Mead Lover's Digest #9 Tue 06 October 1992

Forum for Discussion of Mead Brewing and Consuming
John Dilley, Digest Coordinator

Contents:

corking & clearing (Alan Mayman)
Re: Mead Lover's Digest #8 (October 04, 1992) (Robert Crawford)
Re: Mead Lover's Digest #7 (October 03, 1992) (Michael Tighe)
Plum melomel recipe??? (Brewing Chemist Mitch)
Acid-blend??? (Mark N. Davis)

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Date: Mon, 5 Oct 92 11:15:29 -0400
From: Alan Mayman <maymanal@scvoting.fvo.osd.mil>
Subject: corking & clearing

Howdy,

I am hoping a veteran corker out ther could share his/her method with me,
including sanitation and any special treatment of the cork, and special
treatment of the bottles after corking.

My first try with this type of closure turned out horribly. I infected
every bottle with algea like scum 🙁

I am also curious about what happens when the mead finally clears and is
ready to bottle. Too add insult to injury, I corked the doomed batch
of mead prematurely after it had been sitting quietly for about 5 months.
(I was moving & could'nt think of a better way to transport the mead)
Though it had not cleared when bottled, I assumed that fermentation had
ceased and that I was into the "conditioning" period where harsh tastes
are mellowed and patience tested. Anyway, back to the insult & injury
part, roughly half of the bottles blew there corks and spewed mead all
over my closet. Does clearing indicate an end to fermentation and
therefore a safe time to bottle?

Thanks All,

Alan


Date: Mon, 5 Oct 92 10:40:29 CDT
From: Robert Crawford <betel@camelot.bradley.edu>
Subject: Re: Mead Lover's Digest #8 (October 04, 1992)

Where are good places to look for reasonable prices on bulk

 

honey? So far I've only made gallon batches of meads, but I'm planning
on making a five-gallon batch of melomel, and don't want to spend the
ridiculous store prices.



Robert Crawford betel@camelot.bradley.edu


Date: Mon, 5 Oct 92 11:55:23 EDT
From: tighe@kc.camb.inmet.com (Michael Tighe)
Subject: Re: Mead Lover's Digest #7 (October 03, 1992)

To gelly@persoft.com (Mitch Gelly) who asks if aged honey
makes any difference –

In my opinion it does not make any difference. I've used "fresh"
honey and two-year-old bulk honey that had to be scooped out of tin
with an ice-cream scoop it was so dense. I've had very nice results
in both cases. I haven't done a side-by-side comparison, so I can't
really comment on the taste issues, but I don't see any problem with
using older bulk honey. Most of the reading I've done says you can
just heat the honey to get it back to liquid form with no probelms.
In addition, honey is so dense (specific gravity) that practically
nothing can grow on it (unless mixed with H2O) so you don't have to
worry about bacterial or mold infection…. 🙂

Michael Tighe, Intermetrics, Inc., Cambridge, MA 02138 (USA)
email: tighe@inmet.camb.inmet.com, phone: 617-661-1840


Date: Mon, 5 Oct 92 13:44:41 CDT
From: gelly@persoft.com (Brewing Chemist Mitch)
Subject: Plum melomel recipe???

Greetings,

A co-worker who enjoyed my raspberry melomel has approached me with a
proposition (no, not that kind). He has tons of plums and wanted to
'commission' a batch of plum melomel from me. I have plenty of carboys
and fermenting room, so I thought hell why not. It will get me a few
champagne bottles of it (I never would have made plum otherwise).

Anyone have a good plum melomel recipe? Also a guess on quantities of
plum, skins/no skins, etc. I will probably use about 15 lbs of light
clover honey as the base, and it will be a 5 gallon batch.

Are plums a good idea ? Any experience with them ?

Thanks,

Mitch


  • Mitch Gelly – | We tend to scoff at the beliefs of the ancients.

software QA specialist | But we can't scoff at them personally, to their

and zymurgist | faces, and this is what annoys me.


Date: Mon, 5 Oct 92 18:12:47 PDT
From: Mark N. Davis <mndavis@pbhya.PacBell.COM>
Subject: Acid-blend???

Meadings greed lovers (er, I mean Greetings Mead lovers),

In reading through my first two issues of the MLD I noticed the mention
of acid blend. Being only a beer brewer (and the occassional mead of course)
and never attempting wine making, I'm not sure what the purpose of this
stuff is. In addition, in a recipe that I saw in issue #7, it called for
acid blend to taste. So what does this stuff affect the taste anyway?

While I'm on the subject, does mead require a low pH like beer for fermentation
(OK, I know the in beer the low pH aids in mashing mainly), or are the yeasties
pretty flexible with or without and addition of acid?

And finally, what makes Mead Yeast nutrient any different than generic Yeast
Nutrient (besides the price I imagine) ?

Enquiring minds want to know,
Mark



End of Mead Lover's Digest