First batch bottled..

[Darren]

Ok my very first batch has been bottled and its quite weak at 10% and i hope you wont be offended in how i describe it ;D

Looks like pee, smells like pee and taste like alcoholic pee. I have bottled it you think there is a glimmer it may taste nice in 6 months?

 

[Chevette Girl]

You started this when, September? Yeah, it'll probably taste way better in 6-12 months

Did you get the SG when you bottled it? Was it stabilized?

 

[wowbagger]

Turning honey into booze is a miracle of yeast.
Turning crappy booze into better booze is a miracle of time.

 

[fatbloke]

Mate, as the others have already alluded to......many young meads, particularly traditionals, can taste bloody hideous.

Its one of the reasons that even the great and good like Ken Schramm suggest that when bottling, if you can do, put some of it in smaller bottles as its easier to taste a small amount to see if its ready or not.

I know it can be hard to find bottles smaller than 375ml so there's nothing wrong with 330 or 250ml beer bottles with crown caps. That way you can taste one every couple of months etc.....

Yet its also easier to bulk age it in a carboy/demi-john. That way you get consistency across all the bottles, with bottle ageing you need a consistent low temp environment......

Plus bulk aging allows for flavour modification etc...

 

[Darren]

Thank you for your answers guys.. this was made 7th December 2012 and only recently bottled. Funny enough i did have enough for 6.2bottles and did what you suggesetd and bottled the small amount too for testing.

SG was 1060 and 995 after. Yes i did stabilise it Chevette Girl I bought a Vinometre and it gave me a reading of 10% as this is my first batch im hoping 6 months bottled in a cupboard in darkness it might taste nice lol.

 

[Chevette Girl]

Thank you for your answers guys.. this was made 7th December 2012 and only recently bottled. Funny enough i did have enough for 6.2bottles and did what you suggesetd and bottled the small amount too for testing.

SG was 1060 and 995 after. Yes i did stabilise it Chevette Girl I bought a Vinometre and it gave me a reading of 10% as this is my first batch im hoping 6 months bottled in a cupboard in darkness it might taste nice lol.

At .995, it's pretty dry and MAN is that ever young (I'll be surprised if you don't end up with all kinds of sediment if that was only started in December?), so yeah, it'll taste like ass for a while even if you LIKE dry meads (turns out, I really don't). You'll eventually figure out whether you will want to backsweeten further batches.

A note about vinometers, they don't work when you've got residual sugars, so you were OK this time but if you ever have it stop above 1.000 or backsweeten, it's going to give you erroneous readings...

 

[Intheswamp]

Just trying to give a little helpful criticism here...and I may not know what I'm talking about. The level of the mead in your bottles looks low to me, this exposes the mead to more oxygen (oxidation). I'm thinking the level should be higher...maybe something like this...

Ed

 

[fatbloke]

Just trying to give a little helpful criticism here...and I may not know what I'm talking about. The level of the mead in your bottles looks low to me, this exposes the mead to more oxygen (oxidation). I'm thinking the level should be higher...maybe something like this...

Ed

hum ? yes, I'd have probably filled the bottles a little more - but I'm a lazy person so I'd just set the fill depth differently on my enolmatic.......

 

[Darren]

Ok thank you guys great advice... will do on next batch