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4-7-20 Tonight at 9PM ET we’re happy to have the opportunity to hang out with Ken Schramm, owner of Schramm’s Mead in Ferndale, MI.
If you’re new to the mead world, you may not be familiar with Ken (I’m sure there are one or two of you, lol). Ken, oft referred to as ‘The Godfather of Mead’ and is the author of The Compleat Meadmaker, arguably the book that launched a mead making revolution. Many meadmakers learned a lot about mead and meadmaking from Ken and his book. “The Compleat Meadmaker,” is the current reference text of record on mead making. It has sold more than 70,000 copies. Ken has been a beer brewer, mead maker and student of honey, fruit and spice since 1988. He co-founded the Mazer Cup Mead Competition in 1992, the world’s oldest and largest mead-only competition.
He has presented at brewing, meadmaking and winemaking conferences from Delaware to Alaska over the past 20+ years, starting in 1994 with the first “Mead Matrix” with Dr. Dan McConnell – a flight of twelve meads made with the same recipe: six from the same honey and different yeast strains, and six with the same yeast strain and different varietal honeys. Ken lives in Troy, Michigan.
Schramm’s Mead is Ken’s commercial meadery in Ferndale, MI, and it’s there that he puts his meadmaking skills to the test, creating a number of amazing meads, including his famous ‘Heart of Darkness’, made entirely of fruit grown on Ken’s property, and thus a small batch that is highly prized, and now legendary in mead circles. Ken is also the owner of Schramm’s Orchards, a 6.1-acre orchard in Rochester Hills, Michigan. He has raised dozens of varieties of cherries, apples peaches, plums and berries.
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If you want to ask your mead making questions, you can call us at 803-443-MEAD (6323) or send us a question via email, or via Twitter @GotmeadNow and we’ll tackle it online! 9PM EDT/6PM PDT Join us on live chat during the show Bring your questions and your mead, and let’s talk mead! You can call us at 803-443-MEAD (6323), or Skype us at meadwench (please friend me first and say you’re a listener, I get tons of Skype spam), or tweet to @gotmeadnow.
Coming up:
- April 14 – Scott Scharr
Show links and notes
- The Compleat Meadmaker by Ken Schramm
- Apple varietals and where they grow – http://orangepippen.com
- National Honey Board Mead Crafter Compeitition
Upcoming Events
- July 22-25 Mazer Cup International, Broomfield, CO
- September 26-28 AMMA MeadCon, Broomfield, CO
- Due to the pandemic, most meaderies cannot have events or open their taprooms, and are offering their mead via online and pickup service. You can find an ongoing list at https://gotmead.com/meaderies/support-meaderies-during-coronavirus-where-to-get-mead-online-and-pickup/
- Visit our mead directory at https://gotmead.com/commercial-mead/
Got an event you’d like us to mention on GotMead Live? Send us an email at gotmeadlive@gotmead.com and tell us about it!
She is also an experienced marketing coach and consultant who has recently decided to focus her marketing expertise exclusively on the craft beverage market to help meaderies, cideries, breweries and distilleries expand their business and get more customers while doing what they love.
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