Homebrewing sweet sparkling mead?

[Yuri]

Hi,

I am new to brewing and I'm having some trouble finding the answer to this question on the internet. It seems that people carbonate mead(traditionally) with priming sugar and reyeasting in the bottle which would make it impossible to make a sparkling mead that is sweet since all sugar that is left in the bottle will ferment.

Also does the yeast species affect if it can carbonate a drink? Or is that a separate technique?

How does one carbonate a mead which still has a sugar content, preferably traditionally or without expensive equipment outside of my standard brewing kit.

Regards,

Yuri

 

[Ebob01]

Hi

As long as you don't stabilise using sulphites and potassium sorbate there should be enough yeast present to carbonate.

As you pointed out the fermentation will carry on and consume all the sugar until it is dry leaving no sweetness.

You could use a yeast with a lowish alcohol tolerance and hope that stops the fermentation once the alcohol level gets to a certain point but that is not very reliable.

Also my understanding is that you need to use a yeast for sparkling wine which can withstand the pressure such as ec-1118 or similar, the only sparkling wine yeasts I have seen seen to have an alcohol tolerance up to 18%! So that's not really an option.

What most people do if they want sweet AND sparkling is to add a non fermentable sugar such as lactose.

Also be sure to use either plastic soda/tonic bottles or proper Champagne bottles