Tasmanian leatherwood sparkling mead

[monkeyspearfish]

Hi this my first post and i'm hoping for some tips and pointers on this mead

1 kilo leatherwood honey
600 grams blossom honey to take the edge off
1 cup blackcurrents (bettter than raisins imo)
1 cup french oak chips for spice
3 teabags
Water for 5 litre end product
Gervin g4 yeast

I want this to be a medium sparkling mead. Will i need to expect a certain amount of sediment in the bottles? Any way to reduce sediment? General tips appreciated

 

[fatbloke]

Leatherwood and "Blossom" honey ? Sounds like you've been too Paynes (at Hurstpierpoint).....

5 litres ? A European standard size for demi-john type jars/jugs.....

So without some practice and likely some more kit, you will likely find "medium/sparkling" not so easy.

its probable that you'll need more nutrient than just the black currants.

dry and sparkling is straight forward, not easy but straight forward......

any sweetness would likely need some non-fermentable sweetener.

I haven't used that yeast as I usually get Lalvin yeasts in mail order (there are some HBS who stock lalvin yeasts), so I don't know its properties etc. Normally you'd use a champagne yeast, but only ferment to 14% ABV, then once its cleared and aged, you'd carry out "methode champenoise" to sparkle it.

you can of course, prime it like beer and bottle it in beer bottles but they hold a lower pressure, so you'd need to think on it.

you could easily make a sweet batch abd then force carbonate it in a keg and then chill it down as far as possible and then bottle it.........

 

[monkeyspearfish]

Yes, the honey is from paynes; Ive got a sack mead going using a blend of their mexican and orange blossom honey which is going very well, alcohol sitting at about 9% and rising on that one! Is there anything wrong with using paynes though?

Thanks for the info, the g4 is meant to have a maximum of 15% which i thought would be ideal as leatherwood mead is supposedly better when sweet. I suppose i will end up with a slightly cloudy product if i back sweeten and sparkle using the champagne method.

I am using tea as well as a nutrient; i had a stuck fermentation previously and adding tea and blackcurrents seem to get things going.

 

[fatbloke]

Paynes honey is fine. I get some of mine tbere..... they're about 10 miles up the road from me.

As I say, you'll likely need more nutrients. Some in the currants but nothing in the tea really. Some boiled bread yeast and a vitamin B1 tablet crushed up.....

better still, some Tronozymol........

the 15 % is achievable, you're gonna need some gravity readings though. 1.3kg honey is a normal sort of level for a gallon/4.55 litres so your 1.6kg in 5 litres should be good.

The reason I'm going on about nutrients is that honey has plenty of sugars but bugger all else.

You'll just have to keep measuring the gravity to monitor the drop. Without a start gravity you won't know how far its dropped and be able to work out the strength.....

though you can just step feed extra bits of honey once it gets down to, say, 1.020. You just need to make sure its nourished correctly.

the "newbee" guide is linked in the left side yellow box. Its well worth the read......

 

[monkeyspearfish]

Thanks very much fatbloke, I will go have a read of the guide.