Mead Lover's Digest #1132 28 September 2004
Forum for Discussion of Mead Making and Consuming
Dick Dunn, Digest Janitor
Contents:
Re: Frozen/canned fruit (Phil)
Re: Acid levels (Randy Goldberg MD)
Re: Branching out - good canned/frozen ingredients (Randy Goldberg MD)
Tart Cherries (Phillip Groom)
Re: Branching out - good canned/frozen ingredients. ("Ken Taborek")
RE: Yet Another Yeast Experiment ("Janis Gross")
Re: Fermentation bucket blues (Dick Dunn)
fool proof cold meads ("John P. Looney")
NOTE: Digest appears when there is enough material to send one.
Send ONLY articles for the digest to mead@talisman.com.
Use mead-request@talisman.com for [un]subscribe/admin requests.
Digest archives and FAQ are available at www.talisman.com/mead.
Subject: Re: Frozen/canned fruit
From: Phil <dogglebe@yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 03:28:14 -0700 (PDT)
> From: "Richard T. Perry" <perryrt@hotmail.com>
> So, folks, what works well out of a can/freezer
> case? F'rinstince - We get
> those freezer case bags of bluberries...are they
> worth my time to try? What
> about the canned fruit extract(s) I've seen on the
> market? Pie fillings?
> Canned/frozen/bottled fruit juices? What about
> quantities - same as fresh?
> More? Less?
I've used frozen and canned fruit in the past with
good results. Just make sure that there are no
preservatives in it. Use the same amount as fresh
fruit.
Phil
Subject: Re: Acid levels
From: Randy Goldberg MD <randy@randygoldberg.net>
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:12:51 -0400
> Hello, I am working on my first batch of apple mead. I used 15# of
> honey, 2 gallons of juice and 6 gal of water to fill a 7.5 gal bucket.
> Fermentation started within a day or so and stopped fermenting after a
> little under 1 month. I racked into a 6 gal carby after it had been
> stopped for a few days. The original sg was about 1.089 (going from
> memory) and ended at about 1.0. I checked the acid level with a test kit
> and measured it to be 0.5%
>
> Is this what I should expect from such a mixture? Is the acid level too
> high? Too low?
I never measure acid levels, so I couldn't comment on that. Whether your FG=
is right depends on your yeast strain. I will say that, given the small
relative amount of apple juice, you may have little or no apple flavor in
this melomel.
****************
Randy Goldberg MD
Random Tag: Delusions are often functional. A mother's opinions about her
children's beauty, intelligence, goodness, et cetera, ad nauseam, keep her
from trying to drown them at birth. - [Lazarus Long]
Subject: Re: Branching out - good canned/frozen ingredients
From: Randy Goldberg MD <randy@randygoldberg.net>
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 07:18:24 -0400
> So, folks, what works well out of a can/freezer case? F'rinstince - We
> get those freezer case bags of bluberries...are they worth my time to
> try? What about the canned fruit extract(s) I've seen on the market? Pie
> fillings? Canned/frozen/bottled fruit juices? What about quantities -
> same as fresh? More? Less?
Frozen fruits, berries especially, are perfectly fine to use. In fact, it's
recommended to freeze, then completely thaw, any fresh fruit you want to use
in brewing, as it breaks down cell walls and allows more juice out. I avoid
most "extracts" on principle, although I do use vanilla extract when called
for. Pie fillings are loaded with complex starches to make them set, which
are likely to haze your mead, and will also be far too sweet unless you cut
back the amount of honey you use.
> What I've been planning is to get a whole bunch of 1-gallon containers
> and try adding a few things to a split-up basic batch (I started a dry
> still 5-gal batch about six weeks ago now). The problem is that with the
> lead time that mead requires, if I find something that works well, it
> will be 6 months to a year before I can recreate another (larger!)
> batch...so before I start, I figured I would ask. Also, I know that
> fruits interact differently when they're added at different times (yeast
> and available sugars) so what I'm doing, while interesting, might not be
> the whole story.
I generally prefer to add fruits to the secondary anyway; I think less of
the volatiles are lost, and the fruit flavor is more noticeable. Adding
fruit to the primary, I find, results in a melomel that's far too subtle for
my taste.
****************
Randy Goldberg MD
Random Tag: .sigs 1-3 destroyed early in construction. .sig 4 vanished from
filesystem 24 hours after going operational. .sig 5 is our last best hope
for bandwidth
Subject: Tart Cherries
From: Phillip Groom <phjgroom@yahoo.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 06:17:17 -0700 (PDT)
I recently vacationed at Door County, WI and recalled
that Ken Schramm mentioned the dearth of tart cherries
in the United States in his book. I noticed that
while there were a lot of cherries, the only
alternative to Montmorency tart cherries were Balaton
(which coincidentally made a better pie). Does anybody
know where there would be a wider selection of tart
cherries in the Midwest? I live in the Chicago area,
but I'm assuming there must be a location in Wisconsin
or Michigan.
Also, has anybody made a melomel from
thimbleberries(Rubus parviflorum)? They're a little
more tart than red and black raspberries, so I'm
wondering how much you might use.
Phil
Subject: Re: Branching out - good canned/frozen ingredients.
From: "Ken Taborek" <Ken.Taborek@verizon.net>
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 11:06:27 -0400
> From: "Richard T. Perry"
> Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 09:22:06 +1200
[snipped]
> I work (as a civilian) for the US Army on Kwajalein Atoll, in the Marshall
> Islands. As such, getting fresh anything is difficult and pricy out here.
> So, folks, what works well out of a can/freezer case? F'rinstince - We get
> those freezer case bags of bluberries...are they worth my time to try?
> What
> about the canned fruit extract(s) I've seen on the market? Pie fillings?
> Canned/frozen/bottled fruit juices? What about quantities - same as fresh?
> More? Less?
>
> Can anyone suggest a good recipe or book with these constraints?
Richard,
Jack Keller has a web site (http://winemaking.jackkeller.net/) with many
recipes using canned, frozen, and dried fruit, nuts, spices, grains,
vegetables, and other ingredients other than fresh fruit.
It primarily focuses on winemaking, but there are mead recipes on the site,
and country winemaking and meadmaking techniques are almost identical.
Cheers,
Ken
Subject: RE: Yet Another Yeast Experiment
From: "Janis Gross" <totallygross@hotmail.com>
Date: Fri, 24 Sep 2004 17:44:02 -0600
Daryl,
Please post your yeast experiment results! I'm very interested. I did an
experiment a few years ago using 6 gallons of cyser must, and the results
were great for learning about the character imparted by the yeast. I'm
sorry to say I'm not in your neighborhood, otherwise I'd come to the
tasting!
Cheers!
Janis [8-)
Subject: Re: Fermentation bucket blues
From: rcd@talisman.com (Dick Dunn)
Date: Sat, 25 Sep 2004 01:05:20 -0600 (MDT)
Ross McKay <rosko@zeta.org.au> wrote:
> Miriam wrote:
...
> >How does a stainless-steel water kettle sound? They are tall pots
> >holding about 20 liters, with spigot and close-fitting lid with a small
> >hole in it. I should think stainless steel would resist invasions of
> >bacteria better than plastic.
>
> Well... wineries use stainless steel for fermenters and short-term bulk
> aging, so maybe you'd be OK. But there are many grades of stainless
> steel, and the wineries are careful to use grades that can withstand the
> acid of wines. (Actually, I think they use one grade for the sides, in
> contact with the wine, and another for the covers, which get fumes off
> the wines)
Yes, where possible. What you're likely to find is either 304 throughout
or 304 for the vessel and 316 for the lid. 316 is more resistant to acidic
corrosion.
I would think 304 should be fine for mead.
SS has a couple of advantages over plastic: It can be cleaned more
aggressively, and it is not permeable to oxygen so it is fine for long-
term storage.
- ---
Dick Dunn rcd@talisman.com Hygiene, Colorado USA
Subject: fool proof cold meads
From: "John P. Looney" <valen@tuatha.org>
Date: Sun, 26 Sep 2004 17:28:54 +0100
I've a wee problem; I've huge amounts of really good wildflower honey
(75kg of Donegal Irish mountain honey, about a third of it heather, with
some whitethorn). And, I want to make loads of mead, without screwing it
up.
I've two huge oak casks, ex a brandy distillery. Is it possible to brew
it in those casks, without a high ambient temprature ? As in, once full, I
can't lift them. Even empty, it's a big job to lift. So, if I could make a
mead without a high temprature - AKA in my garden shed, it would be
perfect.
At this time of year (Irish autumn), do I have any chance of getting a
slow fermentation going ? An alternate idea is to run a mains cable from
the house, out to the garden, with some sort of heating element, into the
cask. I'm not a big fan of that idea, as the cork-holes in the casks are
only about 3" wide.
If someone reckons I can ferment a mead with an ambient temprature of
about 10-12 centigrade, I'd love to here a receipe you used.
John
End of Mead Lover's Digest #1132
*******************************