First post....needing information and expertise

[nduetime]

This is my first post on this site, happy to have found it.

I'm a homebrewer of beer and love it so I understand a little about mead. However, I don't make wine nor have I ever tried to make mead before either. I recently tried a commercial mead and wasn't very impressed. It was made with juniper berries and I'm sure it is an aquired taste. The first and only other mead I've tried was one that was made by a local homebrew shop owner a couple of years ago. It tasted wonderful, sweet but not too much. I don't know much more about it as to what category it fell into, didn't realize there were more than one.

Here's the situation, if you can help, I'd greatly appreciate it. I recently traveled over to Belarus to visit a friend. While I was there, my friends father let me try his wine he made (very good) and some stuff that was referred to as honey vodka, of which he made. Because of the language barrier, I wasn't able to ask him the ingredients, quantities, process, etc. he went through to prepare it. The taste was smooth and very high in alcohol content, two shots did more to me than 4 shots of Russian vodka I had tried there earlier. The taste of honey was evident and I throughly enjoyed it.

Upon my departure from Belarus, I was presented about 2-3 lbs. of their honey they have from their hives. I immediatly knew I wanted to make something with it that I can present to them upon my return which I have yet to set any dates. When I arrived back to the States, my friend had emailed me the name of what this drink was called but it doesn't really help me. It is called medovuha, check here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medovuha.

Has anyone tried this stuff before or know anything about it? If all else fails, I'll just use it in a beer recipe or attempt to make some mead.

Thanks for reading and any information you are willing to share-b.

 

[wolf_tracker]

Check out and read under making mead ..
the neebee guide.

It tells you pretty much everything you need
to know to get started

I am a total beginner on my second batch
and it has helped...

any questions you have about the guide
can almost always find answers here by just
asking

good luck
wolf

 

[WRATHWILDE]

Welcome to the Forums,
Basically if you're looking to recreate it you'd be distilling, and that's generally illegal territory for home brewers in the US, and not a topic encouraged here at GotMead. If you have 3lbs you've just enough for a 1 gallon batch of mead, try using Lalvin D47 yeast, and some Fermaid K for nutrients as Honey is very nutrient deficient. Try to get your starting gravity to 1.130 and you should finish with a delightful sweet mead that will finish around 1.015-1.020. Aging is very important in mead making, 6 months is usually the minimum, with a year being better. The taste difference between the two is incredible. Hope that helps.

Cheers,
Wrathwilde

 

[nduetime]

Actually....I'm not sure if what I'm attempting to do is distill. I'm not sure that's what he does. I'm really trying to ask if anyone here has heard of this and if so, what exactly it is. I'm willing to make mead and will try some real soon. I'm fully aware of the aging issue. How exactly does the recipe of Joes Mattioli's Ancient Orange taste compared to another recipe of simular ingredients that take longer? I'm going to attempt to try some mead locally to make sure what it is that I like and dislike before spending the time for a batch. I plan to try a test batch or two before using the stuff given to me. Thanks for all the help-b.

 

[Leonora]

Welcome to the forums!

Your description makes me wonder if what you drank was honey disolved in a strong vodka. You can get all sorts of vodka infusions in the store now - lemon, pepper, etc.

My suggestion would be to get some high proof vodka or everclear and mix in the honey. You might have to tinker with it to get the honey to actually disolve. I'd try to NOT heat the booze or the honey but instead try shaking or just letting it sit on the bottom of the bottle until it disolves. Heat will drive off flavors as well as massive amounts of alcohol.

If you find it won't dissolve at all, try blending the honey with a small amount of water and heating GENTLY until it is liquid. Let it cool down and try to blend it.

Then once you have it blended, let it sit in a closed container for at least a month or two to let the flavors marry. Cool and dark.

Look around for various cordial recipes on-line for other ideas.

Let us hear what you do and how it turns out!

Leonora

 

[Oskaar]

This is a fairly common drink in parts of Croatia in the hinterland and northern areas around Zagreb, etc.

It is, in my experience a distilled beverage either from a sweet mead, or a fruit-brandy treated with honey. It's popluar in Zagreb during the summer festivals, and most of the rest of the year for that matter. You can get it in many of the Konoba or Gostionica (Bars or Inns) there. In many cases it is a drink that is a blend of Rakija (grape or fruit brandy) and Medovina (Mead) or honey and is commonly called medovaca (pronounced meadow-VACHKA).

Hope that helps,

Oskaar

 

[nduetime]

...Medovina (Mead) or honey and is commonly called medovaca (pronounced meadow-VACHKA).

That's it!!!! That's how they pronounced it. Do you know more about it? Is it infact mead or is it honey disolved in strong vodka? I have since sent a message to my friend asking all the questions I could and am waiting for a reply. I'll certainly post when I receive the information. Thanks for all the help-b.

 

[Oskaar]

As mentioned below, it's generally distilled from a sweet mead, or is a rakija that is blended with mead or raw honey. It can also be very similar to another honey drink called Gverc (pronounced g-VAIRts) that is also popular in Zagreb and the surrounding areas. A lot of the mead there is made from Chestnut, Buckwheat or Acacia (actually the false locust) and is decidedly dark and sweet.

Let's see what your freinds from Belarus have to say.

Zivjeli,

Oskaar