Mead Made Easy

There are a number of yeasts you can use to make mead. I've used various champagne yeasts a lot, as I don't make my meads incredibly strong, and I like a dry, sparkling mead. The drawback of champagne yeast is that it's not too tolerant to very high original gravities, and it is very tolerant to high alcohol content. This means that it will start very slow if you're brewing a high-gravity mead, but it will ferment out almost all the sugar available. If you're brewing high-gravity meads, I'd suggest starting with either a wine or mead yeast, and if you like a dry, strong mead, finishing it with champagne yeast. If you like a sweeter mead, you can use a mead or a wine yeast right from the beginning.

Some yeasts that I've had good results with, or have heard recommended by others, are Lalvin K1V, which is a fast starting, intermediate finishing wine yeast; Flor Sherry yeast, for a sweet finish (or you could use more honey with the Lalvin K1V); and Prise de Mousse, which is similar to champagne yeasts in finish. I've heard of people having good results with Vierka mead yeast, but I've had mixed results. I've also tried YeastLab Dry Mead yeast, which worked nicely. I think the problems I've seen with the Vierka may have been due to older yeast. As mead continues to increase in popularity with homebrewers, more new varieties should become available, and they'll be fresh more often.

Be aware that this list is far from complete, and there are probably many other suitable yeasts out there. For lower gravity meads, I've used Edme ale yeast with good results, and it's becoming a favorite of mine. As long as you don't make the mead with such a high starting gravity that the yeast never get a good start, results are pretty good, and slightly higher-than-normal temperatures don't bother ale yeasts as much as they do other strains. An added benefit is that the mead doesn't need as much aging as mead made with wine or champagne yeasts do, and you can enjoy it earlier.

In short, don't be afraid to try something new, but make sure you check the expiration dates. Some mead yeasts sell slow enough that keeping fresh stock in a homebrew store is a challenge. You may also want to check out the Zymurgy special issue on yeast and beer, or the Summer 1994 issue, which has a table listing yeasts and their characteristics. They describe a large number of yeasts, many of which will work well for mead-making.

Lallemand also has good information available on their web pages. In particular, when asked about using their yeasts in meads, they suggested that the K1V-1116 produces a more “light and fruity” product. ICV-D-47 produces fewer esters and more earthy tones, which are good for dry mead and cider that is being considered for aging on lees and perhaps in oak. It also enhances mouth feel by the production of trace amounts of 90,000 mw polysaccharides. The K1V would be great for light and fruity mead or cider with a little residual sugar.

The 71B-1122 would be an excellent choice for the American style, light and fruity mead and cider. It will produce a little more alcohol in cider, because it converts some of the malic acid in the apple juice to alcohol (different than bacterial malo-lactic fermentation).

WYeast 3184 (sweet mead) has gotten a lot of criticism on the The Mead Lover's Digest over the years. Some of this is justified, since it's a slow fermenter in many cases, but it can be made to produce a good mead. The most important thing to remember with 3184 is that you need a good amount of nutrients for it, and it does poorly in high-sugar or low pH conditions. The best results have come when people start with a small amount of honey, and feed additional honey into the must as fermentation slows. That is, you start out with honey and water for a fairly weak mead (say two to three pounds per gallon), and when the fermentation slows, check the pH, correct if necessary (3184 is good down to about 3.6), and then add the equivalent of a pound or less of honey per gallon of must. I discuss this in more detail in the section on High Gravity Mead.

Another thing to consider if you're having problems with slow fermentation is that you need to have a good strong starter solution with many yeasts. D-47 and 3184 are both examples that will not do well if you have a low yeast-cell concentration in the must. Also, if the sugar concentration is very high, almost no yeast will multiply well. Again, quoting Clayton Cone at Lallemand:

EC-1118, K1V-1116 and ICV-71B are recommended for ice wine and late harvest wine. The key to fermenting high brix must—30-40 brix—is cell population and lots of nutrients. No wine yeast grows well in a high sugar environment so you must add at least 1.2 g. of yeast/l of must and 0.5+ g. nutrients/l. Agitate the fermenting must frequently. The fermentation can be completed in <30 days.

#yeast

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There are two different kinds of yeast nutrient available. They are yeast hulls (also known as ghosts) and di-ammonium phosphate (usually just called yeast nutrient—this is the easiest to find). Some people say that the yeast hulls make for better meads more quickly, since you don't have to wait for the chemical taste from the phosphates to wane. My opinion is that both are usable, but the yeast-hulls leave you more margin for error. If you put in too many hulls, you'll just have a larger layer of sediment to deal with. If you put in too much phosphate, you'll have a chemical taste that'll take a while to fade.

In older times, egg white was also used as a yeast nutrient, but given the problems with salmonella in eggs nowadays, I'd recommend against using this method. That said, to use 'em, you basically just whip up an egg white until you've got something resembling meringue, break that up into little bits, and toss it into the must. If more than roughly a third of your fermentable sugars are coming from fruit or barley malt, you won't need to worry about yeast nutrients, since these ingredients contain the things yeast will need.

#nutrient #yeast

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The first batch of recipes are from the Mead-Lover's Digest. We've edited them for clarity, while also trying to preserve the spirit of the originals. Also, we've tried to touch the authors' original comments as little as possible, since some of them cover things I haven't covered yet in the book. I hope you find them helpful. Here's a blurb on the MLD that its coordinator asked we include:

The Mead-Lover's Digest is an electronic forum for meadmakers and mead-lovers to discuss all aspects of mead: recipes, ingredients, techniques, history. (Most of the day-to-day discussion tends to be about making mead).

To sign up for the Digest: Send e-mail with the subject “Subscribe”, with your full name and your e-mail address in the message, to: The Mead Lover's Digest

About the Digest: The Mead-Lover's Digest was created in Fall, 1992 to help people interested in mead find one another, discuss mead, and exchange information.

An issue of the Digest is sent out about every two or three days, depending on the amount of material submitted. As of April, 1997, more than 550 issues of the Digest had appeared. A typical issue is between 200 and 500 lines (about 8 – 30 KB). Distribution is worldwide.

The Digest is a non-commercial, strictly volunteer effort by/for mead folk. The caretaker of the digest is currently Dick Dunn.

• Traditional Mead or Maple Wine
• Citrus Mead
• The Thrilla from Vanilla
• Blueberry-Jasmine Mead
• Cranberry Mead
• Grapefruit Melomel
• Jamaica Blue Mead
• Mulberry Mead (Morat)
• Royal Colors Melomel
• Strawberry Melomel
• Sweet Pyment
• de-Cyser Apple Mead-pagne
• Honey-Maple Mead
• Simha
• Honey Bucket Bracket

And here are a few more of Dave's recipes, new to the 1995 html version of this book.

• Dave's Bracket
• Hangover Cyser

Note also that the #recipe hashtag should show all the pages within Mead Made Easy which I have tagged as recipes.

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Source: John Gorman Mead Lover's Digest #19, 17 October, 1993

Ingredients:

• 5-6 qts honey or 7-8 qts maple syrup (bulk grade B dark)
• 5 tsp yeast nutrient
• 15 grams white wine yeast

Directions:

• Relax, don't worry, have some mead.
• Hydrate the yeast and dissolve the yeast nutrient separately in warm water for 30 minutes. Mix the honey, maple syrup, or both with first hot and then cold tap water in a large open container to about 5 gallons. Splash or spray the water to oxygenate the must so that the yeast will multiply. Pour the must into a glass carboy, then pitch in the hydrated yeast and dissolved yeast nutrient, dregs included.
• Use a blow off tube for the first few days and then switch to a water trap. In a month or so, the alcohol will kill the yeast before it runs out of sugar. If not, and the mead turns out too dry, add some more honey. It is ready to drink as soon as fermentation stops.
• Maple wine becomes crystal clear with a beautiful sherry color within sixty days. Mead will sometimes clarify in ninety days. If you choose to bottle the mead before it is clear, it will clarify in the bottles, leaving an unsightly but delicious sediment.
• Use bentonite (clay) to quickly clarify a mead any time after fermentation stops. Boil 12 ounces of water in a saucepan. While simmering, slowly sprinkle and stir in 5 tsp of bentonite. Cover and let stand for 24 hours. Add during racking. It may be necessary to rack and bentonite twice. The result is crystal clear.

Notes:

• Traditional Meads and Maple Wines have an alcohol content of 12-15%.
• Always use yeast nutrient and plenty of yeast for a strong start. The fermentation will take off with a bang and the rapidly rising alcohol content will quickly kill off any wild yeast. There is no need to sulfite, heat, or boil the must. Why ruin good honey? I have never had a bad batch of mead, except when I added acid blend.

Dave's Notes:

John's comment about acid blend here is a good one. I almost always avoid acid blend pre-fermentation. And because I mostly ferment my meads dry, I don't need to add acid to balance out the sweetness when the mead is done. But if you are making a sweet mead, a little acid blend can be added near the end. Add a small amount, let it sit for a day or two, and test. Don't overdo it.

#recipe

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#recipe

Source: Sir Kenelme Digbie, updated by Michael Tighe

Mead Lover's Digest #211, 21 September, 1993

Ingredients:

• 10 lbs honey
• Citrus peel (about ¾ the skin of one orange)
• Sliced ginger (about the size of a thumb)
• Yeast

Directions:

• Make a basic mead with 2 lbs of honey per gallon. Use a clover honey or a light wildflower honey for this recipe. Just before taking the must off the boil, add a small amount of sliced ginger (about the size of one's thumb for a 5-gallon batch) and then add the thinnest peel of orange skin (about ¾ of the skin of the orange). Be careful not to get the white pith of the skin—it leaves a bitter/soapy aftertaste.
• Let it cool naturally about ¾ hour (longer for larger batches) and then remove the ginger and orange peel. Put in a carboy to cool, then add yeast and let it go for three to six weeks (I usually let it go till it starts to clear). Bottle, let sit for another week or two (to charge the bottles) and then chill and serve.

Notes:

I've made this with lemon peel or grapefruit peel instead of orange peel, and all taste great! If you use orange blossom honey, use orange peel rather than some other citrus fruit—it really enhances the flavor! Grapefruit is the strongest flavor, and the most likely to be bitter/harsh, so use less of it than for orange or lemon. Leave some of the ginger and the skin in the must during fermentation for stronger flavor.

Use less ginger and less citrus skin for the first batches, and then increase the amounts till you get the exact flavor you want. (One friend used a pound of ginger per gallon! And he liked it!)

The slow-cool method (rather than using a chiller) is supposed to be part of what makes the flavor great.

I prefer mead yeasts if possible, but champagne or general purpose wine yeast works fine. This should create a slightly sweet mead with an alcohol content of three or four percent.

Dave's Notes:

Clayton Cone from Lallemand got asked about putting orange (or other citrus zest) into mead, and he pointed out that The substance involved is d-limonine, one of the oils present in orange peel. It kills micro-organisms. Including yeast. The zest of one citrus fruit per liter of must is definitely enough to kill yeast.

After much discussion on the Mead Lover's Digest, we figured that best practice was to add the citrus zest late in fermentation (you can freeze it after you take it off the fruit when initially making your mead), when you've reached the point of not being certain if the fermentation is complete or not. But if you are looking to bottle-carbonate, be aware that a lot of zest may prevent the yeast from carbonating the mead in the bottles, and you may end up with a sweet mead, rather than a bubbly one.

#recipe #metheglin

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#recipe

Float like a butterfly, Sting like a bee

Source: Microburst Brewery (Forrest Cook and Jon Corbet)

Mead Lover's Digest #123, 1 May, 1993

Ingredients (for 7 gallons):

• 9 lbs of mesquite honey from Tempe, AZ
• 2 tbsp gypsum to harden up the water a bit
• 4-ounce bottle of Madagascar vanilla extract

Directions:

• Vanilla extract added after the must cooled.
• The unfermented beverage tasted great, it's been bubbling away for over a month. I don't know how many vanilla beans are in one bottle, but I've heard that they are rather potent.

Notes:

The inspiration for this recipe came from a mead that was poured at the Beer and Steer, a large outdoor homebrewers party held in Colorado occasionally.

As this mead has aged, the vanilla flavor has become more pronounced. For the next batch, we will probably increase the vanilla extract to 6 oz. At nine months the flavor is still improving, I project that it will be incredible at eighteen months—if there is any left.

Dave's Notes:

I made a mead based on this recipe, except I went nuts with the vanilla. I had a 16 oz bottle of Mexican vanilla extract, and I put in the whole thing. I don't think it was too much vanilla, and most people agreed. The other major change was that I used a real dark “wildflower blend” of honey, which balanced the strong vanilla flavor nicely.

#recipe #metheglin

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#recipe

Source: Alan Derr

Mead Lover's Digest #122, 1 May, 1993

Ingredients:

• 10 lb clover honey (basic, grocery store variety)
• 2-12 oz bags of frozen Maine wild blueberries
• ¼ cup jasmine tea (dry)
• 3 tsp pectic enzyme
• 3 tsp yeast nutrient
• 1 pkg Red Star Champagne yeast

Directions:

• The honey, blueberries, pectic enzyme, and yeast nutrient were added to about 2 gal of water and raised and held at 170 F for 25 minutes. I squished the blueberries and strained them about halfway through the heating process. This mixture was then poured into a carboy with water to make a bit less than 5 gallons. I then boiled about 2 cups of water, steeped the tea for several minutes and strained it into the carboy. When cool, I pitched the dry yeast (I know, I should know better than to use dry yeast...).
• OK. Time passes. Fermentation happens. It stops. I taste the result. The jasmine was a bit too heavy, but I figure it will probably mellow with age. The blueberry smell, flavor, and color was kind of underwhelming. The main problem was, the resulting mead was thin-bodied and dry as a bone. Now I want a fairly dry mead, but this was way too much so.
• So next, I heated:
  • 2 lb clover honey
  • 12 oz frozen wild blueberries
  • 1 tsp yeast nutrient
  • 1 tsp pectic enzyme in a quart or so of water, squished and strained, and added this mixture to the carboy.
• Fermentation started again (slowly) and has continued for the past couple of months. It is now crystal clear, has a beautiful purple color, nice blueberry and jasmine aromas, and a very nice mouthfeel (not to mention a fairly high alcohol content!).

Notes:

• 1st OG: 1.067
• 1st FG: 0.990 (before 2nd addition of honey)
• 2nd OG: 1.004 (after 2nd addition of honey)
• 2nd FG: 0.996

#recipe #melomel

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#recipe

Source: John (The Coyote) Wyllie

Mead Lover's Digest #243, 9 December, 1993

Ingredients (for 2 gallons):

• 1 gal Oceanspray cranberry juice. (Good jug too!)
• 5 lb vernal honey (clover-alfalfa)
• Palmful raisins, chopped
• 1 tsp yeast nutrient
• ½ tsp acid blend
• Champagne yeast

Directions:

• Heat the honey with some water (1:1 is fine). Pasteurize or boil. I campden-treated the juice. Shouldn't really need it though. Add the rest of the goods, divide the juice between two gallon jugs. Divide honey mixture. Pitch yeast, bring up to a full gallon. (10/17/92)
• I fermented one in a closet upstairs (60s) and one in the basement at lower 50s. They both fermented forever. In January I transferred to a secondary. The SG was 1.010. Added 2 cups/gallon dissolved corn sugar to top it up. The upstairs one was bottled 1/31. It was, and still is, cloudy.
• The downstairs one was bottled 7/5. It was clearer, sweet and strong. It did finally clear. and was significantly better than the first.

Notes:

Some of this broth lasted a full year. The last bottle disappeared with my folks at X-mas, celebrating their survival of the Pasadena fires. It is very sweet, and tasty. Nicely balanced. It has become lightly carbonated—even though it's corked. Nice touch though. Light red/orange color, clear, fruity nose. It has a full body, almost syrupy, and is quite strong!

#recipe #melomel

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#recipe

Source: John (The Coyote) Wyllie

Mead Lover's Digest #214, 24 September, 1993

Ingredients:

• 7 lb Clover Honey
• 6 (medium) grapefruit
• 1 tbsp fresh grated ginger
• Dash of acid blend
• ½ oz cascade hops (used as finishing hops)
• 1 tbsp pectic enzyme
• 1 tbsp sparkalloid
• Champagne yeast

Directions:

• Mix honey into a couple gallons heated water.
• Bring to a boil.
• Skim scum.
• Grate peel from grapefruits and juice them.
• Add peel, hops and acid blend to boil.
• Add juice when heat goes off.
• Cool by adding cold water.
• Pitch yeast.
• Ferment for a month.
• Rack to secondary.
• Add pectic enzyme and sparkalloid.
• Ferment until done
• Rack again, and bottle with ¾ cup corn sugar.

Notes:

It was a grapefruit melomel mead brewed in Feb, `92. I didn't take gravity readings, but it was a pretty light mead. It was bottled maybe two or three months later. After a month or two in the bottle it had carbonated, but smelled like vomit. Had a sour citrusy aftertaste. Not pleasant.

I put it away for a long time, and a year later it was clear, sparkling, and smelled nicely citrus. The pukey smell had cleared. It did taste like grapefruit, but more gently so. It may have been a bit too acid. A nice champagne-like presentation. You could even make raisin submarines in it. (If you've never tried this, drop a wrinkly raisin in a glass of clear sparkly mead, and be amazed!!! Fun for the whole family! Up and down!) The take-home lesson here was: age is a good thing. Be patient! Some meads are very harsh young, but can age beautifully, and become quite enjoyable.

Dave's Notes:

See also my notes from the Citrus Mead in which I discuss how citrus zest can kill yeast and stop a fermentation.

#recipe #melomel #metheglin

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#recipe

Source: Guy McConnell

Ingredients:

• 6 lb clover honey
• 1 lb orange blossom honey
• 1.5 lb corn sugar
• 2 oz fresh, minced ginger root
• 3 tsp ground cinnamon
• 3 tsp yeast extract
• 1 gal fresh blueberries
• 2 lemons, halved
• Wyeast #1214 Belgian Ale Yeast
• 0.5 cup orange blossom honey (bottling)

Directions:

• Put honey, corn sugar, and yeast extract in brewpot with water.
• Simmer for 10 minutes, skimming foam with kitchen strainer.
• Add ginger root and simmer for 10 more minutes without skimming.
• Remove from heat, squeeze in lemons, and throw into brewpot.
• Cover and let stand for 15 minutes.
• Strain out lemon halves and ginger.
• Add blueberries, chill, pour mixture (blueberries and all) into primary fermenter, and pitch yeast.
• After 7 days, rack off of fruit into secondary and age for one to two months.
• When fermentation is complete, prepare a `tea' by simmering cinnamon and honey in water for 15 minutes in a covered pot.
• Cool, add to bottling bucket, and quietly siphon in must.
• Bottle and age for a couple of months or so.

Notes:

This makes a nice, light, sparkling beverage that is a brilliantly clear rose-purple color. The flavor is of blueberries kissed with cinnamon. A wonderful change of pace for a summer drink at about 5% alcohol by weight.

#recipe #metheglin #melomel

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#recipe