Grocery Store Mead

[mcork]

Hi all,

For reasons that I can't go into now, I am limited to making mead from ingredients I can get from a Grocery store (no specialty brew stores near me). So I have taken on this task with my first batch of mead.

Equipment
-----------------------
Plastic Water Bottles (as fermentation vessels)
Ballons with holes as an airlock

Ingrdients
------------------------
1L Water
350g - 400g of Honey
Active Dry Bread Yeast
25 Raisins (sultanas)

So I made the batch yesterday and have the following questions?
- Is there a way to determine when the fermentation starts and ends with a hydrometer?
- I read that sunlight (UV light) actually helps activate bread yeast however most brewing sites (I've brewed beer before at a different house) talk against that. Would being exposed to UV light for part of today killed off all my yeast?
- Can I leave it in the primary fermentation vessel for months or is racking necessary?


Anyone attempted this before and have tips?

Matt

 

[pdh]

The classic grocery-store mead recipe is Joe's Ancient Orange Mead; it addresses several of your questions:

http://gotmead.com/blog/recipe/joes-ancient-orange-clove-and-cinnamon-mead/

 

[mcork]

Thanks for the link. I'm going to spend the next couple of days reading all the variations people are asking. Bye bye sleep.
I didn't realise it was such a hit. Cool.

 

[darigoni]

You should check out the first post of this thread : http://www.gotmead.com/forum/showthread.php/26032-Making-Mead

The nine part meadology series starts off with making a JAOM and uses plastic gallon jugs and balloons. No hydrometer.

 

[pwizard]

Can you order stuff online? I highly recommend you get a proper yeast nutrient like Fermaid O from one of the sites that sell it. At the very least, buy two gallons of cheap jug wine or apple juice that comes in glass and use the jugs as your fermentation vessels. Plastic milk jugs won't work well.