Does anyone have a simple mead recipe?
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strange-steve
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Joe's Ancient Orange Mead is a simple tried and tested recipe, I made it once and it was fantastic. Make sure and stick a bottle or two away for a few years cos it just gets better with age.
Recipe and method here.
Recipe and method here.
We have a mead forum i am sure the question will have been asked before :thumba:- https://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/forums/coffee-kombucha-mead-forum.46/
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Zephyr259
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The trick with mead seems to be nutrients, they need plenty but not so much as you can taste them at the end (took me ages to realise that's what I could taste).
I will be bottling a traditional and a BOMM in the next week or 2. the traditional stuck despite nutrients but I eventually got it finished. The BOMM (Bray's One Month Mead - uses Wyeast 1388) went smoother but took about 2 months to finish for some reason, I sourced Fermaid O for that one from ebay.
If you want an easy start use about 1 kg honey made up to 5L, that should give about 1.060 OG, a teaspoon of nutrient, I like Tronozymol as it's got a heap of micro nutrients too, and a sachet of yeast and it should ferment out to a dry 7%. I did 2, the first with D47 which I fermented dry then primed and bottle conditioned, it was like a dry cider. The second got S-04 and was stabilised at 1.007 (or 1.004 I always forget and my notes are never to hand) which left it as a still, barely off-dry wine. These fermented out in about 2 - 3 weeks without a hitch and I used tesco orange blossom honey in both, and the BOMM above.
I will be bottling a traditional and a BOMM in the next week or 2. the traditional stuck despite nutrients but I eventually got it finished. The BOMM (Bray's One Month Mead - uses Wyeast 1388) went smoother but took about 2 months to finish for some reason, I sourced Fermaid O for that one from ebay.
If you want an easy start use about 1 kg honey made up to 5L, that should give about 1.060 OG, a teaspoon of nutrient, I like Tronozymol as it's got a heap of micro nutrients too, and a sachet of yeast and it should ferment out to a dry 7%. I did 2, the first with D47 which I fermented dry then primed and bottle conditioned, it was like a dry cider. The second got S-04 and was stabilised at 1.007 (or 1.004 I always forget and my notes are never to hand) which left it as a still, barely off-dry wine. These fermented out in about 2 - 3 weeks without a hitch and I used tesco orange blossom honey in both, and the BOMM above.
StevieG83
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Thanks Z. Orange blossom honey sounds nice. I think i will get that. I also get local honey of a farmer for hay fever so i will make a gallon with that as well.
StevieG83
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BeerCat
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5 jars of 340g honey. 1 pack of Lalvin EC-1118 yeast and a teaspoon of nutrient. Leave a bit of head space to top up later and feed with 1/2 tps of nutrient every few days for about a week. Leave for a few months the you can rack it.
StevieG83
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Thanks BeerCat. I picked up some lovely honey in natures way belfast and have some EC - 118 yeast packets that i have to use up.
Going to make it today after lunch.
Mr_S_Jerusalem
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Can this be done the normal way in a bucket for a week then strained to a demijohn?
Does that actually have any effect on the flavour?
Does that actually have any effect on the flavour?
Zephyr259
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Kinda, you shouldn't need to strain it unless you have fruit in it, at which point a bucket is probably a good plan. Why not just ferment in the demijohn the whole time?
Mr_S_Jerusalem
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I figure you’d lose more than usual in the racking from primary to secondary if there’s more bits in it?
Zephyr259
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Why's there more bits in it? What recipe are you using?
Mr_S_Jerusalem
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It seems like a lot of these recipes have bits of orange or cinnamon sticks or cloves floating around in them, I was wondering if there was a tidier way to do this.
An Ankoù
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You might browse this forum: https://www.gotmead.com/forum/forum.php
Mr_S_Jerusalem
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Ooohh excellent, thank you
Zephyr259
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Ah, your on Joe's Ancient Orange, Haven't read that recipe in years (and never made it) but using a bucket initially would still be fine, easier to get the orange pieces out.
Mr_S_Jerusalem
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Yes basically his recipe but with a few modifications.
I'm not buying a jar of cloves to only use 2. lol
Also there's no way I'm gonna buy 3 pounds of honey and waste it with bread yeast. That's just damn silly.
I might actually just omit the orange peel and just use the juice of 2 instead of one. That will eliminate the whole messy peel business.
I'm not buying a jar of cloves to only use 2. lol
Also there's no way I'm gonna buy 3 pounds of honey and waste it with bread yeast. That's just damn silly.
I might actually just omit the orange peel and just use the juice of 2 instead of one. That will eliminate the whole messy peel business.
Zephyr259
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I think the recipe intends to extract some bitterness from the pith for balance. It's a weird recipe, breaks just about every rule but seems to work for most people. I'd add nutrient to it personally, I tried a staggered nutrient addition on a mead and it still stuck on me...
