finished at 0994 ABV 16.5%
 
Cool, the recipe I was originally going to make from the Cook's Scrapbook asks for 1.8 kg honey to an imperial gallon, so I guess that would be semi-sweet?
 
So last Saturday I went ahead and got some mead on the go.

1.8 kg honey
4 L water
1 tsp Young's nutrient
1 tsp tannin
15 g acid blend
1 sachet EC-1118

Decided to go with a boil method for the first one so I can compare, simmered gently for 20 mins and got a post-boil gravity of 1.120 once it had cooled to room temp.

Started bubbling slowly after a few hours nd was going steady the next day and has continued to do so, might have slowed a bit so I'm going to top up to the neck of the demijohn in the next day or so.

So far it all seems to be going well.
 
Needing some help here, its been 3 weeks the mead was looking great, nice sediment and starting to clear, bubbles stopped fully sometime in the week. Just tested the FG before racking and got 1.090 from an OG of 1.120 which is 3.9%. Tastes fine but obviously not done, sounds like a stuck fermentation? Any advice on how to proceed? Thanks.
 
Zephyr259 said:
Needing some help here, its been 3 weeks the mead was looking great, nice sediment and starting to clear, bubbles stopped fully sometime in the week. Just tested the FG before racking and got 1.090 from an OG of 1.120 which is 3.9%. Tastes fine but obviously not done, sounds like a stuck fermentation? Any advice on how to proceed? Thanks.
Click to expand...

Not enough nutrient, should add tsp every week for first 3 weeks.
 
Tau said:
Not enough nutrient, should add tsp every week for first 3 weeks.
Click to expand...

I was wondering that the recipe said 2 tsp but my packet of nutrient advised 1 tsp per gallon, in hindsight it will be quoting for wine which isn't as demanding as mead. I was worried about getting off-flavours from the nutrient if i overdosed it.

Gave the demijohn a shake up and the yeast just instantly settled back out, guess they have had it and I should rack onto a starter?

Thanks for the advice.
 
BeerCat said:
2kg should give you a fairly sweet mead. 1.5kg would be dry. You can stop fermentation early if that's what you want but i find it easier to blend in the glass rather than try and back sweeten. I always add the juice of a lemon to mine for acidity.
4jars honey(1360g)+1 Scandinavian blackcurrant conserve 350g & GV4 yeast finished at 0994 ABV 16.5%
Click to expand...

what type of honey ? i know that may sound stupid but i have looked at the contents list of a basic honey from tesco and its basically all the odds and sods from all over europe, like its been recovered off machinery or something. lets call it the chicken nugget of honey's :lol:
 
Personal91 said:
what type of honey ? i know that may sound stupid but i have looked at the contents list of a basic honey from tesco and its basically all the odds and sods from all over europe, like its been recovered off machinery or something. lets call it the chicken nugget of honey's :lol:
Click to expand...

Lol, like the comparison. I get mine from Aldi, the 99p stuff but i think Tesco would be the same. Fairly sure i looked into this and in the UK honey has to be honey unlike the states but its the cheapest you can get so i didn't have high expectations. Have heard they feed bees on GMO high glucose corn syrup although i don't know if this is in Europe. It is surely blended though as you say. I would like to use more expensive stuff but at the moment i am still experimenting so not got around to doing it. That's another thing i would love, a beehive. :lol:
 
Thanks for the input Personal91, I used 3 lb of Rowse and 1 lb of generic blended stuff from Makro. It's all cheaper blended honey for starting out.

I've treated the stuck Mead with Tronozymol but didn't start so I have a starter of EC-1118 going to see if that has any luck.

A blend of 900g of the generic honey and 2.5 kg of redcurrants fermented out very well, didn't get an OG but FG was 0.996. Currently feeding it another jar of honey as not enough Mead character and unless the bitterness from the currants mellows it's gonna need a fair bit of back sweetening.
 
BeerCat said:
Lol, like the comparison. I get mine from Aldi, the 99p stuff but i think Tesco would be the same. Fairly sure i looked into this and in the UK honey has to be honey unlike the states but its the cheapest you can get so i didn't have high expectations. Have heard they feed bees on GMO high glucose corn syrup although i don't know if this is in Europe. It is surely blended though as you say. I would like to use more expensive stuff but at the moment i am still experimenting so not got around to doing it. That's another thing i would love, a beehive. :lol:
Click to expand...


i would love to be a bee keeper aswell, but its just another hobby that i dont have the time or money for at the moment
 
Zephyr259 said:
Thanks for the input Personal91, I used 3 lb of Rowse and 1 lb of generic blended stuff from Makro. It's all cheaper blended honey for starting out.

I've treated the stuck Mead with Tronozymol but didn't start so I have a starter of EC-1118 going to see if that has any luck.

A blend of 900g of the generic honey and 2.5 kg of redcurrants fermented out very well, didn't get an OG but FG was 0.996. Currently feeding it another jar of honey as not enough Mead character and unless the bitterness from the currants mellows it's gonna need a fair bit of back sweetening.
Click to expand...

keep me posted, it is going dryer because the ec-1118 is champange yeast - high alchohol tolerance - it will power through sugar like nobodys business

how did you make a stater/grow it from the kit
 
Think that's the mead going again, slowly added it to a starter over a day or so and last I saw it was bubbling away fairly enthusiastically.

The redcurrant melomel is using RC-212 yeast which is a Burgundy strain and not so aggressive as the EC-1118 but it only had 990g of honey and what little sugar was in the currants to work through.

Starter was a mishmash from various web articles, i ended up with 250 mls boiled water, a splash of orange (clementine) juice, a pinch of nutrients and 2 tsp of sugar. Aimed to pitch the yeast once it was in the high 20s but as I was doing too much at once I forgot to check and it was still around 34C, a dash of clementine juice from the fridge knocked it down again. The aim is to leav it til its very active which was expected after about 12 hrs then to double up the volume every 6 hrs with stuck mead. However, in the morning it had eaten all the sugar so I gave it a splash of grape concentrate and a couple of hours later it was back to life so I started adding mead.

Hope that helps.
 
Mead seems to be going nicely, it bubbled away vigorously for a week or 2 then gently until recently, thought it was time to rack since it's clearing then when i looked with a torch i saw loads of tiny bubbles rising from the yeast cake. Guess it's still going. :-)
 
It's in the bottle. Fermented totally dry to 0.994 and with the acid blend was way too sour, 227g of honey after stabilising boosted it back to 1.010 and after another 6 weeks resting it's fairly pleasant. Given that's it's around 18% it will likely continue to mellow for a good while.
 
Zephyr259 said:
It's in the bottle. Fermented totally dry to 0.994 and with the acid blend was way too sour, 227g of honey after stabilising boosted it back to 1.010 and after another 6 weeks resting it's fairly pleasant. Given that's it's around 18% it will likely continue to mellow for a good while.
Click to expand...

Wow, thats impressive. Most i have managed was about 16% but was very sweet. Not that its always a bad thing. My stuff from a year ago is tasting really good now. Much better than at bottling.
 

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