Clearing raspberry melomel

[Mazaruni]

Hi there,

I have a raspberry melomel that’s 3 months old, and it tastes nice. I’m looking for advice about degassing and clearing it.

Raspberry Melomel

Honey, 15 lbs
Water to a little over 5 gal
Go-Ferm Protect, 10 g
Fermaid K, 8 g
DAP, 15 g
Potassium Bicarbonate, 0.75 t
Campden Tablets (5)
Pectic Enzyme, 10 g
MT Yeast
Raspberry Puree, 96 oz can

I started the everything except the raspberry puree, campden and pectic enzyme, and added the nutrients over a few days. SG = 1.11 and I added the raspberry and pectic enzyme at SG = 1.042. After 2 weeks, it was at 1.000 and so I racked it and added 5 campden and 1.25 t sorbate. It’s now separated into 3 gal, 1 gal and 0.5 gal jugs.

It’s been sitting in the basement for 3 months. It’s still a little gassy and it isn’t clear. I’m going to degas it soon.

1. What should I add to help it clear?
2. I guess I should add more campden but probably not sorbate, right?

Thanks for the advice!

 

[bmwr75]

I rack typically 4 times before bottling. That helps to degas and clarify.

This is a frequently used clarifying agent: http://www.midwestsupplies.com/sparkolloid

 

[PapaScout]

After three months of stillness degassing should be easy. if you like the taste I would stabilize and bottle.

 

[HeidrunsGift]

1. Time and patience are the cheapest and most natural clarifier! If you are willing to wait a full year, it should (generally) be clear after 2-3 racks. Check the lees though, if there are a lot, depending on your yeast (Im not familiar with MT yeast) you may need to rack more. If its a chardonnay yeast, letting it sit longer on lees may add benefits, so maybe less. Im with bmwr75, I usually rack about 4 times before bottling (throughout a period of generally 15+ months)

2. Sorbate (ie, potassium sorbate) is for stabilizing...do not use unless you want to stabilize the mead, in which case you would need to add suflites (ie, potassium metabisulfite) along with it to prevent spoilage organisms from potentially creating a geranium flavor in your mead. I dont use Campden tablets so can't help with that...

Probably not much to degas at this point, if I had to guess

Skal

 

[Mazaruni]

Thanks, folks. I'm going to rack today and degas it...I'll try the less is more approach!

 

[Cobrac]

There are several clearing agents when im in a hurry (which you never should be with a mead) i use silica sol (dont now the english word for it kiselsol in swedish...) and chitosan. Clear within 48h.