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JAOM clouded up

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Barrel Char Wood Products
L

Leeham991

NewBee
Registered Member
Jul 11, 2012
68
1
0
Lincoln - UK
My exact to the recipe JAOM I was going to be bottling this Sunday has clouded up in the last week or so. It was perfectly clear at the start of the month when it was still fermenting, but since then it's clouded up quite a lot. It's clear enough to read a book through, but it's much cloudier than it was before.
I was thinking maybe it's the temperature. It's heading into winter and my bedroom doesn't have any heating. Luckily there is no live yeast eating away at anything in there, just aging mead and apple wine, so I didn't think the drop in temperature would be a problem.
It could be the variance though because without a heat the room is uncontrollably moving between 5c at night to 10c in the day.
If the variance in temperature is a problem though I have a friend who will give me an electric heater so that's not really a problem if that is what's causing the cloudiness.
 
I'm thinking that it is a reaction to the cooler temps. Have you smelled or tasted it? any strange artefacts that weren't there before?
 
Yeah, usually it's proteins that cause hazing with temperature, or so I've been led to understand... I've only ever had it happen with things containing beer wort, personally.

But as long as it smells and tastes OK and you don't see obvious growths or anything, it's probably fine.
 
It smell like orange juice and yeast to me, though the orange pieces are pretty much forming the entire surface of the liquid. Haven't tasted it though because I broke my pipette, but I'll be replacing that soon.

I noticed that my traditional mead also in the last few weeks has gone from cloudy to almost solid coloured, though it now smells just like the commercial mead I often buy, not like compost and yeast how it did smell two months ago so I'm not worried about that.

If it is the cold causing the clouding will getting the room heated up help or should I just leave it how it is for a few weeks before bottling?
 
Does the clarity matter to you? It's fine to drink cloudy.
If you warm it up, and it goes away, then it's chill haze. If you let it cool down again, it will haze up again. (I think)
Personally I wouldn't worry about it, but if it's that clear, and that cold, I'm surprised the fruit has not fallen.
 
I had a similar problem with my 3gal batch of JAO. I let it sit for 4.5 months, the fruit had dropped, I added some pectinase, I even added some clarifying agent (I don't remember the name, but it was based on some animal product). Anyways, it was never clear enough to see all the way through, but I could see a little bit into the bottom. When I bottled, I could see all the way through the bottle. Since it finished fermenting in July, it doesn't seem like it was the temp that kept it cloudy, even though it is cold now. Compared to my other meads, you could tell that in the glass it was a little bit cloudy, but it was still fantastic. So if you don't mind, it will be fine (I did find out that the SG was high even for a JAO, 1.058, but it had a really good reception).
 
Started it on the 29th of August

I'm only worried about the cloudiness because I tend to associate cloudiness in alcoholic drinks with a kind of dirty yeast taste.

If you all think it's perfectly fine then I will bottle it next time I get a couple hours free with the kitchen to sanitize everything and do the bottling.
 
Have a taste and see, I guess... is there anywhere you could warm it up for a day or two?
 
Well, not having experienced something like this, where it could indeed be connected to the temperature of the batch i.e. protein, or something like that (the only example of something like this it the "wine diamonds" i.e. tartaric acid, crystalising out at lower temperatures), perhaps if it's related to very fine particulates, then it could be filtered out on fine/sterile filtration media ?

I think the No3 mini-jet pads are about 0.5 micron, or the very fine cartridge for a "Tandem" filter housing (normally with my enolmatic) is 0.25 microns.

The only problem being, that this kind of filtration media is so fine that it can also remove pigmentation and even some flavouring/aromatic elements. So it's rather a case of if you have the kit, giving it a try at small scale and tasting the result.......
 
...or if it's just for you, and you're not planning to give it away as gifts, just say $#%& it and drink it cloudy... :D
 
I'm going to put the electric heater in the room and see what happens in the next few days, but either way, cloudy or not I'm going to bottle it this Sunday xD
 
Well bottled today, a little later that I'd planned because I had family visiting on Sunday, but it went brilliantly if I do say so myself :D

Used a cotton handkerchief (fresh out of the box and properly sanitised and rinsed of course) as a rough filter to keep the worse of the sediment out of it, but after a few days in a warmed room it was crystal clear already. Got 4 clear 750 bottles and 1 bottles with a little sediment in.
Corked with the hand corker which was less of a job when I practiced with it before, maybe because the corks were wet from being cleaned. Definitely no regrets about getting a simple hand corker for £2.50 instead of a lever action one for £20 :3

I poured a small amount out into shot glasses before bottling, a little cloudy and a little clear, tasted both, both brilliant! I'm very very happy with it, especially considering that it's not even supposed to taste very good for a couple more months xD
The taste was pretty alcohol hot, though not in flavour, just in the mild burn at the back of the throat, and I didn't detect much orange flavour, just that sort of bitterness orange peal, something which tasted 'warm' which I'd imagine was the spices, though couldn't really make them out, and a taste not unlike my usual mead, the Harvest Gold. The cloudier glass tasted a little more bitter but that was the only difference I could make out.

I'm definitely putting another batch in the carboy (which was very easy to clean, much to my surprise) as soon as I get a little extra cash for ingredients ;D

Have to say thank you to everyone here, you've been a major help, I'm even starting to understand the many confusing recipes I was reading before I found a forum to ask questions in xD
You've all been extremely helpful and I don't think I could have my first bottles of drinkable mead sat next to me right now without your help.

Cheers :3


PS: I used bees wax to seal the top of the bottles and it looks really nice :3
 
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