Homebrew Mead Wine

[osok-308]

I made 2.5 gallons of cider earlier this month. It tastes a bit more like champagne than I wanted, but still drinkable. Planning on doing a wheat beer this weekend. Home brewing can be very rewarding. I say this as I sip my homemade pale ale.

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[GilpinGuy]

GilpinGuy -- where in the heck are you getting honey for $5 a gallon? I'll totally drive to wherever that is on a weekend and get like 50 gallons for future use.

I could have wrote that sentence better. I meant each gallon of mead cost me about $5 per gallon to make.

[CS1983]

I could have wrote that sentence better. I meant each gallon of mead cost me about $5 per gallon to make.

Ah. What's your per gallon cost on honey itself?

[GilpinGuy]

I used regular store bought stuff for my forst go at it, nothing fancy. It was <$10 for 5 lbs. I think my wife picked it up at Costco.

[Brian]

Awesome to see this thread pop up again.

With fall finally here, I've been drinking stuff again I made last year that was stashed away in a dark corner in the basement. Spiced mead is perfect for this time of year, IMHO. Also found a 3 gal carboy stashed away that's been bulk aging now for probably 18 months. Strawberry mead. Flavor was awesome, but I didn't use a lot of chems and it's no longer the super bright red color that was amazing at first. Can't decide how much I want to bottle still vs. adding a little carb. I think a slight fizz would go well with a strawberry mead.

I need to find a good long weekend and start bottling so I can free up some carboys.

[CS1983]

A little carbonation does sound like it would lend itself well to a strawberry melomel. I assume should be good til next summer too? Seems like a good summer variety.

Also, I found a place I can get honey @ ~26 gallon.

[GilpinGuy]

Ok, newb question here. I have several individual gallons going now. The first got made on October 7th. Activity has slowed down significantly, but they're still bubbling away.

So, when is a good time rack for the first time? I see this kinda ugly fruit sitting on top and I'm wondering (it smells wonderful though). Of all the hours of video I've watched about mead, I can't believe I didn't catch this part.

[CS1983]

Air lock activity doesn't necessarily indicate completion of fermentation; lack of air lock activity simply means excess gas is no longer being produced and the yeast may still be slowly eating remaining sugar. Yeast can also clean up some immediate post-fermentation things to smooth out any off flavors. Fermentation completion awareness is accomplished through gravity readings. Do you have a hydrometer and did you take initial readings?

What yeast? What ambient average ambient temp?

My airlock advice from more experienced brewers is 1 airlock bubble every 30 seconds = rack to secondary.

[GilpinGuy]

No hydrometer reading at the start - didn't have one and didn't realize taking a reading in the beginning was highly recommended until too late. I have one now.

I've been reading that a reading of 1.000 or less is a good guess if you didn't take a reading at the beginning. I'll do it then I guess.

Yeast is Red Star Cuvee and Red Star Blanc, equal parts. Plus Fermax.

[CS1983]

The cuvee will likely be doing the heavy lifting as it has a higher tolerance for alcohol and can go to like 18%. It's what I use. Have to be careful with it as going too high in ambient temp can lead to a lot of fusels -- requiring a longer aging process for smoothing out.

What's your ambient temp been?