# 18% ABV Sweet mead



## JWPalmer

So this is my first attempt at making mead, and just to keep it interesting, I bumped my head and decided to make an 18% abv sweet mead. 
Here is what I have done so far and the ingredients I used.

Bought all my equipment today, washed and sanitized it.

Mixed approx. 20# (7 quarts) of honey with hot tap water from my deep well to obtain an OG of 1.138. Shook and stirred vigorously to oxygenate.

Mixed 1 package of Lalvin EC-1118 in warm water according to directions. I have read that even though 5g is enough for 6 gallons, two packages are recommended for this process.

Mixed 1 tsp DAP with 1/2 tsp. Wyeast wine nutrient blend and mixed 1/4 th of the mixture with the yeast. Progressive supplementation.

Dumped the frothy mess into the fermenter and mixed it into the must.

Stuck an airlock and bung on top of the carboy.

Lessons learned so far. 
1. Do not pour boiling water into anything made of PET. It was recommended that well water be boiled before using. I dutifully followed instructions and poured the still very hot but no longer boiling water into my brand new primary. Rut-roh. Got cold water into it fast enough to not cause any significant deformation. So much for the boiled well water.

2. It is easier to mix the honey and water together in a large pot than it is to mix it in the carboy. Now I know why plastic buckets work well as primary fermenters.

3. Do not put the airlock on when the carboy is still warmer than room temperature.

More to come...


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## JWPalmer

12 hours in and starting off nicely with about seven bubbles per minute.


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## Jackam

*Re: A question about feeding*

I've made wine.
I've made whiskey.
I've made beer.
When I had some extra "play" honey, I made mead..... it was the most disgusting thing ever and I pitched it and have zero inclination to try again.
What a disaster that was!


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## JWPalmer

*Re: A question about feeding*



Jackam said:


> When I had some extra "play" honey, I made mead..... it was the most disgusting thing ever.


How so? Did you try to drink it right after racking? Mead needs three months in the secondary and at least a month or two after bottling, or so they say. Around six months from start to drinkable. After this batch goes to the secondary, I will be making some wine that I can enjoy while this batch is still aging.

24 hrs in and it smells like honey, only yeastier.


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## mgolden

Suggest you also try Melomels(Honey and Fruit). 

Just about to bottle some blueberry. 2 pints of crushed blueberries in 4 gallons. Good taste and beautiful reddish purple color. Fermented about a month, one week in primary and 3 weeks in carboy

Next batch will likely be Orange Cinnamon. Spiral an orange(sanitize outside peel) and add cinnamon sticks. Made some last fall for Christmas. Not overly colorful but nice taste.


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## JWPalmer

Been considering soaking some cinnamon sticks in Everclear to make a flavoring for some metheglin. Would add before bottling. I will probably use raspberry for my first melomel. Kinda partial to the fruit. Blueberry sounds good too. I have huckleberries, very similar to blueberries but way smaller, that grow wild in my woods. Should be able to harvest a quart or so next spring for a batch.

Lesson learned today. 

Stirring in the nutients and releasing the entrained CO2 is like Pompeii in 79 AD all over again.


Went ahead and put 5 sticks of cinnamon in a 1/4 cup of 190 proof Everclear to start soaking.


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## Jackam

*Re: A question about feeding*

I don't remember exactly when I tried it, but it only makes sense that I sampled it immediately to test it out. I know that it never made it into a bottle!

I'm following your endeavor hoping that I can try again.


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## aran

I made about a dozen or so different flavored meads and melomels about 18 months ago ( will have to check my mead book). My fav is the apple cyser.
Thing ive learned is that Mead REALLY needs to age. It can be downright undrinkable initially then be bloody lovely a year later.


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## bushpilot

Looking forward to hearing how it turns out. I did not boil my well water for my recent (first) batch, but I think I will in the future. 

Greg


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## JWPalmer

*Re: A question about feeding*



Jackam said:


> I'm following your endeavor hoping that I can try again.


Oh great, no pressure there! What if I screw up?

I will be trying it straight out of the secondary just to get a feel for the sweetness and to know what the starting flavor profile is.

My hope is that jewel1130 will use her excess honey for something better than just feeding it back to the bees.


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## BDT123

*Re: A question about feeding*

Mead I pitched last year is approaching “bragging” quality. 
When I extract each year, the uncapped frames, or partially capped frames are done last. This is my mead honey. 
Interesting that I did 2 batches last year and one stayed slightly cloudy, the other is chrystal clear. Same honey, yeast and water. :scratch:
A remarkably rewarding endeavour, mead making! Go hard JW!
Show Mead, just honey, water and yeast.
Best regards, 
Brian


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## JWPalmer

*Re: A question about feeding*

48 hrs in.

Stirred down the must and released a good amount of CO2 in a controlled manner. Added the third set of DAP and nutrients and was able to keep the eruption contained by placing my sanitized palm over the opening and allowing the gases to escape slowly. Yesterday's fiasco resulted in honey water all over the countertop and floor. The yeast must be doing it's job as the must is already starting to smell like wine.

17 bpm. It is really cooking.


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## JConnolly

*Re: A question about feeding*



Jackam said:


> …it was the most disgusting thing ever and I pitched it and have zero inclination to try again.
> What a disaster that was!


That is a disaster. You should have bottled it and opened a bottle 8 to 10 months later. Make your Christmas mead in February.


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## JWPalmer

*Re: A question about feeding*

Not much new to report. I fed the yeast their last bit of DAP and nutrients after stir down. Bpm count last night got upto 24 before bedtime. Right now it is at 10 and increasing. SG has dropped to 1.118. Still a good ways to go to get to 1.010 or so.

Drinking some Stags Breath Liqueur and hoping that the mead I am making tastes similar when properly aged.

https://stagsbreath.co.uk/

Good stuff if you can get your hands on some.


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## JWPalmer

Day 5. The mead is continuing to ferment. In the clear container that is my primary fermenter, I can see thousands of tiny bubbles making their way quickly to the surface. The airlock has been pretty steady at 24-25 BPM. One curious thing of note is that the once dark brown must has taken on a decidedly burnt orange color. It is getting lighter. I was expecting that the dark honey would also end up producing a dark mead. Now I am not so sure that will be the case. Have not seen this mentioned in my reading so for me, this is a good suprise.


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## oldsap

The fermentation sounds really hot! But remember time helps all meads, well most at least. We use honey from cutouts and cappings to make our mead which is often darker than our own but it ends up light in the bottle. Good luck with your mead adventure!


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## bushpilot

Hey JW, it's been a while, how about an update? I assume it is in secondary now?

My batch (another thread) is aging now, waiting for Thanksgiving. I am hopeful it turned out well. I didn't do anything "right" so I can't say for sure, but I am estimating 12% ABV, and it seems to have turned out semi-sweet to sweet. We'll know for sure in a few weeks.


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## JWPalmer

Fermentation has slowed way down. Approximately 3 BPM. I plan on transfering to the secondary sometime this week. As of last week, SG was 1.050, down from my OG of 1.138. Hoping to hit somewhere around 1.010 upon completion. Will post a pboto once I get it into the secondary fermenter. Smells like booze.


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## beemandan

Everyone’s palates are different. I’ve never tasted a mead I liked. I tried blue ribbon award winning meads. I’ve made meads of all sorts. Sparkling meads, sweet meads, dry meads, blueberry, strawberry, from renowned meadmaker’s recipes. I still have dozens of bottles that have aged for nearly ten years. Still taste like diesel fuel to me.
When you go to a liquor store….there’s a reason that they don’t have a section for meads. 
Just sayin’…..it ain’t for everybody.
Having said that, I made many gallons of vinegar from honey…intentionally…. and even sold it. It makes excellent vinegar. I quit making it a few years ago but still have customers asking for it today.


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## JWPalmer

I transfered to the secondary today. My BPM is right around 1. SG is now 1.038, which should mean that the ABV is at 13.12% so far. Reran the numbers and it looks like I'll have to go fairly dry to get 18%. Since I really want a sweet mead, an ending gravity of of 1.010 will give me 16+%. 
Being somewhat adventurous, I am straining the dregs through a coffee filter right now with the intent of taking a sip. The filtered mead is looking clearer than what is in the secondary right now, so there is still hope for a product that is not cloudy.

Getting the primary cleaned up so I can start some wine.

PS. Checked on the cinnamon sticks soaking in Everclear. Liquid is a beautiful reddish brown and has one heck of a cinnamon kick to it. Can't wait to add it to a few bottles of the mead.


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## JWPalmer

Dan, how do you make the honey vinegar?


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## JWPalmer

Another update. After a little psyching myself up, I tasted the mead from the coffee filter set up. Still has a definite yeasty taste and is very sweet, but no other off flavors that I could discern. No hint of Jet A.


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## Ravenseye

As mentioned, time is the magic ingredient. I opened 2 bottles of Acerglyn (Maple Mead) this week. One spiced. One not. They were started on New Years Day, 2017. Both were better than anything you could buy at the store. And both were twice as good as bottles from the same batch that I opened and tried a year ago.


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## beemandan

JWPalmer said:


> Dan, how do you make the honey vinegar?


The basics are pretty straightforward. Begin by making mead. I would mix honey and water to a specific gravity that resulted in an alcohol content lower than that rated for the yeast I was using. I wanted complete fermentation.
Once fermentation is complete, I would mix in some vinegar mother. I would close the container using a fine weave cloth as the conversion from mead to vinegar is aerobic. Over time that process will run to completion.
The tricky part is making sure that the resulting vinegar has neither an acid content that is too high or too low. I made sure that my initial specific gravity would result in an acid content above 5%. I titrated the final vinegar and would add distilled water to dilute to achieve 5% acid content. 
An interesting extension bulletin from 1935 on making vinegar from honey. 

https://archive.lib.msu.edu/DMC/Ag. Ext. 2007-Chelsie/PDF/e149.pdf


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## JWPalmer

Thanks for the link Dan, good stuff. Uh, what exactly is a vinegar eel? Sounds disgusting.

Ok, I googled it. They *are* disgusting. Tiny little worms (nematodes) living in and destroying ones vinegar.


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## JWPalmer

Since transferring the mead to the secondary, I noticed that I no longer was generating CO2. As I mentioned in another thread recently, I tend to keep the house a little on the cool side in the winter. Apparently, too cool for fermentation to continue. So, last night I moved the carboy in front of a heater and was pleased to see CO2 bubbles forming again. Of course, I couldn't leave the carboy full of mead in the middle of the floor, so I took some quick measurements and discovered it would fit in my incubator. Just put it inside and set the thermostat to 80° F. We will see what happens.


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## Jackam

My attempt at Mead was such a disaster that I'm REALLY hesitant to try again. This thread is heartening though.


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## JWPalmer

The carboy has been in the incubator for a month now and is no longer bubbling. At last check the SG was still higher than it should be indicating that the fermentation may not be complete. Talked to the guy at the home brew shop and he recommended adding more DAP and another package of the EC1118 yeast. Going to give that a try. Meantime, bought some D47 for the sweet wine, and stuff to bottle and cork the mead when it is done. Suddenly realized how valuable all the empties I have been tossing out really are. Case of 12-750 ml bottles set me back $16.50 plus corks. Quickly dug through the trash and "rescued" several bottles.

This is my first experience with using a corker and it is cool to put the cork INTO the bottle since all my previous experience has been with taking them out So now I have an empty bottle with a cork in it. Hmmm.


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## JWPalmer

I finally got around to checking the SG of the mead. Sure enough, fermentation stopped at 1.032, or about 25 points shy of my goal. Mixed up another packet of the 1118 and dumped it in with a tsp. of DAP right behind it. Gently stirred so as not to add oxygen to the mead and put the airlock back in. Now we wait.

20 minutes later and...we are back making greenhouse gases. Albeit quite slowly for the time being.


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## JWPalmer

Well the bubbling stopped a few days later. I let the mead sit until today. It is a beautiful deep amber colored and quite clear. Did not bother with the hydrometer and just bottled it all up. All totaled I got 12-750ml bottles of regular sweet mead and 8-750ml bottles of cinnamon metheglyn. The mead tastes good and is very sweet and strong, almost like a brandy. I definitely want to try a raspberry melomel after the next honey harvest.


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## Fivej

Sounds like success! J


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## JWPalmer

Thanks J. Not bad at all for a first attempt. Want to go a bit drier next time around too.


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## Fivej

I only tried mead once and didn't care for it. But if you can get it dry and more like brandy, I would give it a go. J


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## bushpilot

I am going to start a dry 10-12% ABV today or tomorrow. A gallon of it will get raspberries in the secondary, and the remainder will be converted to vinager.

I use one gallon equipment, because I don't drink much (haven't finished the Mel I started in October yet), and to reduce risk as well. I also like the freedom of small batches. I will push the space in my primary bucket to get 1 1/2 - 1 3/4 gallons from it, which will be split into 2 1-gallon carboys for the secondary.


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## BadBeeKeeper

Two things-

(1) When going for a high gravity mead, you may need to use a method called 'blasting'- instead of adding more yeast at some later time, you hold back on some of the honey instead, and add it when the initial primary ferment starts to slow down. Too much honey in the beginning may make it difficult for the yeast to ferment to completion. You might want to start with only 10lbs (2lbs/gal, for a 5gal batch), and then add the second 10lbs after the initial ferment has peaked.

(2) If you make vinegar, in addition to something that you want to be drinkable, make sure that you keep the two operations completely separate.


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## JWPalmer

Thanks for the tip. I will try that the next time I go for a high ABV mead. My next batch will be more traditional at 14% as a raspberry melomel. Waiting on the girls to do their job.


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## Trin

*Re: A question about feeding*



Jackam said:


> I've made wine.
> I've made whiskey.
> I've made beer.
> When I had some extra "play" honey, I made mead..... it was the most disgusting thing ever and I pitched it and have zero inclination to try again.
> What a disaster that was!


I had a friend who tried to make mead. Got poured down the drain. Found out that if you use honey with natural yeast you are gambling that the yeast is a good one. What we read about this is that it is either really good or really bad. So maybe something to sterilize of kill natural yeasts, and then use a proven commercial variety.


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## Trin

Best wines I have made; Slow fermented cherry/grape. Sure wish I had written down the yeast variety. Took something like 6 months to complete. Took it to a party/cookout and carried it around pouring occasional glasses. Got a superior complement, overheard 2 friends, "I say we knock him in the head and steal the jug".

Second was elderberry/blackberry/gooseberry, called it 'old black goose' 1st year it caused some bad headaches in some people. After aging for 2 years that disappeared. 

The process of step fermenting also depends on the ability of the yeast to withstand the rising alcohol %. Maybe switch to a champagne yeast in the second stage? Lot of science here. Maybe added yeast nutrients as well? Probably better to experiment in gallon batches. So many variables.


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## Absinthe

Just to note depending on goals, one can add either malt or lactose which aren't fermentable. I used them to make a cider sweet enough for SWIMBO to drink  You can also ferment it to whatever ABV you are interested in attaining, then killing the yeast with a few possible techniques, then adding fermentable sweeteners to achieve the flavor you want. This will generally keep you from bottle conditioning it for carbonation. So you can either use compressed CO2 or an advanced secondary pitch technique but I have never tried it.


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## eltri555

Hi. I have the strongest and tastiest mead made from aromatic lime honey using natural hops and barley. It is not so tasty with yeast. Since I`m my own home, I get all the necessary ingredients myself 😀


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