Mead too strong

[Roger524]

I made 2 1 gallon batches of mead about a year ago. Seems to have a very high alcohol content. I bought some mead at the local liquor store. The flavor is similar but the bite is much less on the store bought mead.
I mixed 2parts mead with 1 part coke and the taste was much better.
Looking for other ideas of how to enjoy my mead and lessen the Bite.


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[Dan O]

I made 2 1 gallon batches of mead about a year ago. Seems to have a very high alcohol content. I bought some mead at the local liquor store. The flavor is similar but the bite is much less on the store bought mead.
I mixed 2parts mead with 1 part coke and the taste was much better.
Looking for other ideas of how to enjoy my mead and lessen the Bite.


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How much honey did you use? What kind of yeast did you use? What was your OG? What was your FG? All of these things are important to include when asking for help. Otherwise, it makes it difficult to help diagnose potential issues.
3 lbs of honey will give you about .105 points of gravity (ie. SG 1.105).
If you subtract your FG from your OG, the multiply that number by 131.25, you can get a pretty good idea of your ABV.
(Example- SG of 1.105 minus FG of 1.010 = .095. Multiply this number by 131.25=12.47% ABV)
Different yeasts have different tolerances & behaviors. Some yeasts like a warmer environment, while others prefer & do much better in a cooler environment.
If you're looking for less alcohol, try adding less honey than you did. Or, swap out your yeast with a different one , say one with a lower tolerance. Champagne yeast will almost always ferment dry & leave you with a fairly high ABV. Wine yeast ( many of them anyways) will generally leave you with a little bit of residual sweetness, assuming you use 3 lbs of honey.
I hope this helps.
Happy meading

 

[Roger524]

I used 4 lbs of honey in each gallon batch. I will drop it to 2 lbs for my next try.
Thanks


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[Shelley]

I used 4 lbs of honey in each gallon batch. I will drop it to 2 lbs for my next try.
Thanks


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Yeast choice is also really important, like Dan mentioned. It's well worth researching, and there are many threads on GotMead about yeast experiments, recommendations, and reasons behind those recommendations.

 

[EricHartman]

To much alcohol is really easy to have happen... especially during the first few runs of mead making. In general aim for 10-14% and target the SG on the front end to accomplish this. I dissolve my honey and add water to the SG I want rather than mixing a set amount of honey and water and hoping for the best

With respect to balance:

sugar + carbonation ~ balance the ~ tannins + acid + alcohol

Adding sugar (back sweeten with honey is our common method, or could add fruit juice), carbonation, & oak can help balance/obscure the alcohol.

Tannins and acid will tend to enhance the alcohol side of the equation.

If the alcohol is quite excessive then blending will be necessary as we do with spirits. When you add coke to your mead you are adding sugar, water, acid, and carbonation. The water drops the ABV a little by dilution, the sugar and carbonation balance the alcohol making it less punch in the face, and then the acid tries to enhance, the alcohol, but cannot overcome the first three.

See the BJCP section on balance in my links below for a great education on this end of things

 

[Roger524]

Thanks. Your answer is what I was looking for.


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[EricHartman]

No problem Roger. I forgot to address stabilizing... your yeast will start turning newly added sugar to more alcohol unless they have reached their maximum ABV tolerance (generally it hasn't) or unless you hamper their ability to do so with sorbate and sulfites (KMBS).

If you are blending drink by drink, as you were with the coke, it is a null issue. However, if you want to sweeten the whole batch with dissolved honey or fruit juice you'll need to stabilize the batch before adding more sugar. Yeasts are hardy, and they LOVE to ferment sugars for energy. They don't much care if they wreck a ginger mead by resuming fermentation, when they weren't supposed to, under terrible conditions, when I back sweetened it in the keg! (grumble... the mead is still hot on the tongue 18 months out lol)