Mead making basics

[jthomas]

As i have bit of knowledge about making meads, and this type of drink have very long history in Poland (where I come from) and in our family, i decided to post some usefull infos about making them. I make myself meads from 2005, but i assist my family members (grandfather, father-in law, uncles) since I was teenager. The best mead i have tried was 12-years old, was really amazing (now this mead have 22 years but it is in my uncles basement in Poland, so hope to try some maybe next year).

Meads are drinks which require time. If You patient and leave it alone, results will be truly amazing, You will have strong, clear and tasty drink. Therefore it makes more sense to do a bigger batch, coz it takes time, to mature, so shorts here and any chemicals can only destroy amazing end results. I have tried several times, trust me, time is crucial. Once You try in Your life good mead matured 3-4 years from raw honey, You will never be satisfied with simple recipes using chemicals like bentonite- clearzyme etc. made in couple months
I have tried in my life 12 years old half-single spice mead made from 5-types of honey, it was AMAZING:)

Mead types - preparation method: Cooked (saturated mead) or Uncooked- raw (unsaturated). Cooked wort have less honey-flavor, and kills everything what is beneficial for health in honey, but it gives darker color. Is less common nowdays.

Mead types - ingredients - Melomel (some types of fruit addition), Metheglin (spice addition), Pyment (grape addition)

Mead types - honey quantity: quattro mead (1 litre honey to 3 litre liquid), triple (1 litre honey to 2 litre liquid), double (1 litre honey to 1 litre liquid), half-single (1 litre of honey to 0,5 litre of liquid)

End results:
- quattro - will end up dry mead
- triple - medium dry, to very lightly sweet
- double - medium sweet to sweet
- half-single - definitely sweet, but can be less sweet if used with hops, and/or more acid blend used

Ageing/conditioning
- quattro - from 8 months to 1 year
- triple - from 18 months to 3 years
- double - 3-4 years
- half single 6-10 years

Why some much time for ageing?????
The more honey is used the bigger sugar concentration is in must/liquid, the harder it is for yeast to convert it in alcohol, therefore half-single one, first fermentation stage may take up to 12 months and it will go very slowly.
Another thing is type of honey, the darker/stronger is honey, the longest take to clarify liquid/mead.

Yeast requirements:
- quattro- 0.5g per litre of must/liquid
- triple - 1-1.3g per litre
- double 2.5-3g per litre
-half single - 4-6g per litre

Why so much for double and half-single? Because both those meads will contain so much sugar that half of yeast will die in first couple hours. For double and half-single ones is beter to use strong strain yeast like Bayanus, more of them survive high sugar content.

Yeast Nutrient requirements:
- 0.5 to 2g per litre of must, the higher end for double and half-single ones

Acids requirements: best use is malic or citric or combination of both 50/50

- for melomels its depends on fruit used, if using sharp fruits like currants (black or red), gooseberries, wild quince (delicious !!!), raspberries, etc starting point is 1-2g per litre, other sweet fruits 2-4g per litre
- for spice meads 3-4g per litre, spice doubles and half-single ones 5-6g per litre.

Aeration:
All types of mead (spice ones, fruity ones) doubles and half-singles needs good aeration to helps yeast survive high sugar concentration. It can be easily done by transfering mead must from one bucket to other from 2-3 foot height.

There is about 30+ different types of mead on market, like:
dark and strong buckwheat honey, very light accacia tree honey, orange blossom honey, linden honey, lavender honey, clover honey, rape honey, manuka honey etc. giving us so much possibilities and variations

Making fruit or spice honey can be done in two or three stages, depends on what (how strong) results want to be archived.

For melomels like raspberry is best to add fresh fruit puree on second stage of fermenting after vigorous fermentation and first removing debris from bottom of demijohn, will result strong and fresh fruity flavor and amazing color of end product, or fruits can be fermented since beginning for milder flavor.
For melomels fruit addition should not exceed 25% of total quantity/yield

For metheglin, be very carefull with amount of spices added to must/liquid, if they will be conditioning for year or years their flavor will be more and more powerfull, so think about it.

Sparkling mead?
If mead is not conditioned enough, and bottles too quickly, some left over yeast and sugars can still produce co2 gas, which will make You mead sparkling, it is not good, mead should not be sparkling, unless this is what You aiming for, then that process should be made on purpose much earlier. Just be carefull, too much pressure can destroy Your bottles!

Important info - for most recipes honey is typed in Litres, 1 Litre of honey = 1,4 kg of honey, litre and kg in honey are not equal.

starting BLG of mead/must (roughly)
- quattro - 25-28 BLG
- triple - 34-36 BLG
- double - 46-50 BLG
- half single - 58-62 BLG

I hope i help somebody with mead-making. I tried to post above as much as i can remember now about mead-making, but if i remember myself something else i will add to it. I will find my old paper-pad with my notes from last 12 years and see what i have missed. Good luck and remember be patient.
Cheers

 

[Ajhutch]

Great post :thumb:

 

[IainM]

Thanks for posting, I'll be sure to get some more mead on soon.

 

[Zephyr259]

Awesome info, grateful to know how it's done from a country which still has a tradition for meadmaking. I'm about to bottle some orange blossom mead, 2kg in 10L so fairly mild at 7%. Do you do anything to sanitise a raw honey must?

 

[jthomas]

Thanks for comments guys :)

Zephyr259 - thanks :), i do not sanitize wort/must by itself, but all my workspace, demijohn, funnel, long plastic spoon and all other items and tabletop are cleaned and sanitized before i start work, beacuse mead goes from 9% alcohol up to 25-28% in some extremes, is no need to sanitize mead by itself, in past, when honey was not so pure/clean, saturation by cooking was a way to kill all organic living forms in honey, but nowdays there is no need for it, honeys are good quality, but I absolutely hate cheap honeys from aldi/lidl/tesco etc, most of them are not even honeys, far from it. True/real honey after 3-6 months goes crystlise and goes solid not clear and runny, the only one which does not is accacia honey which stays clear up to 15-18 months.

ohhhh almost forgot, the best is to keep mead must/wort quite cold, when You dissolve honey in water/juice, liquid should not be warmer than 40 deg C, otherwise all goodness of honey, will be killed, and honey start loosing, healthy properties.

And yes there are still 3 huge - mead factories/breweries in Poland whom still make mead, with some good ones in their offers. I came from familly which made and still make quite a bit of homebrewing, most is wine and meads..

Xmas mulled wine + strong Ginger mead is my xmas favoutire drink when outside is -20 deg C :))

 

[AleofWight]

Thanks, think I'll add some Raspberries to mine when I get home. 😀